I feel as if I have been down this isle multiple times today, yet it has never felt more dark and unfamiliar. If only I can find sign, something to point me down a more familiar path. Then, suddenly, I spot two familiar faces on the shelf. While not my best friends, Ben and Jerry (Ice Cream), Tom and Jerry from my cartoon days was definitely a welcoming site. In a land where I speak three words of the local language (pivo – beer; vino – wine; ďakujem – thank you), pictures speak 1,000. And while I never thought I would be one to be swayed by advertisements and celebrities, it did not matter if Tom and Jerry were trying to selling me cat food for a pet I did not own, I was buying a product endorsed by them. Turns out they were selling me cereal, so all was fine.
My grocery store is located about a 5 minute walk from my apartment in a three story, two building complex, all part of Tesco. In addition to food, they sell cooking utensils, bed and bath products, clothes, and electronics. Most important is you must pay for each item on the floor which you found the product, even though everything is one company, or else you are thrown out of the store regardless if you unknowingly take escalator without paying first. Thankfully, I was warned of this policy up-front by my UK co-worker who had the experience of being tossed out.
Grocery stores in Europe are much smaller when compared to America. It seems people prefer to shop more often (a couple times a week), buying the freshest produce, and use a basket vs. a cart (which still is small compared to American standards). Majority of the time, my basket is over-flowing and pulling my arm out of its socket less than half way through the store. Even the portion sizes are smaller, for example, the spaghetti sauce comes in a small jar which is probably used for one meal between two or three people. I realize now that family size lasagna that I took down in one sitting back in the US was probably more suitable for European standards. The one exception to the smaller size is vegetable oil, which oddly comes in a five liter drum for some reason. Bread is baked fresh daily, however, this trip I decided to go with the less fresh,
 |
| Bread Slicer |
pre-sliced option as I was intimidated by the large machine with multiple knives that I had to use to slice the fresh bread. Next trip after I am able to stalk others using the machine, I will give it a try, but I am not up for visiting the hospital again which I will talk about in a future blog (no problems, it was standard procedure for my residence permit). The deli section is just a tough, as there so many different varieties I think the store is inventing meat. As I have never heard of combined ham/turkey cold cut, I resorted back to the pre-packaged meats with pictures. Same with the cheeses since most of the products look similar; I only know that the Swiss variety has holes. But I am keeping the packages which have the names in Slovak for both meats and cheese, so I can make second attempt at the deli another day. Having to grade fresh cheese was easy, and honestly, it tasted ten times better than the graded packaged cheese I use to buy at home.
 |
| Random items from the Sea |
Sea food is also readily available and good, which I was initially nervous because Slovakia is in the middle of Europe not by any sea. As I thought about this more, Chicago, which is two times as far from the ocean (I do not eat the Asian Carp out of Lake Michigan), has good sea food, so there is really nothing to be worried about. However, this first trip, I did pass on the one sea food platter pictured to the left as it appeared to be a collection of colorful crustaceans that were raked from the bottom of the sea. Fruits and vegetables are all the same, but I have to get use to using a carrot peeler since they do not have the packaged baby carrots like home. There is one vegetable which I had no idea what it might be used for. As I approached the table, I could not tell if it was a tree root or an oversized potato. With a camera in hand, I took a photo and jotted down the name to research the item. Apparently it is known as zeler, which is the root of a celery stalk, and is used for soup in Slovakia. Given that it was the size of a softball, I am curious how big the pot is for this soup.
 |
| Zeler |
Finally, the checkout line, where I am able to get past by nodding my head, and handling over my credit card. After your goods are scanned, you have very little real estate for the items to collect at the end of the counter, meaning you must quickly bag your groceries or risk causing a back-up. After all this, I was actually challenged on my physical signature vs the one on the back of the credit card for the first time ever, but managed to get everything straightened out.
No comments:
Post a Comment