Tuesday 28 May 2013

Groceries

I've never been one for the Monday blues. Especially if I'm on holiday and have the whole week to myself. But yesterday was different. Yes, I still have the whole week to myself, but for some reason my body had decided to throw a spanner in the works. Presenting me with.... (drumroll) a headache. Which I certainly don't want to have while on holiday!!

Not that it stopped me from getting what I needed: groceries. As stated in yesterday's post, the food I can get in my home country the Netherlands is different than the food I can get in my new home country Norway.  Especially when it comes to bread and more specifically the things you put on your bread. Norway is a haven for jams and they have chocolate paste and peanut butter and stuff like that. But nothing beats 'hagelslag' in all sorts, shapes and sizes. 

Of course you now wonder what 'hagelslag' is exactly. Well, it's like the hundreds and thousands you can get in the UK to use for cake decoration. But where it costs an arm and a leg over there, over here in the Netherlands it's really cheap. There are several versions now: the ordinary chocolate sprinkles (the hagelslag) in white, milk or pure chocolate, chocolate flakes (vlokken), fruity sprinkles (and I discovered a new one: strawberry raspberry sprinkles) or aniseed sprinkles/powder/mice. The last one is used whenever a child is born. The white/pink one for a girl and the white/blue one for a boy. Basically it's the whole aniseed coated in sugar. Very often the tail is still visible, hence mice. 

Something else that's difficult to find is Dutch syrup waffles. Monique over in Canada has it easy: she makes her own, but I am not that lucky and I depend on the supermarket shelves in the Netherlands. Which I cleared of this particular brand of 'stroopwafels'. Which are my all time favourite. I did get some other biscuit/cookies as well though (see photo).

Besides all this I got liquid syrup in a squeeze bottle, aniseed blocks (lovely in hot milk on a cold night) and some other things that are typically Dutch or very hard to find elsewhere. I won't be taking everything with me now (apart from the stroopwafels), but my parents are due to come in a month's time and they will take that and what I will be writing on my grocery list regarding potted vegetables. 

Now I just hope I won't be stopped by Norwegian customs!!!

5 comments:

  1. Aniseed - I love aniseed:-)

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  2. Until the end, I was wondering how you were going to get it all to Norway.

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  3. Here in the States there is an expression, "You can never go home again." This expression indicates it is never the same once a person leaves home. Your blog shows that food, the foods of our youth, can take us back home no matter where we inhabit. Love your blog!

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  4. Well you certainly did do a lot of shopping! I hope you don't get stopped because I know how much you love those things.

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  5. I am back from my tour around the UK, it was absolutely great and now I have the blues.
    I am not keen on Hagelslag and peanut butter my DIL loves it too and Toby is allergic to peanut butter ! The only thing I really love in Amsterdam are the Pannekuken (but the salty once with a lot of topping !)

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Any weighty (and not so weighty) comments are welcome!