Spanish supermarket must-tries?

[desperatedaysareover]

Heading to Spain self-catering this week - been once before but did no cooking. HMU with your recommendations for brands/food to try while we're there and also foodie souvenirs! Particularly into fish and pickles.

Thank you!

I know you asked about things you could cook yourself OP, but in Mercadona in Valencia recently I noticed how much pre-prepared and convenience stuff there is these days. Also gone are the days of the several metres long tinned fish aisle! It's now much reduced. If there's a Corte Ingles supermarket they tend to have more speciality type foods.

There's also been a real trend for shops selling pre-prepared meals to take home. People were queuing out of the door collecting orders at one near where I stayed.

Thanks to everyone for so many brilliant and detailed responses! I'd usually 'like' each one but the full website is not letting me do anything possibly because I'm in transit so am on the Chat App and can't see how to click like 😬

I now have a fantastic list as long as my arm, beats just guessing at what'll be decent. Lots of delicious food to hunt down, so many thanks to you all! I'll update if there's anything I feel needs added to the Spanish supermarket must-try list!

Gracias!

@PinkSkiesAtNight tomato jam only seems to be available in Valencia/ Tarragona. I've not seen it in Almería or the north.

I forgot to mention smoked almonds.......

They have tomato jam in our mercadona (Bcn). Don't know if it's any good though.

Where in Spain are you going?
In Palma, Majorca we went to the largest supermarket I've ever been to. I think it was a carrefour and some staff were wearing roller skates! They had a large section of souvenirs and an entire section dedicated to just pork. Whole legs of Jamon Iberico hanging up, packaged slices, slicing machines, knives and even frozen, whole sucking pigs!

I often buy saffron, paella spice mix, turron (like a nutty nougat) and wine, but some things are very regional.

I go regularly to Southern Spain. Within walking distance are Super Cor (El corte Ingles), and Mercadona. Also Aldi and Lidl, but they are at home, so I'm not too bothered with them when away.

I love both, but the SuperCor (formerly Supersol) is like Aldi for prices and I just love their make up and toiletries, especially the Revuelle brand, it's cheap as chips. In fact I bought a nail polish called SOS repair for brittle and broken nails, it was around €2 and folks, I painted those talons last Friday, and there ain't a chip to be seen yet. It is super stuff. I'll be stocking up when I get there later in the year.

I also like the big tubs of flavoured cappuccino, Caramel, Vanilla, etc. so moreish and gorgeous and cheap as chips. Lots of other stuff too, too many to mention.

But you can't beat Mercadona for fresh food and a huge range. A ten minute drive away is Carrefour. But honestly that place is just SOOO big I get the heebie jeebies and am overwhelmed by the sheer size of it, so don't use it much apart from big ticket items like replacing a busted suitcase etc.!

OP, enjoy your trip and your shopping, you've got lots of ideas above.

Ah, that's a shame! I was very excited for a moment!

I'm in Mallorca. Also....if OP, or anyone, is heading to Mallorca, do try the sobresada. It's kind a of a spreadable cured meat paste(?) with spices. Sound weird, but on some mallorquín bread, covered with honey and goat's cheese, it's wonderful. You can get spicy (picante) or not-spicy. You can also get it in Mercadona, in Mallorca!

I live in mallorca and Mercadona is by far the worst supermarket. I never go there as its food selection is basic and limited. The best is the big carrefour near Palma or el campo.

the one thing I miss about living here is British supermarkets. You don’t get the choice here, though the cleaning products are good. I especially miss M&S bread…

lays crisps, especially the truffle ones are great. And I go through a ton of aioli. Aldi and Lidl do the best fish I find. Wine is cheap, but soft drinks are very expensive. In fact, food here is expensive in general.

Mercadona is probably a bit like a Spanish Aldi. Not a massive range but just about everything you need and most things are decent quality.

So great if you want to shop like a local and eat Spanish food. Perhaps not so great if you want to spend time browsing a massive range of non food items and buy ingredients from all over the world.

We used it because we had friends who lived in Spain who went there most out of Mercadona, Eroski, Dia and Super Sol. I asked them why they'd picked that one and they said it was the one that all the Spaniards used. Eroski was too big, Dia was a bit basic, but fine for most things and Supersol was where you went if you wanted Heinz baked beans and UK branded butter and didn't mind paying triple the price for them.

It maybe varies from place to place but I'm an Eroski fan. My MIL is Spanish and the Mercadona near her house is small and not very good but there is a brilliant Eroski not far away. So I developed a loyalty to Eroski from there and it's always my go to supermarket now, wherever I am in Spain. I'm sure that's unreasonable though - there are probably plenty of good Mercadona stores!

I love wine.

@Havalona
I haven't seen SuperCor - we thought that Carrefour had taken over Supersol as at one time all the big supermarkets seemed to be Suoersol and now they seem to be Carrefour. Perhaps it's just that we've stayed in different towns. Mercadona seems a lot more upmarket to me than Aldi/Lidl. Also larger El Cortes Ingles seem good .

Admittedly though we tend to walk round going 'ooh that looks interesting' and then come out with our usual selection of cheeses with bread, olives, tomatoes and Russian salad. And wine of course.

If you like marzipan, the marzipan figures and huesos de santo are available now.

@ShinyAppleDreamingOfTheSea SuperCor is part of El Corte Ingles and has taken over the former Super Sol. The SuperCor near where we stay has kept the feel of the former SuperSol and is warehouse like, but OMG it has everything and is just so inexpensive I can hardly believe it. But then again I focus on the toiletries/make up stuff if I'm honest, since eating out is such a handy and inexpensive pleasure I don't buy many groceries at all apart from the basics which I get in the local shop that has a yummy bakery. Sorted!

Spreadable brie/camembert - think it's the President brand on a slice of fresh baguette 🙂

For anyone over here who's missing their Spanish food fixes, I've picked up sobrasada, blocks of manchego and other cheese, ensaimadas, tortas de aceite and glass jars of pulses at Lidl when they do Spanish week.

Turron definitely

Buy gazpacho!

Agreed! I've got a friend going over next week for a couple of weeks so she'll be bringing some back, if it's in stock yet. Generally appears around the end of October near us (Valencia)

And also salmorejo

Ola troops!

The update is:

Kids- El Patriarca Galleta Chocolateada Bolsa were an expensive habit and the cartón of ready-made RAM a la Taza Dipping Hot Chocolate was swiftly annihilated. Can literally stand a spoon in it. Bought some powdered stuff for the case so will see if we can get it super-thick.

I could eat the Mercadona ensaladilla russe every day and would recommend the migc-discussed tomato jam, on bread, with Boquerones en vinagre, fresh tomatoes and aioli- 15 y.o son was reminded of the fish on a pretzel scene in The Burbs lol. Said on eating it that it was much less bogging than it looked. Brought a jar home to sweeten my tomato pasta sauces as well. The oregano crisps were dangerously moreish and little one liked the crunchy, cheesy Risketos.

For me, salmorejo is such a must I immediately bought a new blender on my return 😂 also dragged a load of vacuum packed ibérico jamón all the way on Ryanair. Thanks again!

Roll on next July!

*much

That on the pic is fig jam, not tomato

Oh yeah and the tween bought an eye palette, eyeliner and nail polish in Mercadona for about 8€ the whole lot and the nail polish is still on! Sainsburys sucks man

Correct. 😂 The tomato jam was on the top shelf and I couldn't reach it without the steps.