Stuart Melling

Hi, I’m Stuart, nice to meet you! I’m the founder, writer and wrangler at Gastronomic SLC - Utah's biggest and oldest online food magazine; I’m also a former restaurant critic of more than five years, working for the Salt Lake Tribune. I’ve worked extensively with multiple local publications from Visit Salt Lake to Salt Lake Magazine, not least helped to consult on national TV shows. I’m a multiple-award winning journalist and have covered the Utah dining scene for the better part of fifteen years. I’m largely fueled by a critical obsession with rice, alliteration and the use of big words I don’t understand. I started Shop Smart to catalogue my adventures in the grocery store and kitchen. Follow along on Instagram too!

Review: Great Value Chicken Dipping Sauce

February 8, 2020February 27, 2019 by Stuart Melling

To glance at this product on the store shelf, you’d be forgiven for overlooking the rather understated bottle. Actually that’s being overly kind, badged as it is with the fairy …

Review: MorningStar Farms Falafel Burger

September 21, 2019February 25, 2019 by Stuart Melling

A lot has been going on with the MorningStar Farms product line the past year or so. From the controversy surrounding the reformulation of their Grillers product through to the …

Review: Trader Joe’s Channa Masala

September 21, 2019February 17, 2019 by Stuart Melling

Any trip to Trader Joe’s isn’t complete for me until I’ve stood around the Indian frozen food section and loaded enough meals into my cart to cause onlookers to give …

Review: Trader Joe’s Shrimp Stir Fry

September 21, 2019February 17, 2019 by Stuart Melling

If you’ve read more than a handful of reviews covering Trader Joe’s product line, you’ll no doubt have heard repeatedly about how reliable the brand name is. It’s true, it’s …

Recipe: Indian Cabbage with Peas

October 11, 2019February 17, 2019 by Stuart Melling

This dish is a riff on a fairly traditional Indian vegetable dish that I’ve been tweaking and testing for years. I don’t know the traditional name, and at this point …

Review: State Fair Beef Corn Dogs

March 27, 2022February 17, 2019 by Stuart Melling

Who doesn’t love food on a stick? Thats right – no one. The moment you prod anything with a little stick and twirl it around, well, that food just became …

Review: Kokumaro Curry

April 24, 2021February 14, 2019 by Stuart Melling

There’s something ever so wonderfully comforting about Japanese curries. More closely related to the five spice sweetness of a Chinese curry, than the earthiness of an Indian curry; Japanese curries …

Review: Gardein The Ultimate Beefless Ground

May 9, 2022February 14, 2019 by Stuart Melling

My experience with Gardein spans the gamut. There are more than a few items I don’t care for, and some I’m obsessed with; essentially those based on soy protein, I …

Recipe: Indian saag

October 5, 2019January 20, 2019 by Stuart Melling

This particular recipe is the result of on and off experimentation for the better part of two year. I’m pretty proud of the results and as such, we use it …

Review: MorningStar Farms Tex Mex Burger

February 25, 2019January 16, 2019 by Stuart Melling

$MorningStar Farms Tex Mex Burger$

Over the past 12-18 months it’s been fascinating to watch MorningStar Farms iterate and evolve their popular product lines. In the face of the rapidly growing vegan product space, I’ve …