HEB Central Market opens 10th store today with rare goods, free delivery, new Dean Fearing sauces

Beloved Texas grocer H-E-B unveiled its 10th gourmet supermarket today, a Dallas supermarket at Midway Road and Northwest Highway whose footprint is slightly smaller than its flagship Lovers Lane Dallas store but not as small as its two other suburban stores.

On a VIP sneak peek yesterday, a Central Market spokesman pointed out a few of the new store’s unique items not available in other locations: a display bin featuring a dozen types of mushrooms and whole black truffles (at $299 a pound); the grocer’s most extensive selection of chocolate bars sourced worldwide, including rare “pink” cacao chocolate and Central Market’s own bean-to-bar chocolates made in their Houston store; and complete grab-and-go roasted chicken dinners in the prepared foods section. Also new to the Dallas market: curbside pickup and delivery — including wines — within a seven mile radius of the store. (For the next few weeks, the service charge for your first four deliveries and pick-ups are waived.)

Dallas chef Dean Fearing is also using the store opening to launch his new line of grilling, mopping and finishing sauces — and a new bottled version of his heat-and-serve tortilla soup –which will be available exclusively at this Central Market store through the fall. Each is on sale now for $3.99

The wine wall at the new Midway store, located at the intersection of Midway Road and Northwest Highway, includes prized, highly allocated selections plus bottles imported by well-regarded negotiant Kermit Lynch. In the grocery aisles, you’ll find the city’s largest selection of imported shoyu, olive oils, dried pastas, ice cream pints (including Graeter’s, Jeni’s Splendid and McConnell’s), micro-roasted coffees and produce. It’s also the only place you’ll find the new Rave apple, a sweet, crispy hybrid apple that was developed to be a step up from best seller Honeycrisp.

The Midway store offers boil-then-baked bagels, an extensive option of custom-made sandwiches and is the first to have a dedicated area for custom gift baskets that can be filled with any item from the shelves and shipped directly from the store. 

And that guy in the picture above? That’s Stephen Butt surveying the last minute opening details. He oversees all the Central Market stores for HEB, the grocery company he and his family own.