Do you love foreign supermarkets?

[SentToTheSynByn]

I never shop at home, just get a delivery. However I love browsing supermarkets abroad. I love the huge jars of chickpeas and lentils in France and Spain. I also love that you can buy remoulade in France. And picnic wine

I bought some lovely bottles of rose in holland with stopper, like a grolsch bottle. And the cheese . Everything in holland looks so effortlessly fresh and healthy.

I bought the most gorgeous oregano in Zante last year which is about to run out so thinking about booking a holiday only half joking and olive oil.

Can't think of anything else, so do you love a foreign supermarket, and what have been your best buys?

Ps I sometimes go to Lidl and pretend to be on holiday 😎

I love the myriad of pickles and tofu in supermarkets in Japan also their savoury seaweed based snacks and fresh fish

Bizarrely, I look forward most to the non-food aisles. I hail from Australia, so even UK supermarkets hold exotic treasures for me!

My latest italy trip haul included 2kg of supermarket wins: those haberdashery braids of multi-coloured threads for mending, and super low-cut white cotton sports & ballet shoe socks. Also a cute-as-hell cantaloupe/melon storage thingo for the fridge, modelled exactly like the fruit. Also quite a few sets of candles with letters for cakes- I love having them in Italian on my tortas!

You can’t bring much edible stuff back to oz (tough customs regs) but I do manage a few granulated herbal teas (Ricola brand from Switzerland) and salty Aromat seasonings (great for sprinkling on chips & steamed veg). I’m drinking a cup of the herbal tea right now!

The children loved the MM Migros in Turkey this year. Mainly for the many different flavoured chewing gums, watermelon and peach. And lots of different watermelon flavoured sweets.

Also was dd’s saviour as she really liked the fruit and said it tasted like fruit and she didn’t like the food on offer at our hotel so we brought fruit and bread each day for her.

Oh and some little cakes individually wrapped and usually by the sweets called pop kek. They went mad for the lemon iced ones.

@fourfriedchickensdrywhitetoast, I haven't specifically but the kind I've found over here is much denser than the pumpernickel sold back home. I'll definitely check it out though!

The world aisle in most U.K. supermarkets is always worth a wander down got a stash of Korean snacks and sweets for K-pop mad ds2 there recently

@flightywoman

**7 types of pasta you can’t buy in the UK”

I’m positive you could!

@Mugglemom

Pimpernickel bread is everywhere. Ocado, sainsburys, Waitrose...

I'm also with Twunk and Deal. I now love a trip to UK supermarkets when we are back. I also prefer UK's Aldi. The French ones are pants.

Another very annoying thing about French supermarkets which you don't get in the UK: you get aisle-cleaning and shelf-packing right at the busiest time of day when the aisles are rammed full of shoppers which drives me bonkers.

I also find staff much friendlier in UK stores. Eg 'Could you tell me where the mustard is?' 'Yes of course, I'll take you and show you the exact shelf'. Same question in France generally gets you a grunt, and a Gallic shrug meaning 'over there somewhere'.

I Love foreign supermarkets too, just so I can see what isn't available at home. Equally though, after a couple of weeks abroad I am very sadly delighted to go back to Morrisons and the choice we have here.

Favourite holiday supermarket abroad though is Walmarts just amazed that you can buy the most weird, calorific and full of additive foods alongside guns and any bottle or pack is at least the size of my body for even the most basic things.

Truffle cream in Italy came home with me this year. No idea what do do with it, and it looks too lovely to open.

I wander about wide eyed in all UK and European supermarkets, (particularly the wine aisle) when I visit. In the Middle East the supermarkets are so incredibly crap and super expensive.

I'm interested to know what the 7 types of pasta are...

SuperSol and Mercadona in Spain for the ready jointed rabbit. Mmmmm. Also the fish/squid/seafood and white onions and incredible peppers and avocados.
Greek corner shops for amazing fruit - oranges with leaves still on and strawberries as big as your hand. Happy times.

Of all the things to buy in France...why remoulade when it's so easy to make your own?

I'm all about the French biscuits myself :p

oh I loved the small Spanish supermarkets with a meat counter, you buy a whole chicken and say 'en quatro' and the butcher chops it up savagely..

I LOVE Italian supermarkets...so many gorgeous pasta varieties...and oh yes, more biscuits! My husband will always pick up a pig foot in an Italian supermarket too!

what even is 'remoulade'?

Remoulade is basically just grated celeriac!

@EmGee I used to HATE that when I lived in France. They don't seem to believe in shift working so there's no stock taking, shelf stacking etc on a late night or early morning shift. No: all done when people are actually trying to shop ...

As for the Dutch supermarkets I find some of the comments here a bit strange. I've lived in Holland for a year now and of course if you go to the Marqt (a chain of organic supermarkets) then the produce is of very high quality. Go to Albert Heijn or Jumbo however and you'll find as much processed crap there as anywhere else in the world.

oh I don't know, Albert Heijn is pretty good tbh., not that I have ever done a full shop there, just snacks.

Just putting this out there - ‘Mollie Stones In Sauselito’
Please tell me someone else has had the delight of visiting here!

We went to a German Aldi, and it had a bread machine!! You pushed a button next to the picture of what you wanted (baguette, croissant, mini pizza etc) and it came down the chute fresh and warm. We went EVERY DAY to witness the marvelousness!

These World Of Tanks rye snacks were a welcome discovery after a trawl through a small Russian supermarket.

"Remoulade is basically just grated celeriac!"

That's a type isn't it?

I would say it's similar to tartare sauce but not as "sharp"?

I do love a foreign supermarket except German ones which are horrible, at least when I lived in Berlin they were. However we lived within walking distance of KaDeWe and the foodhall there was amazing, like a German Fortnum and Mason.

When DH was working in Singapore we were living a very small serviced apartment so couldn't cook much, not that you need to in Singapore as the food is amazing. Around the corner from where we lived was a small supermarket that was chock full of expat stuff. I remember eating microwaved frozen sausage wrapped in blueberry pancake for breakfast quite a few mornings.

Depends on the country. French supermarkets are amazing, I love them. Brazilian ones, not so much.