You have mixed up the frictional force due to sliding between two surfaces with the "gripping force" produced by the grooves at the bottom of your shoes.
No surface is perfectly smooth. There are tiny humps and bumps on any surface. When you walk on a surface with shoes that have deep grooves, these grooves, in fact, lock onto the tiny humps and bumps, thus preventing you from slipping. Such "locking effect" is more prominent if you walk on rugged muddy road.
Frictional force is independent of the contact surface area. Generally, the frictional force is given by the equation
F = uN , u = coefficient of static friction,
N = reaction force given by the ground
u is determined by the nature of the surface (i.e. what the surface is made of)
Actually, the reason why the frictional force is independent of area can be explained as follows:
When two surface joins, friction arises due to the tiny bumps of the surface (no surface is completely smooth!). Let the area be A0. And actually, frictional force is not evenly distributed through out the surface (as the bumps are not evenly distributed). So let the frctional force be distributed in k0 points.
Now with the same object but a larger contact surface area A (A > A0), there are k1 (k1 > k0) number of points. However, with more points, the force on each point is smaller. So the fricitonal force on the whole stays the same.