A stroll through an Irish supermarket

[dianeduane]

For those of you who may be interested:

The Irish recipe pages at our European Cuisines website are constantly getting search-engine hits from people asking "What do Irish people eat?". With that in mind, we've put a new page up that talks about the subject -- in very broad strokes -- and links to a Flickr photoset of images from our local supermarket, Gillespies' SuperValu of Baltinglass, County Wicklow. (You can also view the images as a slideshow, if you like.) Anyway, if you've been wondering what a small-town supermarket in Ireland might offer, here's your chance to find out.

There are also links on the "What do Irish people eat?" page to our Irish recipe collections, if you're interested.

 

 

 

Comments

[tysolna]

Thanks for the photos; but how did the other shoppers and the people working there to you taking pictures of the shop?

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Mostly I avoided taking any pictures of shoppers (though the people at the checkouts said to go ahead) and as regarded pictures in general, the store management didn't mind in the slightest. The manager was pleased, in fact. The only concern I heard voiced was from the butcher, who said, "You should come in tomorrow morning and get some more pictures: the meat case isn't as pretty right now as it will be then." (And indeed they were restocking some of the shelves after the weekend, so things were a little bare in places.)

By and large, European businesses are nothing like as insane as US ones seem to have gone about photography.

[tysolna]

It seems the shops in Ireland are much less anonymous as those here in Germany. If I tried this, I'd probably get a lot of cold shoulders and frozen looks.

[dduane.livejournal.com]

That I could understand. There seems to be much more of a feeling of needing to go through all the correct bureaucratic moves first...

[tysolna]

Alas, yes... Halfway through the shop, I'd probably be stopped and asked why I was taking pictures. We're a suspicious lot.
Going to have to try it now.

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

Making a splash over here recently are Irish cheeses--mainly white Cheddars (and a perfectly magnificent Irish "Swiss" that's going to have a permanent home in my fridge)--but not many native ones outside of a few flavored cheddars, even in specialty shops. I've already given up all hope of finding any native Polish cheeses outside of a vacation in Kraków. Locally, there's a fairly large Irish festival (http://www.dublinirishfestival.org/) but I can't say I've noticed the food because as soon as I hear the music, I forget about eating. Uilleann pipes get me every single time...

[dduane.livejournal.com]

(heh heh, re the pipes) The Irish cheeses are slowly making their way over -- the problem being that some of them are raw-milk cheeses and therefore (I think?) now illegal in the US. Interestingly, though, when you're exiting Ireland via Dublin Airport, I've started to see at least one retailer -- Wright's of Howth -- carrying foods that have been pre-approved for import into the US by the USDA. Some cheeses have been among these.

And yeah, we do a good "Emmenthal" here. :) And many other clones. Interestingly, though, pretty much the one cheese that the Irish have tried to clone and failed is Monterey Jack -- their first efforts came out very much like cheddar, and tanked. So I still have to either bring it home from NY with me, or make it from scratch.

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

Some raw-milk cheeses are available, but you have to look for them--and I don't know if they're imported or domestic. Fortunately, not only do I have a Wild Oats (http://www.wildoats.com) and a Whole Foods (http://www.wholefoods.com/) and a Trader Joe's (http://www.traderjoes.com/) all in the neighborhood, but also a top-notch specialty and gourmet market (http://www.northmarket.com/) and if I feel like driving for two hours, there's the ultimate foodie's paradise, Jungle Jim's (http://www.junglejims.com).

I used to be able to get an unpasteurized Stilton that wasn't so much a cheese as it was a religious experience, but the supply has either dried up or it can't be imported anymore. Recently had a raw-milk gorgonzola dolce that made a bleu cheese dressing of such flavor that I'd swear I heard the salad singing hallelujah.

[spiritdancer]

I suspect the problem is actually importing the raw-milk cheeses, unless everyone involved in the making of that cheese has going thru some rather vigorous documentation and licensing. Mostly based on various diseases (off the top of my head, hoof & mouth disease, and tuberculosis), hence one of the rules being how long the cheese must have aged before import.

[trdsf.livejournal.com]

It's a risk I'm willing to take. :) The difference between raw and pasteurized is definitely there. There are few forms of bliss easier reached than a bit of Stilton with fresh, crips pear.

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

I wonder what Marks&Spencer would think of people taking pictures in there. It'd be impossible (at least in the one in Cork) to do so without several dozen people in each shot even if they were amenable to it. Nor would I actually be inclined to, because although M&S has very good fruit, the whole prepackagedness of their entire food section makes me feel slightly nervous. I have no idea why. It's Just Wrong!

That's a great article. Thanks for linking to it!

[crissachappell.livejournal.com]

Have you ever seen those giant Andreas Gursky supermarket shots? I love those pictures!

[krisw.livejournal.com]

I always suspected that Irish people ate...food! some of the recipes look like they make quite tasty food. =)

[dsgood.livejournal.com]

Do the Irish eat the Finnish-American delicacy pasties?

In the Upper Midwest (and in Colorado, and probably parts of Canada), Cornishmen were the experts on mining and immigrants from elsewhere learned from them. And along the way, they picked up pasties -- which are apparently quite handy for eating under the ground.

So: In the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, there's Toivo and Eino's Pasty Sauce. Toivo and Eino are the standard names in jokes about Finnish-Americans; equivalent to Pat and Mike or Ole and Sven.

In Minneapolis supermarkets, the Mexican food sections include: 1) Food imported from Mexico; 2) Food from Texas with labels partly in Spanish, including such exotica as spaghetti; 3) Taco Bell sauces.

I see I will eat well if I ever make it to Ireland!

[cjmr.livejournal.com]

My sister has a supermarket this neat by her in the Metro Detroit area. It seems ridiculous that in D.C., a much more cosmopolitan city theoretically, we're stuck with non-gourmet food chains.

My husband tells me that under no circumstances do I want to know what is in Black Pudding. I can't imagine that it's worse than what's in scrapple or Blutwurst, though. So what's in Black Pudding?