Shopping for food in a country town
July 27th 2007 03:35
Sunday -quiet, Monday - trucks, utes and muddy cars
Don’t you hate those food preparation programs on TV that insist that you must visit the local fish market to pick up some exotic species of marine animal that is essential for their recipe? Or even things like sea salt or a variety of Chinese vegetable only to be found in a city market? Now I don’t know what the local supermarket is like near you, but the only fish I can get is frozen hake, schnapper and a couple of other types – and they nearly all come from somewhere like Japan, Vietnam or Korea. Fresh unusual vegetables will take a week to get if you really want them – by which time the urge to experiment will have left long ago. You can try tinned lychees if you like or frozen raspberries – but they will be rather squishy when they defrost.
However, what is missing in variety of products is usually made up in friendly service. I mean you won’t get someone filling the shelves and admiring young Jenny’s new baby at the same time in a big city supermarket! I also doubt you will ever see a strange pnenonemum that occurs in our main street every now and then, when either pink or blue balloons suddenly appear on a post outside one of the shops just to let everyone know that someone who works in that shop have just had a new addition to the family.
And does the manager of one of your local supermarkets give his time freely to be the Treasurer of one of the local Community groups? Or does the manager of the other food store in your area allow the School Chaplain to hold money raising sausage sizzles in the front of his shop every fortnight during winter and gives them the sausages to cook?
Also there is the issue of parking. Those of you in the city have to spend ages finding a spot in the large supermarket car parks and have to keep in your mind the row and the exact spot you parked - sometimes walking for ages to return to your car. Almost without exception I can drive into our car parks or park on the main street and be back to the car in less than a minute. And if I am rather preoccupied and can't remember if I parked out the front or out the back - soemone will usually be able to tell me which door I came in - (They are very tolerant in my supermarket.)
We may not be able to make anchovy or fresh crab dishes and even eggplant and artichokes are not always available – but I’ll survive!
PS Sorry for my long silence- regular readers (special Hi to Peter!) I've been sending off my novel - wish me luck!- Bumpkin.
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