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Perhaps this is a sign from the universe that I should make some Have not made noodles in over a decade. My kitchen is so small, and I detest having to roll out things because I don’t have enough room for them. More Discussions.
In rural southern Michigan, my neighborhood Meijers grocery store hasn’t had them in weeks. When I recently visited Aldis, they carried a variety of noodles, but not the wide egg varieties. Even though I can live without them, it seems strange because they have plenty of other pasta. Walmart is the only other grocery store nearby, and I don’t shop there much because I find it to be too crowded and chaotic, and the smells, noise, and lighting there are stressful. If I can avoid all that I do.
Poor pasta selection at Walmart.
I visit the grocery store a few times a week, and for the past few months, each time I go, the pasta section is consistently noticeably empty. This week, the Laurel Walmart’s pasta aisle was completely empty, but there was still a respectable amount of Barilla brand goods available. On subsequent visits, the shortage of stock was reversed; there was an abundance of store-brand options but none of Barilla.
There were also quite a few gaps in the pasta selection at IGA, which was down the street. I didn’t have time to visit Albertsons for this post, but we’ve had no trouble locating those enormous spaghetti packets at Costco.
Why the pasta shortage?
Some of the noodle shortages may still be fallout from COVID supply chain problems, but it appears that a bigger reason for nearly-empty pasta shelves, is a shortage of durum wheat, according to an article by Market Realist. Canada is the biggest exporter of durum wheat used for pasta making, and an abnormally hot, dry, smoke-filled growing season last summer made for a poor harvest. Less wheat harvested = less spaghetti on the shelf.
