grocery shopping in Belgium

There's so much to tell about our adventures so far, but lets keep it to the curious and the different instead of the mundane and the typical (ie: you know air travel can be tiring and patience wearing, so why tell you the same again?)

Now that we're in Glons (SE edge of the country, 14 km from Maasricht) we've rented a lovely apartment in a converted and renovated barn (the portals that were used to dry the hay have been made into windows, the space has an exotic Parisian spiral staircase to the second storey loft and fully equipped with all amenities of home). We've of course made ourself at home, and since the kitchen is an open-concept with an island workstation much like we have in Toronto, we've wasted no time cooking up lovely dishes and meals with the local produce. Grocery shopping was the first order of business after getting a rental car and learning the layout of the neigbourhood and nearby villages. We went to a great super marchee called "Delaize", a Belgian chain much like our Canadian Loblaws. Some things were the same, such as having to use a coin to access the grocery cart, and others were very different, such as the two rows right off the bat of wine and spirits right in the grocery...this blew us away, since next to these was an entire row of chocolate products--Cote D'Or is a common brand (actually distributed by Kraft here) but there were probably 20 other brands. Unlike Loblaws or Sobey's where they have the produce first, the booze and choloate is where you blow your Euro first--go figure! Now, don't get me wrong--the produce is excellent, and much more inexpensive than I worried it would be. An entire bunch of carrots right out of the ground (still with tops, probably 25 of them) was a mere 1.20 Euro. The cucumber was 0.20 Euro...but if you went for junk food or imported goods, that is when they nailed you right in the wallet...one of hubby's weaknesses is chips, or crisps. The 130 g bag of Kettle Chips slammed us close to 4.00 Euro (that is $6.00 CAD)...perhaps this will be one habit that won't come home with us. We brought home foods for meals we would make at home, a few staple the home didn't already have on hand (coffee, onions, garlic, pasta) and the bill came to a whopping 114.00 Euro! The wine was the least costly frill at 2-5 Euro a bottle--I'm going to like this country!

The first meal we shared with the brother of the landlord, and a good friend of hubby's teacher from when he lived in Liege. He's a local travel agent and has been our JR. It was simple Margueze sausage in tomato sauce with pasta, a lovely (and cheap) italian red and some Chimay semi-soft wash rind cheese and fresh made baguette. Divine. Our second dinner consisted of a roast chicken advertised as corn-fed with roast carrots, braised zucchini, rice and gravy. Our dessert was simple: fruit, cheese and chocolate. To ensure we used the bird to its best, we made a browned chicken stock (right out of the Chez Piggy-Kingston ON cookbook) and will have a rich chicken, leek, potato and carrot stew for dinner.

This village is lovely and very rural...we just got interrupted by the cows being walked through the village to be milked. The picture at the top of this post is a typical view twice a day out our second floor window. No wonder why milk is relatively cheep (0.59 Eu/litre) and cheese is exotic and plentiful.

So that's it for now. If you'd like to see more of our adventures, see Matthew's most recent post at www.matthewzadow.com and follow the links to his blog.

All the best until next post--Bon soir!