Grocery Markets Around the World

The Ninja admiring all the dried meats and fancy cheeses at
 the Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne, Australia

 One of my favorite things to do while traveling abroad is visiting grocery stores and food markets. Not only are markets a great venue for people watching and experiencing culture, they also provide me with a valuable lesson in food diversity, value and, most importantly, they remind me to be ever-so-thankful for our American food supply.

It's always fun to peruse a foreign grocery store to see what kinds of different products are available that we don't have in the U.S. For example, I was in Poland for a short time in December and saw many unique things in the store. Live carp were available in the fish section and the produce section featured a wide variety of pickles and sauerkraut.
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Fresh Markets

On my other blog, I posted about the Queen Victoria Market and how cool it is to buy all of our produce fresh. It's also a chance to get some good bargains - Hyatt and I have become first rate hagglers with the fruit vendors.

Look at all this great stuff we got a few days ago!

 - 1 HUGE butternut squash
 - 1 very large parsnip
 - 2 red peppers
 - 1/2 kilo of mushrooms
 - a whole bag of roasting potatoes
 - 1 medium pineapple
 - 1 kilo of pears
 - a punnett of GIGANTIC strawberries -- Look at the size of these things!

That is a normal sized sticky note. And that strawberry has since been demolished.

All of that great fresh produce cost us less that $14! It was a steal.

Are there fresh markets near your home? What's your favorite vendor with which to haggle?

Until next time,

~ Buzzard ~