Many of you know that my son John started a hot sauce company, Fartley Farms, a couple of years ago. During the time we have been back in Ohio, Tom has been helping out a little. Sometimes he accompanies John on sauce deliveries (free delivery within the I-270 circle of Columbus) or to pick up a new batch of sauce. In February we headed to Jungle Jim’s International Market with John and Jackie so Jungle Jim’s could begin selling the hot sauce.
Last week, John asked Tom and I if we could go to Jungle Jim’s to deliver some more sauce. It seems the sauce is selling so well that they needed more of #8, Scorpion Garlic Hot Sauce. John and Jackie were planning to do it, but needed to have a plumber come out and fix some things so they had to stay home. Tom and I were happy to help them out and add a new job to our resumes: Fartley Farms Hot Sauce Delivery Service.
The sauce had to be delivered before noon, so we left about 9 a.m. on Saturday and headed down I-71 to Cincinnati. I was excited to go because, now that we are fully vaccinated, I was looking forward to spending some time shopping inside Jungle Jim’s. Last time we went to the Eastgate location, but this time we headed for the original location in Fairfield.
The first thing that tells you this is not a normal store is the signs off I-71 and I-71 that point to Jungle Jim’s. There was a separate street just for deliveries, which we ignored until we had driven all the way around the HUGE building. We finally found the Deliveries entrance and it only took a few minutes to deliver the Fartley Farms Hot Sauce boxes, safe and sound. Then we drove back around to the front of the store to go in and look around.
The inside of Jungle Jim’s was colorful, noisy and full of people. I haven’t seen that many people in one place in over a year. Everyone was masked, but there was no social distancing going on – too many people. It was overwhelming! I’m not sure if it was because we’ve avoided crowds for so long or because everything was new. Everything in Jungle Jim’s is in its own section. I would have liked to spend more time in the international sections – many countries had their own room! – but I was bumping into people every time I turned around.
We found the hot sauce section in the back corner, diagonally opposite to where we went in. There were groups of people picking out the hottest sauces they could find. No wonder Fartley Farms #8 was sold out! We did find the other Fartley Farms sauces on the shelf and took a few pictures.
We didn’t buy much at Jungle Jim’s. Tom wouldn’t let me get a shopping cart and we couldn’t find any baskets. I got some chicken salad, a slice of chocolate cake roll and some chips. The chocolate cake roll was delicious – a piece of HoHos on steroids and 10 times fresher. I wasn’t a fan of the chicken salad.
Tom and I had fun being the Fartley Farms Hot Sauce Delivery Service for the day. I would still like to spend time wandering around Jungle Jim’s, but I won’t go back on a Saturday.