Shopping for food - Costco living this is not

I am a not-so-secret Costco lover. I really don’t enjoy admitting this, but it is true. Perhaps it is genetic, my mother has been a long-standing Costco fan and got me hooked years ago by bringing me spinach raviolis and blocks of aged cheddar. I must have lived a past life in a famine, because I love to stock my freezer with enough food for months on end. It is a freedom to be able to open my cupboard and know I can make a meal for 10 at the drop of a hat. The 2 gallons of milk that I would buy at a time, made my heart sing.

So withdrawals were inevitable here in Germany.

All food that we eat is carried home in my handy shopping bag and backpack at the end of each day, every day. So, the kids and I have to plan what we are able to carry from the store to home. This is tricky if we need more than 2 heavy items, since I really am the pack horse and the kids tend to complain if they have more than toilet paper to carry. Remember, beer is heavy!

Generally Germans are not one stop shoppers. There is an open market to buy vegetables, a bakery for bread, the cheese shop with hundreds of delicious cheeses, the butcher shop (which I have yet to venture into), special shops for toiletries, etc. There are a few grocery stores that carry most items, but these are pretty limited.

Luckily, just around the corner from us is a great open air vegetable market, where we pick out which fruits and vegetables we want, and the stall owner weighs it and hands it over – we are not allowed to handle the produce ourselves – so it pays to be nice in order to get the best goods. There is also “bio” (organic) market 2 times a weeks a bit further on, which is also nice, but not as convenient. So, in a way, it is like having the Davis Farmers market available every day, in several places in town.

After picking out our veggies and fruit, we often stop by the bread store. I love the heavy brown breads (which are perfect for dipping in soup), but the kids usually go for a soft baguette, it’s all good though. Then we are loaded to go home. I try not to make more than 2 or 3 stops at the end of our day, because the kids get squirrely and I go nuts.

Because the milk does not come in gallon size, or even half gallon size, but by the liter, we have to pick some up every few days. So, on a non-produce day, we make a grocery trip and stock up on butter, pasta, cereal, milk, whatever we need, and of course beer.

All this shopping is pretty time consuming, but it has been a great way to practice my pigeon German and get to know our way around town. I have heard there is a Costco-like store outside of town, but by the time we get a car, I may have adapted to this rather quaint way of life.