Black Angus

My life is very busy as of late, noticeable by the times I don't go to the supermarket. Last Saturday, rather than traipse around town buying from my regular small-scale suppliers, I decided that life felt too short at this moment in time, to actively support the local shopowners, who I adore because they know me and my sharp observation skills, and I know them and their pass-one-over methods, and I get some great conversations out of them. So I headed down to the local supermarket to do the weekly shop and to pick up some meat for Sunday lunch while I was there.

Supermarket meat is often sold more expensively (at least, here in Hania) than small-shop meat, so I was aware that I would be spending more money in this setting. I wanted some mince for my freezer bifteki: Greek beef - €10.98/kg, Belgian beef - €9.59/kg. The Greek beef looked pinky-red, like it usually does, because it rarely allowed to 'sit' for longer than 2-3 days before it's sold, The Belgian meat looked just a little darker, but I preferred the shape of the cut. I chose the Belgian beef over the Greek, mixing in some Cretan pork (€6.78/kg) into the mince mixture - remember that in Crete, it is far more common to buy fresh mince that is prepared before you after you have chosen the pieces of meat that will be minced for you.

While I was at the supermarket yesterday, I also found US Black Angus at the same meat counter, selling at €9.69/kg. Like the Belgian beef, it was cheaper than Greek beef. Black Angus is one of the most highly rated beef products in the world, and we can get it for LESS than Greek beef! I've never tried Black Angus before, so I thought it was time we did. I asked the butcher to cut me three large slices.

I'm not sure what the problem is with Greek beef. Over time, it has developed a better texture. It's not as stringy as the foregin stuff. But you still can't cook it in a pan, like you can do with Black Angus. Although I'm not still convinced that beef should be eaten medium-rare with its pink colour, for the first time in my life, I am cooking beef in Greece in the oven, and I can already feel how tender it is, as the knife slides through so easily.

My first foray into Black Angus will be in a Greek-style recipe. After pan-searing the fillets, I placed them in the oven in a tomato-based sauce with the regular seasoning. It's cooking now. My husband keeps asking me: "Are you sure this will be edible?" Greek beef still has that nasty reputation of being tough. It needs a facelift if it's going to survive in this money-poor world, when cheap foreign imports are invading its domain.

UPDATE:
Black Angus stays tender throughout the cooking period and it is very juicy. But it lacks the aroma of Greek-raised meat. I guess it's true that you are what you eat - if grazing animals eat aromatic plants, their meat smells like it too.

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You could be anywhere

Chocolate flakes, grated coconut and vanilla pods from Madagascar,
Ground hazelnuts, sliced blanched almonds and vanilla-flavoured sugar,
Apple-cinammon mini-pizzas, coloured Christmas cookies and vials of 'baking flavourings'
(at €1.99, a 20-pack of vials is cheaper than buying real lemons, oranges and rum)
Cranberries, plum halves, pitted cherries and sugar strands, all complete with paper cake doilies,
And don't forget the lebkuchem, speculoos, marzipan, pandoro and Advent calendar.
Be in quick because they go so fast - how can Christmas in Crete be complete without them?

LIDL delivers its leaflets to households every weekend. LIDL has done much more than any other institute/organisation in terms of the promotion of German cuisine. Angela, you need to tell the troika to carry more cookies in their briefcases whenever they have meetings in Greece.

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BOGOFs (2 + 2 δώρο)

Buy 2 packets of pasta, get 2 packets free, the special read above a supermarket shelf. Not the standard buy-1-get-1-free special, but pretty good nevertheless. No point refusing; pasta is one of those ingredients that rarely goes off past its expiry date, and it is very versatile. So I bought some spaghetti and some orzo rice (not all pasta shapes were on sale), which are both favorites in our house.

8x500g pasta = €0.55x4 = €2.20 for 4kg of 100% Greek pasta.

After picking out the few bits and pieces that I needed, I went to one of the cashiers to pay for them. I was surprised to see the owner of the mini-market in my neighburhood waiting in the queue. There is another branch of the same supermarket closer to his shop, but I suppose he feesl a bit embarrassed going there because it's a much smaller branch, and he would be buying out most fo the supermarket's stock of basic goods: I noticed he had filled up at least 4 supermarket trolleys worth of products, most of which were of the 'bogof' type - there were quite a few packets of pasta in one of the trolleys. The pasta was not packaged together with the classic warning about the product being sold as one item and each packet may not be sold separately.

The mini-market owner was buying supermarket stock on special, probably selling each item at the regular price, and making a 50% profit without any hidden expenses apart from fuel. The specials are distributed by brochure on a regular basis, so he knows when they are on. I only shop from mini-markets when I desperately need a product and the supermarket is not open, or when I want to pick up the local paper (if I were a smoker, I suppose I would use them more often). Otherwise, I always feel as though I am being ripped off in such places.

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Sunday trading (Κυριακάτικη αργία)

"Sunday trading" is the phrase used int he west to denote shops opening up on Sundays. In Greece, we haven't quite got a phrase that can be translated in the same way - it is more likely to hear about the Κυριακάτικη αργία - the "Sunday holiday". So you can understand form this that Sunday trading is regarded as an abomination, according to Greek shop owners and workers. But Sunday trading is regarded as quite 'normal' by most Western countries for at least two decades now. I remember when it was first introduced in New Zealand, and I thought it was a little weird... but now that it's commonplace, I think it's a perfect way to brighten up the drab atmosphere of the ghost town appearance of our commercial centres after the shops close down on Saturday at 2-3pm.

SUNDAY SHOPPING The streets of many cities around the country were busier than usual on Sunday, as shops opened for the first time on Sundays outside the holiday period. The first phase of Sunday opening also kicked off a ten-day sales period. Shop owner unions, who were unhappy with the move, said the more people seemed to be window shopping rather than actual shopping. Nevertheless, Development Minister Kostis Hatzidakis said "our cities are changing image today. The consumers have embraced both the idea of the new sales 10-day periods and the opening of stores on Sunday. Therefore, we did very well in not listening to those fearing what is new. We are following what is taking place in most European countries. Why should it not take place in Greece as well?" Describing the move as "unacceptable and reactionary", main opposition Syriza said that "only big department stores and the multinational chains will benefit from the redistribution of the reduced turnover" cause by its salary and pension cuts. http://www.enetenglish.gr/?i=news.en.home&id=1583

Yesterday was, supposedly, the first Sunday that shops were allowed to open in Greece - but this is a half-truth. In tourist areas, shops are open all day long every day. Then there are the Easter and Christmas Sunday shopping days, to allow people to get more shopping done at more convenient times for them. But when Sunday trading happens simply as a way to allow people to shop when they feel like it, and not for any special reason, people get hoity-toity about it in Greece, with flimsy excuses like "It's the Lord's day" (ask doctors, nurses, policemen, firemen, etc about the Easters and Christmases they've spent on duty), and "Everyone deserves a day of rest" (ask those same shift workers about the day they prefer to have off, so they can get any real personal work done, like take your kids for a medical check-up, do some banking, etc).

Never (trade) on  a Sunday, complete with Melina Mercouri waving to sailors on the wharf.

The business community of Hania declared that they would not open their stores on Sunday, so I am assuming that the shops were closed in the centre, but I heard that supermarkets (which don't fit into the small-medium enterprise framework) would open this Sunday around the country. I had no shopping to do, so I don't know what happened in the areas of Hania where those supermarkets opened. I am sure that quite a bit of harassment took place from the anti groups, as these photos clearly depict, taken in Athens, which always bears the brunt of all forces.

ΚΥΡΙΑΚΗ 3 ΝΟΕΜΒΡΗ: ΔΕΝ ΕΙΝΑΙ ΑΡΓΙΑ; ΝΑ ΓΙΝΕΙ ΑΠΕΡΓΙΑ!!!

Την Κυριακή 3 Νοεμβρίου 2013 ξεκινάει η εφαρμογή του νόμου με τον οποίο η κυβέρνηση ΝΔ - ΠΑΣΟΚ σε συνεργασία με την εργοδοσία επιδιώκουν να καταργήσουν την κυριακάτικη αργία. Ο συγκεκριμένος νόμος προβλέπει την καθιέρωση τεσσάρων εκπτωτικών περιόδων το χρόνο, με την πρώτη Κυριακή κάθε περιόδου να θεωρείται εργάσιμη. Είναι δεδομένο ότι αυτό το μέτρο θα γίνει προσπάθεια να γενικευθεί σε όσο το δυνατόν περισσότερες Κυριακές, άλλωστε ο συγκεκριμένος νόμος ήδη δίνει τη δυνατότητα να ανοίγουν όλες τις Κυριακές του έτους τα εμπορικά καταστήματα μέχρι 250 τ.μ. Η απελευθέρωση του ωραρίου αποτελεί χρόνιο αίτημα του ΣΕΒ. Το νέο αυτό μέτρο οδηγεί στην εξόντωση των εργαζομένων στο εμπόριο καθώς ο ελεύθερός τους χρόνος συρρικνώνεται δραματικά, η εργασία τους εντατικοποιείται ακόμα περισσότερο.

Φυσικά το νέο μέτρο δεν αφορά μόνο τους εργαζόμενους στο εμπόριο. Το επόμενο βήμα για την κυβέρνηση στην συρρίκνωση των αργιών είναι οι κλάδοι που συνδέονται με το εμπόριο, πχ λογιστές, τραπεζοϋπάλληλοι, συμβολαιογράφοι για να μπορέσει να «δουλέψει η οικονομία» και φυσικά στόχος του μεγάλου κεφαλαίου αποτελεί η 7ήμερη εργασία για όλους τους εργαζόμενους

Οι εκπρόσωποι της κυβέρνησης θεωρούν ότι το «πρωτογενές πλεόνασμα» και το «success story» περνάει μέσα από την 7ήμερη εργασία, ο ελληνικός λαός όμως ξέρει ότι τα άδεια καταστήματα πολλαπλασιάζονται επειδή το εισόδημα του έχει μειωθεί από 40 έως 60% από το 2010, από την γιγάντωση της ανεργίας, κι από την διαρκή φοροληστεία που έχουν εξαπολύσεις οι κυβερνήσεις ΝΔ και ΠΑΣΟΚ και δεν μπορεί πλέον να ψωνίζει ούτε τις καθημερινές !

Ως ΑΝΤΑΡΣΥΑ Χανίων

Καλούμε τους εργαζόμενους στο εμπόριο να βάλουν φρένο στην κατάργηση της κυριακάτικης αργίας, στην ελαστικοποίηση του ωραρίου τους, στην συρρίκνωση του ελεύθερου χρόνου τους απεργώντας την Κυριακή 3 Νοέμβρη

Καλούμε τους αυτοαπασχολούμενους στο χώρο του εμπορίου, σε συστράτευση και κοινό αγώνα με τους εμποροϋπαλλήλους. Τους καλούμε να κάνουν πράξη τις αποφάσεις που πήραν το προηγούμενο διάστημα ενάντια στο άνοιγμα των καταστημάτων τις Κυριακές, να αντιδράσουν και να καταδικάσουν στην πράξη την κατάργηση της κυριακάτικης αργίας

Καλούμε το Εργατικό Κέντρο Χανίων να πράξει το αυτονόητο, δηλαδή να κηρύξει απεργία την Κυριακή 3 Νοέμβρη.

Καλούμε τους εργαζόμενους που δεν δουλεύουν εκείνη την μέρα να συμμετέχουν σε απεργιακές φρουρές για να ανατραπεί αυτό το μέτρο. Για να μην χρειαστεί οι ίδιοι να απεργήσουν κάποια επόμενη Κυριακή που θα έχει γενικευτεί το μέτρο

Καλούμε τους Χανιώτες και τις Χανιώτισσες να μην πάνε να ψωνίσουν την Κυριακή 3 Νοέμβρη, να μην στηρίξουν με την στάση τους αυτή την απόφαση.

Υπερασπιζόμαστε την Κυριακή ως υποχρεωτική αργία για όλα τα καταστήματα. Κατάργηση της μερικής απασχόλησης, του ωρομίσθιου, των συμβάσεων ορισμένου χρόνου και όλων των ελαστικών μορφών εργασίας και μετατροπής τους σε 8ωρες συμβάσεις αορίστου χρόνου. Υπογραφή κλαδικής σύμβασης.

ΑΝΤ.ΑΡ.ΣΥ.Α. Χανίων

Ι found this leaflet in my supermarket trolley this morning - the same text is available here - from the "Front of the Greek Anticapitalist Left" (a name that presumably distinguishes them from the 'capitalist left').

In such a hugely democratic country that we were in the past, where simply anything went, and anyone could do what they liked with complete disregard to how others felt, because in those days there were no rules against such behaviour (and if there were any rules, there was little or no monitoring), it seems such a huge breach of rights to prevent someone from doing what they feel like doing. This was made more obvious to me by my son's reaction during a conversation with his dad on Saturday night:
- If they are letting the supermarkets open on Sunday, then small businesses will close down because supermarkets will take away their business (dad said).
- I don't get it dad, if the small businesses are open, then people may choose to go to them too, just like they do already.
- Well, if the supermarkets open, then other smaller businesses will be swayed to open, because they will feel they are losing out on business.
- That makes sense, doesn't it, dad?
- But Sunday should be a rest day for shop workers.
- Any shops that don't want to open can stay shut if they want.
- But they won't - they will be swayed into opening too.
- How can they be swayed to open, dad? They can stay closed if they want to.
- But... they will either be losing profits or losing their day of rest (says dad, a little tongue-tied by now).
- So why do you work on Sundays, dad?
- Well... I'm a taxi driver... I'm not a shop... (and a few more flimsy excuses).
- OK, dad, don't go to work tomorrow then.
So what do you think dad did the next day, which was a Sunday? Did he go to work in his taxi?
(see the comments section for the answer)

I never really saw it as an economic crisis - it's more an identity crisis, where we have to make changes to suit our choices, not just our pockets.

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Selling expired food (Ληγμένα)

I could be sleeping at this hour, but Persephone is still around - there's a really noisy party going on at our neighbour's house, including a live band (no crisis in that house, obviously). The musicians aren't very good (even though they think they are), which helps me to disconnect - even though I can;t sleep, I can still read and write.  

Due to a busy afternoon at work ploughing through translations, I bought a sandwich for lunch so I could stay at my desk. The lady at the kiosk asked me if I had taken the sandwich from the countertop. I told her I took it from the fridge, as that's where I thought sandwiches were kept, to ensure 'freshness'. 

"Oh, those were yesterday's," she told me, "the fresh ones are here on the counter." So I took a fresh one out of politeness, because I almost felt obliged to; if you were given a choice between fresh and not-so-fresh, you'd have done the same, I suppose. Except perhaps if there was a difference in price. I was too embarrassed to ask; I just paid the 1.60 euro for the sandwich (and 1.50 euro for the freddo coffee, because a Greek crusty baguette-style sandwich just has to have something liquidy to make it go down), and was just about to go back to the office when the local paper's first-page headline caught my attention: "NO" to expired products, it announced.

Last month, the government announced that it would allow the sale of heavily discounted 'recently expired' food goods in supermarkets under strict terms, but local supermarkets in Hania refuse to sell them, while a survey conducted in the town reported that people are totally against their sale for various reasons: "I won't risk it", "Why should I buy it?", "They are useless", "Those who invented this measure can eat them", "I have had all the necessary vaccinations", "They want to get rid of products they can't otherwise sell", "They want to get rid of what has been left over", "I always check expiry dates", "I'd rather pay more", "They should reduce the prices on all products."

The funny thing is that the day before, my mother-in-law had specifically asked me to buy some ληγμένο (lig-ME-no, meaning 'expired') rice and pasta so she could boil them together with some bones which she had put aside for our pets. We usually give them the leftovers from our own meals - both our dog and cats eat vegetarian food, preferring it to the petfood we buy for those just-in-case times when we run out of 'real' food (of course, they are also very partial to meat when they can get it). 

Even without reading yesterday's local paper, I knew that ligmena would not be available in our supermarkets. It's a very provocative measure for a start. Imagine a special area designated in the supermarket for 'off' food. Would you want to be seen there while next to you, people are looking at the not-off fodd? Not that it hasn't been done by supermarkets before: products that are about to expire are often marked down with a heavy discount. But they don't get placed in specially designatied areas! I've bought them myself - they are usually products I would not normally buy which I would have liked to try but the regular price was stopping me (eg specialty sausages made by regional food cooperatives). I've also bought flour that's about to expire - of course, I used it past its expiry date because I bought all the packets on the shelf and wouldn't have used it all up by the end of the expiry date, but there was never anything really wrong with it in the first place, and it never felt 'off' when I used it. In fact, if you are baking with expired flour, anything that might possibly have been regarded as a spoiling factor in food would have been killed off given the high heat it was cooked in. 

So the real reason for the local supermarkets' decision not to sell expired food is that this is real sign of poverty for the consumer on the one hand, and a desperate measure to make a small profit for the supermarket by using the poor on the other. If you're shopping at a supermarket in the outer suburbs of a Mediterranean summer tourist resort town, it's doubtful that you will be in a position to need to make such choices. There are very money-poor people around - I know some myself - but when it comes to food choices, they are still able to eat better food than expired food. Not that expired food products should be treated with disdain - they are simply not preferred. Beingso poor that you need to buy this kind of food is just too embarassing. 

Even though I knew that there would be no expired products to buy on the cheap, I still had to buy some rice and pasta for my mother-in-law; I also knew that she would question my chocie if the packet looked like 'regular' rice/pasta ("Why didn't you buy the ligmena, Maria? It's just for the animals") so I decided to cheat a little. I bought the cheapest rice and pasta in the store, stuff that is packaged as a private label, and is often an imported product. I bought her some rice and pasta that I would never buy to cook our meals with because I've tried them before, and I know for a fact that they did not cook in the same way that I expected them to cook. They had turned sludgy, ruining the texture of my meals. Hence, I had deemed them inappropriate. Food goods don't have to be expired to be bad, nor do they need to be cheap. But cheap food need not be low quality either.

Most people either do not realise or have conveniently forgotten that once upon a time, in Crete's and the world's (relatively) recent past, there were no expiry dates on food products. People used their intuition to work out if food was good or bad. With fresh fruit and vegetables, meat and fish, your eyes and nose told you immediately if it was still good to eat; those which do not look appetising are still made use of in different ways (eg jams for fruit, and soup stock for vegetables). Dry foods sometimes got bug-ridden, but most housewives knew how to sift the bad stuff out of the good. Frozen foods were often forgotten in some dark corner of the open-top freezers, but they were eventually used anyway - what could possibly have gone wrong with them in their icy stiff state? Tinned foods hardly ever go off - and highly processed foods are so full of preservatives that it's hard for them to go off.

The reason why we have expiry dates is, of course, to protect us. Unscrupulous food traders may have had some products lying around their storage spaces for a long time, waiting to be be sold. Without expiry dates, we would be sold stale food products when there is plenty of fresher food readily available. But this is also what has led urban people to rely on expiry dates when deciding what food is good and what food is bad. And we all know how wasteful people can be when it comes to making such choices. So much food is thrown away because people rely on expiry dates rather than on true evidence that a food product has gone off.

I personally would buy certain types of ligmena, as long as they were super cheap. I don't have expiry dates on my garden-grown products (I know when they have gone off due to their appearance/smell), or my home-made jams and tomato sauces, or the meat that I freeze when I buy it directly from a farmer, and I always bulk-buy flour, sugar, pasta, rice and beans, and I always use them up without checking the date. When cheese goes mouldy, I always scrape off the mouldy bits - it doesn't just get hiffed. Expiry dates have their purpose, but most people have actually forgotten what their purpose was. So has the food industry when they print different sell-by, use-by and expires-by dates on a product. It confuses the customer, and it makes them rely on expiry dates to deem if something is suitable for consumption - it is so much easier to simply chuck something out and buy some more to replace it...

My initial reaction to the local people surveyed in Hania that were included in the newspaper report was that they were not actually poor, nor were they not educated enough to know that ligmena need not necessarily be bad food; they were often citing politically motivated reasons for being against the sale of expired food products. If we were very worried about money, we would be looking for these bargains; then again, why don't the supermarkets just give all their ready-to-expire products to the charities providing food for needy people? I'm sure they would appreciate them.

Yesterday's issue of the local newspaper also contained this month's brochure for the specials at the local supermarket. A lot of the food offers was of the highly processed packaged kind: biscuits, pizzas, salami, ready pies, chocolate powder, coffee, etc. Now that is the kind of food that I would have no worries about buying on special discount as expired products. Such food items are full of preservatives, they are generally overpriced to begin with and they are items I never buy. If I could buy an expired medium-sized pizza, for instance, at 1 euro, I would do it. Seriously, food full of preservatives never really goes off...

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Supermarket offers (Προφορές στα σουπερμάρκετ)

We stopped off at the supermarket yesterday to buy some of our favorite brand feta cheese (Plataion), but the store we chose was out of it. How annoying, as it was the only item we needed. While there, we picked up the store's brochure, which listed their latest offers. This time, it was full of 'buy one, get one free' offers. The kids were with us, and they noticed the first item listed: buy one pizza at 3.74 euro each, get one free. It sounded quite convenient, so I bought the special.

Sometimes we need a meal in a hurry and this one could be cooked in a matter of minutes. Each pizza was just enough for two hungry people so I felt it was well priced. If it weren't for the kids being with us and pointing out the offer, to be honest, I would not have bought them. A quick dinner can easily be prepared in our house, consisting of other 'healthier' ingredients, containing notably more salad ingredients.

I skimmed through the brochure and found all sorts of other items in it that could easily lead us into temptation by making our lives easier: for every packet of frankfurters (2.62 euro/285g), sachet of mini-crackers (0.52 euro/70g), bottle of ready squeezed juice (1.77 euro/285g), cup single-serve prepared milk coffee (1.39 euro/230ml), box of special K cornflakes (3.88 euro/375), tub of expensive ice-cream (6.862 euro/430g), bag of pre-cut frozen fries (2.21 euro/600g), prepared meat patties (5.14 euro/500g), or bottle of iced tea (1.50 euro/500ml), you'd get one more of the same for free. Everything was made to sound cheap, and it was all invariably tasty in that fast food sense, and full of fat and salt/sugar. There were what seemed like ten pages of 1+1 offers.

On closer inspection, it was obvious that the supermarket chain had produced the brochure in such a way that it would fool all except the most savvy readers into believing that they were buying bargains. Here are the different ways that they try to trick you:

1. They use a large eye-catching title on their brochure that leads you to believe that the offers in it will be of this type (but the offers in the brochure are of mixed types). The title of the brochure is 1+1 δώρο (buy one, get one free) - the finer print next to it tells us that there are also other offers.

2. Some of the 1+1 offers listed are actually double-packs - you can't buy them singly (but they are labelled in different colour coding - but still, they aren't real 1+1 offers). The products on the cover page of the brochure all show one item, except for the shower gel offer, which shows a double pack - you can't buy each item separately, whereas the other items are all available separately (but you need to remember to pick two up when you buy them). 

3. Use of the same advertising style is made for non-1+1 offers, so you are being fooled by the trompe l'oeil effect (eg a 30% discount offer looks just like a 1+1 offer). This is the most misleading way to sell specials. The similar designs of each different offer are placed on the same page, creating an optical illusion. You wouldn't spot the difference immediately. Look at the way the second page of the brochure is headed: 1+1. Right below the 1+1, the item is being advertised as 40% off the regular price. It's not a 1+1 offer - but the same design is used on the whole page. Half the products are 1+1 while the other half have just 20-40% off the price. Even if you picked up two of them, you'd still be paying a bit extra for the second item.

4. In this brochure, not even the pages that seemed to use only one method of advertising were fair in the sense that they were showing a price per kg of each product, but they were not saying why these prices were special (ie they did not show the regular price - if there was one - or how much they were discounted by). In my opinion, something isn't a special if it doesn't show the regular price it is sold for.

If I get to the brochures first (trhey are delivered to our homes on a regular basis), I always throw them into the recycle bag as soon as I get them. My family likes to look at them because of their eye-catching appeal (they don't focus just on food). There is no such thing as a special offer on food. You are most likely being tricked, or the food is not good quality, or a large quantity will simply last you a lifetime, and you will end up throwing out most of it when you do a check of expiry dates in your pantry.

Here's the funny part: after we paid and left the store, I thought we had paid too much. I checked the brochure once more, and realised that the 'specials' were for the following week. Oh well, the kids did say the pizza was good. If there is any left in the store when the specials start, I may pick up another set.

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

Local products on special offer (Προσφορές)

The local supermarket chain, INKA, is having a specials week, selling various products at very low prices, at one of its branches which is celebrating its first birthday (Αν. Γογονή & Κ.Μάνου, the Gogoni store). These προσφορές (offers) started yesterday and will continue until the 9th of July  I grabbed the chance to go on an early morning shopping spree today, to pick up local products at very low prices:

- πηχτόγαλο: pihtogalo is similar to the well-known PDO mizithra cheese - the former is sweeter and creamier, the latter more acidic and crumbly. The special offer is for a locally-branded vacuum-packed variety with an expiry date of November 2012; it is the kind of cheese we use to make dakos, a favorite local snack. (buy 400ml for €4.34, get 400ml free)

There was also another special for mizithra (curd) cheese, made locally and bagged in the amount the customer asks for. This usually costs about €7/kg. The special gave me a 25% discount. Mizithra cheese freezes incredibly well and it has a variety of uses - it is used in salads, as a pie filling and as a fresh cheese on bread products.

- ice-cream (παγωτό): high quality ice-cream made with fresh milk is available from zaharoplasteia, but it's expensive, usually around €8/kg. Non-branded locally made ice-cream is much cheaper, and it's the same thing as the expensive stuff. (buy 1 litre for €4.49, get 1L free)

- σπαλομπριτζόλα (pork entrecote steaks): meat has suddenly become very expensive for the average pocket in Hania. I bought six medium-sized steaks for something like just over €1 each, with a 25% discount (they would normally have cost me €8.58).

- flour (αλεύρι), milled locally: with two 1kg packets of all-purpose flour, you get 500g of self-raising flour.

- σφακιανές πίτες: sfakianes pites are a local delicacy which I sometimes make and keep in the freezer. They are round pan-sized pies filled with mizithra cheese. They aren't cheap to buy ready made, as they are hand-crafted, but with today's special, I got one free (ΧΙΩΤΑΚΗΣ brand) for each one I bought. (buy 1 box with 4 pies for €5.17, get 1 box free). Funnily enough, the last time I bought these pies was when the same INKA branch was running a special on them (when it opened last year!).
 

If you live in Hania and you intend to go to the supermarket in the next ten days, you can catch these specials at the Gogoni St store for the next ten days. Remember to go early in the morning, when the store is well stocked (these specials run out fast during the day). There are also a number of other international brand products available and there is an in-store flyer available listing all the specials. For local products, the offers are worthwhile. I spent €85 at the supermarket today: without the specials, the total cost for these products (which I wouldn't have bought if they weren't on special) would have been €130. The products I bought on special alone would normally cost €85 without the offers.

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

Receipts (Αποδείξεις)

Just before my book draw - click here; winner announced on Tuesday.

Dear Mr P ,

Things seem to be getting from bad to worse in Greece, don't they? How long will it be before Greece is told to take a hike out of the EU? I'm not too worried at this stage about that happening, but if it does, it will throw a spanner in the works concerning the Greek psyche, don't you think? My European identity was beginning to grow on me, but if we leave the EU, not only will we find ourselves in the throes of an economic crisis, but an identity crisis as well. Way down here where I live, it feels out of place to rename myself a Balkan. Either that, or give myself the now defunct Ottoman label, which would probably not go down too well on the general populace, so let's brush that aside for now, and deal with it when the time comes, shall we? Just as long as we don't forget that the issue may well come up in the near future, because some people no doubt are already thinking about it, aren't they? We don't want to look as though were caught 'στα πράσα' now, do we?!

How many receipts have you gathered so far in the place where you keep your stash? Maybe you are in the special category of people that don't have to collect them. No such thing, you say? Well, judging by the number of receipts people are leaving behind in the supermarket, the mini-market, the fast-food outlets, the canteens, the tavernas and all sorts of other places where I've been keeping my beady eyes open for more evidence of this happening, there seem to be quite a few people who appear not to need them. One customer even told the Chinese owner of a clothes shop that she was quite happy not to accept a receipt (if she got the obvious - there is no need for me to explain what that is because everyone in Greece knows what is meant by that).

Are you wondering whether I'm picking up those miscellaneous receipts and adding them to my own expenses? Yep, sure am, even though they often list things I never buy (namely cigarettes). In fact, since I'm one of the few people who seem to be taking this receipt business seriously (judging by some peop;e's behavior - see previous paragraph), the owner of the mini-market where I buy my weekly newspaper always asks me if I would like some of those uncollected receipts (for free, of course). If no one wants them, I may as well take them, right? More to the point, am I missing something for actually collecting receipts? Or do I live mainly among people who are above the law?

How are you going to check what I've claimed as having spent? I've already collected about 300 receipts* so far, and it's not even the middle of the year. Sounds like you're going to have to employ (and pay with money we haven't got) extra staff to help you cope with the new workload. Will you be inputting all this data onto EXCEL files" You do know what these are, dont' you? Are you seriously going to trace all the transactions via a firm's VAT registration number? For every single tax-filing citizen of Greece?** Boy, you've got yourself a handful!

What will you do when you discover that, as in my case, I have been to the supermarket three or four times in one day? Will you say, 'don't believe you?' You have only asked us to take note of the DATE, VAT number of the business and the TOTAL AMOUNT of each transaction we (say we) made. Do you really care about what we bought? Or how much it cost us (which is usually more than what other Europeans pay for the same product in their own countries)? Or whether I had to go to different branches of the same business (the same VAT number appears on the receipt regardless of the branch)? Well, I guess that's just throwing a few spanners in the works, isn't it?

Thank goodness the car is breaking down more often, thank goodness I needed to change my computer this year, thank goodness we decided to buy the new outdoor furniture this year instead of the last - I'm clocking up the expenses to no end. But are they permissible? You've still got a good few months to play around with me on that one before we file our tax returns again. I suppose you're not interested in the reciepts I obtained for services rendered on my recent family budget holiday (Paris and London); you're only interested in whether Greek businesses pay their taxes, not French or British businesses (and apparently they do pay their taxes there, but they have still managed to run up debts there too).

At the end of the day, what will this receipt-collecting business have proved? Where would you like to see me spending my money? Are you going to judge me by them? How do you feel about people learning to save their money instead of spending it? Can't I choose what I do with my money? What will all this evidence prove? When you rifle through my jumbo-size receipt folder, here's what I think you'll discover:

1. that a large proportion of my income is spent on food (164 of my - to date - 283 permissible tax-rebate receipts are for food purchases: most people will tell you anyway that the supermarket, and food, in general terms, is where the largest share of their spending goes)
2. that we don't go out for a meal much (only 3 receipts came from tavernas, and half a dozen were for snack food: the cost of living has escalated all of a sudden, and when this happens, dining out is one of the first things that is put aside for more prosperous times) 
3. that my clothing purchases are on the cheap side (I have only 10 clothing receipts, totalling 330 euro, and I call that expensive even for cheapskates like myself: during our recent trip to London, we spent 114 pounds on clothing from PRIMARK, buying 25 items in total for all members of the family, which included 6 men's business shirts, all of which were much better quality than the stuff we buy in cheap Chinese clothing shops in Hania) 
4. that I don't eat fish often enough (only 5 receipts concern fish suppliers: I was surprised to discover that I was cooking it for the family only once a month, but it shouldn't be such a big surprise when you discover how much it can cost - which is something up for discussion in a future post)
5. that I started smoking recently (collecting other people's receipts if they have been discarded has become a way of life for many people: I am willing to place a bet that next year, come tax-return-filing time, accountants will be fiddling figures for their 'special' clients by removing receipts from some people's tax returns and distributing them in a way that suits others - I could even cook the books myself, by adding a few dates here and there for supermarket purchases in an EXCEL file - you don't seriously think Mr P and his gang are going to look at every single receipt sent in by every single Greek tax payer, do you???)

You haven't learnt much more about me than you already know, Mr P. But what I want to know is why should I be telling you this anyway. Why should you expect to have the right to find out what I do with my money, when we don't have the right (as yet) to know where you got yours from? Is this going to be a way of life now for the lower rungs of Greek society? Did you expect to find out anything different about the average low-income earner? I think you're barking up the wrong tree, George. You're chasing the wrong people, and by doing this, you're helping to destroy the few threads that remain in the basic structure of Greek society:

1. People have minimised their use of their local kiosk because it didn't issue receipts, because you, George, hadn't planned efficiently before introducing the new measures: how could you expect kiosk owners to issue receipts when they were never required by law to have a machine to do this?
2. People are preferring to do their shopping at the supermarket instead of going to the open-air street markets (the laiki) for their fresh supplies for the same reason as above - this also implies that they may be buying reduced quality or one that is generally not preferred by them, and it also implies that multinational companies will be gaining their ever-increasing share in the food business with their gloablised products, since most people will go to a supermarket to ensure they can pick up a receipt for their transactions.
3. People are being forced to cheat the system in order for the system not to cheat them, a basic example being the collection of other people's receipts - a more extreme example is to show loyalty to regular customers, as in the case of an accountant helping a rich client.
4. In the extreme case, we may be seeing a brother-against-brother state, where there is a lack of trust among people, since it is obvious that deception, corruption and tax evasion is still continuing despite the austerity measures.Greek society can be so predictable at times.

We lost our reputation in the world, we lost our economic power, now we are looking at losing the basic structure that our society was built on - the end of the geitonia as we knew it. It's a heavy cloud that hangs over Greece today, and it's not just the Icelandic ash and desert dust that's causing it.

*** *** ***

It's not far from the truth to say that Greece is a poor country with rich people. We've become a laughing stock around the world for knowing who owes money to the state, but not doing anything about collecting that money. These debts have been largely ignored because of the influence those owing money exert, and the fact that they have their own people in powerful positions, who can cover up their misdemeanors, by cooking their books accordingly. If Greece could just get her VIP citizens (doctors, entertainers and bar/nightclub owners are the main culprits) to pay their taxes just like the unimportant Greeks like myself, the IMF wouldn't have picked up another customer so quickly. The Greek government knows full well who owes taxes to the state, and has also publicly released the names of those φοροδιαφυγάδες. It doesn't take a great brain to realise that just a handful of Voskopoulos-type tax-evaders owe enough to get us out of the can forever.

Let's not put all the blame on the 'aeritzides' of Greek society. It's not just the tax-evaders that have damaged the economy: it is also those that are in positions of power, turning a blind eye to the tax debts of the evaders, while they themselves profit from such activities. Ever heard of a state-employed tax inspector with 3 million euro in their bank account? They're living the high life here in Greece, and all at the ordinary citizens' expense. It will be very difficult to learn to live an OPA!-less lifestyle from now on. Even more importantl;y, it's going to take a whole generation to teach people that they can't live on 'fakelakia' and 'rousfetia', and another generation to get used to the idea, so that they have no role model to look up to, their ancestors, the people who used to do this for a living. Opa.

If you want to enter my book draw - click here; winner announced on Tuesday.

*as at 28 May, 2010
**at this rate, I will probably collect approximately 800 receipts for my family, excluding my husband's taxi-related ones, which comes to 400 receipts per person; times that by the number of Greek tax-payers (the population of Greece is about 12 million)

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

The Ministry of Food - Part 1 (Το Υπουργείο Τροφίμων: Μέρος 1ο)

While I'm getting ready to visit the Ministry of Food exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London, here's a taste of the what the Greek version could be like if I were running it. This post definitely needs to be taken in small bites...

Dear Mr P,

First things first, belated congratulations on taking office and heading the country. I trust that you will endeavour to steer our country in the right direction. Let me tell you that, as a loyal Greek citizen, you have my full support in your work, and that I will not allow the Year of the PIIGS to taint my beloved country's name with its stigma. As instructed by your team, I have been demanding and collecting all the receipts for all my purchases and placing them in a specially labelled box (which has, to my dismay, already started to fill up)...

PM's orders...

... to ensure that I will get the full tax rebate you have so generously allocated to every Greek citizen when I fill out my tax papers next year. When the Brussels sprouts from the European Commission come to check up on us again, to ensure that we aren't doing any (more) creative accounting and reporting a fiscal deficit only half as high as we now know to be the case, you can tell them to come to my place, and I will let them look into that little box, so that they can see that whoever sold me whatever has been charging the customer ΦΠΑ* and they've paid their dues to the taxman, and our country can once again stand tall and take pride in our achievements, such as winning the Eurovision song contest and the Euro Cup, organising the most successful modern Olympic Games ever to be held without an incident of terrorism marring the event, and the recent opening of one of the world's greatest museums in the world.

Waiting for their kidnapped sister to be returned...

They can then leave us alone and concentrate on more pressing matters, like putting their money where their mouths are, in the more urgent issues of the failures in the economies of Dubai and Iceland, which the United Kingdom has invested in so heavily - may God grant them grace, as He has done so many times to our own precious land.

Babylonian profiteering - there was never a hint of sustainability in this project.

But I mustn't tire you with such banter, Mr P, because I know that you are a very busy man. In any case, my forte is not economics in the strictest sense; I should not be dabbling in the country's affairs in this sector and just leave this job in the hands of your expert team. Thus, at this point, I will immediately set upon the purpose of my writing to you: as a conscientious citizen, with skills, knowledge and expertise to offer, I would like to give my services to our country - yes, OUR country, and we don't need to be born here to claim that, as both of us would know - in the sector of home economics, via the Ministry of Food.

I know you have often come to my hometown in Crete on official duties, Mr P, and probably the best of Crete has been laid out for you to indulge in on all your visits. You were probably served dackos and hohlioi for amuse-bouches,

xidato and boureki as entrees,

pilafi and vrasto for mains,

with ascrolimbi as a salad,

and kalitsounia drizzled with honey for dessert,

all washed down with a few sensual glasses of Kotsifali wine.

You would have noticed that we Cretans know how to eat well, without having to resort to molecular gastronomy and hi-tech plating to make our food look more appealing; none of that pretentious mumbo-jumbo for us, no sirree! Did all your senses come into play as you indulged in those Cretan meals you were offered as an honest guest? The kaleidoscopic array of colourful fresh produce, the luxurious aromas of the food as it makes its way to your table, the superlative tastes of the products, the rustic charm of your hosts' Cretan accent, almost a pre-requisite to proving its authenticity, as if the food could not taste so good if it were served by someone who did not pronounce their yia as jia, or their tis as tsi, and the hedonistic, if somewhat messy, feel of the kokkalaki. Good meat is like a woman, Mr G - it needs hands; your late father must have taught you something about that. You'd be surprised at how much we have in common on that point!

A greengrocer's in the town centre

You know how good we have it here: high quality food, raised in a mild temperate Mediterranean climate, where the rays of the sun never seem to be lacking, quickly thawing our early morning winter frost in the colder months. Don't get me wrong, Mr P, I'm not trying to acquire more subsidies for Cretan farmers (although you will recall how scroogy the last ones were, and how you yourself were treated when you came to support us in our rallies). I am just trying to remind you of the greatest boon to the epicureans among us: our food is practically all local, George. Can you believe it - in the globalised world we live in, the largest island in the Greek state can produce more than enough food to feed itself as well as other parts of the country without having to resort to foreign imports?

There are times when we all feel like indulging in something different from our traditional culinary regime...

I now touch upon the point that I wanted to make to you, George. Have you checked out the fresh produce section of the supermarket lately? Don't ask me which supermarket I was in; to my knowledge (gained from being my household's shopper-in-chief), they do not differ on this point. I beg your pardon - I apologise for assuming your ignorance on this topic, but as I already mentioned, I know you are a very busy man, and you probably do not have time yourself to do the food shopping in your household, but you might like to get a report on what is happening in these establishments from your staff (unless your wife would like to inform you about the situation herself during her weekly shop). I was in the supermarket the other day (you will find me in one of those establishments at least two or three times a week), looking to buy some crisp apples for my family, when I almost had a heart attack: as I was searching the fresh produce section to select some crispy apples for my brood, my eyes were dazzled by the array of foreign produce that passed before them:

baby corn from Thailand, radiccio and prickly pears from Italy, boiled beetroot from France, papaya from Ecuador, baby potatoes from Cyprus, pomegranates, kumquat and Medjoul dates from Israel, mango from Brazil, coconut from Sri Lanka, Brussels sprouts from Holland, radish from Israel, asparagus spears from Peru, plums and mini pineapple from South Africa, and large pineapple from Costa Rica.

We are constantly bombarded by so much choice that we are literally drowning in it. We cannot choose due to the abundance of choice, despite the fact that most of these products are out-of-season, not local, and possibly a tad inappropriate in our lifestyle. We have lost our sense of proportion when we feel the need to buy ready-boiled beetroot from a village supermarket; pray tell me - is it asking for too much from the average home cook to boil them themselves in their country kitchen? Hania is drowning in pomegranate production, while we are being offered imported ones! Poor Kerkira has been trying for years to make her kumquats more marketable, yet we are being sold such products by a country that does not even have enough water supplies to keep their plants growing! And what can one say about Holland, who grows a whole host of vegetables that they import all over Europe, even though she herself lacks land surface and grows everything hydroponically; she's even the top European distributor of citrus fruit - and she doesn't even grow any herself!!!

This kumquat tree in urban Hania was laden with fruits, at the same time (early January, 2010) that the supermarket was selling Israeli kumquat for 5.97 euro/kilo. The fruit was at its prime; it was a little bitter, but quite juicy. It isn't peeled - you bite into it as it is. Only the lower fruits on the tree had been picked - the rest will presumably fall onto the ground, unused. Kumquat is grown commercially only on the island of Kerkira.

And what's this with the pineapple? Even size seems to matter when choosing what foreign imported non-seasonal produce we are going to buy; perhaps this is because we have learnt to be more vocal about demanding our freedom to basic human rights (you should be proud of your grandfather's achievements in this respect), one of which is freedom of choice: when other people are fighting for their human right to have access to clean water, medicine and decent accomodation, our compatriots are saying**:

Μικ-PA! Με-ΓA-λα! Τα θέ-λω Ό-λα!
(Big! Small! We-Want-Them-ALL!)

And to think, we don't even cultivate the product ourselves! How on earth did we so quickly turn from snail-foraging war survivors to instant gratification pleasure seekers? By George, George -we're beginning to sound like the British: "I can bloody well eat what I like when I bloody well feel like it"! On top of that, we find ourselves in the midst of an economic crisis, and yet, supermarket giants proudly display provocative price tags, such as Peruvian asparagus spears at 7.94 euro/kilo! Last, but not least, have you ever tried imported fresh produce yourself, George? Perfect to look, tasteless to eat, which I discovered after falling into the temptation myself of gluttony. Did I really need to eat pomegranates after our own pomegranate season had ended?

Peruvian asparagus and Dutch radicci0 - the prices are a little scary...

And that's not all your (wo)man in Hania has noticed going on food-wise in the birthplace of the world-famous Mediterranean Diet. Our restaurants have stopped serving "mama's food"; they're now calling it "yiayia's food. And what's the outcome of all this new-fangled culinary fashion, George? For a start, there's the death of the Mediterranean diet, supplanted by a globalised food culture; obese Cretan children, who get little physical exercise and are raised on low-quality produce; a once food-based society now showing a lack of food knowledge; the loss of traditional culinary skills since cooking is not being passed on from one generation to another like it used to be; food fashions replacing food traditions. The list is too long to write up here, George; we need to form an expert team to address the issue, with special measures to protect us from such outcomes.

Eggplant with xinohondro, xidato, lamb in the wood fired oven, boureki in the summer (or artichokes with broad beans in the winter), pork with celery - if yiayia is the one cooking all these Cretan dishes, what is mama cooking these days???

That's why you need me, Mr P: I'm a mama with primary school-aged children who are eating "yiayia's food" still being cooked by their very own mama! There's a clear need for mama's cooking to be introduced back into the home, otherwise can you imagine the implications of that phenomenon? The youth of today (our country's future, don't forget that!) are starting to be raised on the assumption that grandmothers cook, while mothers don't because they go out to work and don't have time to do this anymore. Before you criticise me for my anti-feminist sentiments, hear me out: mama's kouzina could easily be re-named papa's kouzina - equal rights for all!

Mr OC in the kitchen

In conclusion, before I exceed my talk time, I would like to present my manifesto, to prove to you how deeply I have considered these issues, with some practical solutions to overcome their negative outcomes:

• PRODUCE BAN: There must be a ban on importing foreign produce that is growing seasonally in the homeland; we cannot be importing products grown in excess while ours are allowed to go to waste unsold, eventually being used for animal feed. In any case, imports must not exceed exports.
  
  None of these products are available as local produce in Hania stores; they are always imported. Yet they can all grow in Hania - these ones are from my uncles' farm, a mile away from my home.
• CULTIVATION: Greek farmers should be planting not only well-known Mediterranean species, but also hardy tropical species previously unknown to Greek soil; Mr Organically Cooked has managed to produce mango in our village - maybe you can also make use of him in some way in the Ministry (Greek politics have always been very much a family affair, haven't they, George?).
  
  Our very own mango tree, growing in our orange orchard
• PROMOTION: Greek produce must be given priority over foreign products. This can be achieved by displaying them prominently, advertising via the "home is best" slogan, and other ethnocentric ploys that many other nations in the world to promote their own products over other countries'.
  
• A car sticker I spotted while visiting the Duxford Air Museum, Cambridge, UK in 2006.
• EDUCATION: We need to get people to take more interest in the food they eat, by teaching them to eat seasonally (ie sensibly), and showing them how to create gardens in limited spaces like rooftops and balconies, dissuading people from creating lawns and flower gardens in more arid places receiving less rain (eg Crete). It doesn't just have to be organic to taste good!
  
  Everything in this photo is local food (except for the kiwifruit), but none is organic.
• RATIONING: We must introduce a system of rationing imported goods. Everyone needs to carry a rations booklet, stating their imported food purchases: once they exceed their monthly limit, they will only be allowed to buy local produce. Fair trade is all part of the process by which we measure a country's progress, but enough is enough, don't you think? Cheaper imports means that, often, Greek produce lies wastefully in the same place it was grown while people buy and consume foreign produce...
  

I trust, Yiorgaki, that you will take my considerations into serious account and get back to me once you have thought about how you intend to handle the situation. Until then, I leave my country in your strong hands. And if ever the Minister of Rural Development and Food, Mrs Katerina, or her deputy, Mr Mihali, decide that they cannot keep up with the demands of the job and aren't able to live up to the expectations of the tasks that they have been entrusted with, you know who to turn to, don't you?

Sincerely yours,
A loyal Greek citizen from the Megalonissos

PS: In case you were wondering which apple variety I purchased, I must admit I succumbed to temptation - Pink Lady, an imported variety from Italy. You will understand why I preferred them over the others - they were all bad apples!

A Pink Lady apple (imported from Italy), standing next to another Australian invention (grown in Greece), the Granny Smith. Pink Lady is always unblemished and crisp - these are the kinds of apples I'd like to eat...

PPS: Forgive me once again for dabbling in matters that I am no expert in, but I hope you don't mind me mentioning that when you make major changes to our daily cost of living, could you at least try to make them during the day, and not during late-night parliamentary sessions when most people are sleeping and can't react to them? We're not all efoplistes, you know!

*ΦΠΑ = VAT = value-added tax
** Chant this in the tune of the well-known Greek slogan: Ψω-μί, παι-δεί-α, ε-λευ-θε-ρί-α!

©All Rights Reserved/Organically cooked. No part of this blog may be reproduced and/or copied by any means without prior consent from Maria Verivaki.

Freedom of choice (Ελευθερία να επιλέγουμε)

The opening of a new supermarket is seen as a source of entertainment for us islanders who live in too small a place to maintain a wide and varied leisure market. Shopping and the opening of new megastores fulfills the need for the locals to see and do 'something different'. AB Vasilopoulos’ only store in Hania is located very close to my workplace. When I lived in Athens, I'd been to one of their other branches. I found the prices more expensive at the time, which I thought was mainly due to its stocking imported products like Cadbury's chocolate and Marmite, items one can never find in a neighbourhood supermarket, although this is also changing: more foreign products are becoming available in supermarkets as ex-pat communities are growing in Crete. For this reason, ABV is perceived as a supermarket for discerning shoppers with well-padded wallets, a belief that is well supported by their recent television advertisement. The supermarket admits that in the past, it may have had higher prices, but it now claims that its prices for basic staple products are the same or lower than other supermarkets, a sign of economically difficult times hitting the luxury end of consumerism.

Advertising pamphlet for AB Vasilopoulos

I first used this supermarket out of curiosity (ie for its entertainment value). I did not expect to find what I saw. The supermarket shares very few features with other supermarkets in the region. Despite its limited space, it creates a 'shopping experience'. As you walk in through the entrance, you find recipe cards, information pamphlets about recycling, product quality checking, sustainability, and all manner of food and social concerns. The most documentation you will find in other supermarkets mainly has to do with special offers, monthly brochures and coupon collection pamphlets with which you can acquire, say, a set of porcelain dinner plates at a low cost if you manage to collect 100-or-so coupons, gaining one every time you spend (say again) 3 euro, and you still pay a certain amount of money to acquire them, despite your coupon collection!

The first goods bay you come across is the fresh produce section, which may sound natural to most people outside Greece, but in Hania, this is not at all common. The main entrance of most supermarkets is on the opposite side of the loading bays, so that the fresh produce section is always at the deepest most windowless corner of the store. Appearance and image play a great role in this supermarket. Both paper and plastic bags were available; in this way you could go for the former if you wanted to be environmentally friendly, or the latter if you wanted to be practical. There was also a box of tissues at hand if you got your hands dirty. None of these choices or conveniences are available in other supermarkets in Hania. This kind of respect for the customer is a novel approach in a country where, until only recently, food store assistants could be seen smoking at the same time as slicing salami.

The display cases for most of the fresh food products at ABV are placed in "islands" (as depicted in the picture in the advertising pamphlet above) making them look more appealing and fresher, while the shelves are reserved mainly for non-food products and boxed items. The staff uniforms resemble suits rather than the simple aprons supermarket assistants usually wear on top of their normal clothes. Their mannerisms - polite discreet smiles, knowledge of the products on their shelves, adherence to formalities such as asking for identification when paying by credit card - show the greatest deference to the customer; it conveys the trust that is often lacking these days in food-related businesses. These people almost looked like police officers, with their gray trousers, white shirts, red kerchiefs and blue cardigans. Even though there was a heatwave outside, these people were over-dressed within reason - the refrigeration and air-conditioning is set at such a high level (presumably to ensure the quality of the fresh products), that I was practically shivering in the store. It may have been Dubai outside, but indoors, it felt like Siberia.

My main price comparison index is based on the cost of milk. I was surprised to find that the brand of milk I usually buy at INKA (not the cheapest) was being sold more cheaply at ABV. But that was about all that was cheaper. Basic fruit costs more per kilo here than at other supermarkets, even though bananas and apples come from the same sources (nearly all the bananas sold in Greece come from South or Central America). Strawberries were over-priced (a pamphlet explained where they came from and praised their quality), while the feta cheese I usually buy from Carrefour (the only store to stock my preferred brand) was being sold at ABV at a cost of 2 euro more per kilo. After a more thorough search at the deli counter, I found that the cost of the same cheese in pre-packaged form was 9.68 euro per kilo, while the same product was being sold in bulk (ie you could buy the amount you want) at approximately 7.55 per kilo, which is what I was used to paying for it at Carrefour. More upmarket brands of imported products (eg Kikkoman soy sauce) were being sold in place of their cheaper counterparts (eg Blue Dragon). At the same time however, ABV also stocks its own-brand packaging for staples like rice, beans and sugar, and their prices were similar (if not cheaper) to other supermarkets.

Aesthetic appeal is very important in ABV. Many people will say ‘πουλάει βιτρίνα' (poulaei vitrina - he’s selling the ‘window display’). This was evident right throughout the store, especially at the impressive meat counter. There were cuts of meat that I don’t often see elsewhere: stuffed pork loins (in Greece, these are called ‘rollo’) with a variety of fillings and in different sizes, minced lamb meat (the mere collocation of these two words is laughed at in Crete), and veal (even though it was imported from France, it is extremely rare to come across it in Crete). As soon as I approached this part of the supermarket, the assistant called out the specials to me, and explained all the different cuts of meat in the display case. There were also many pre-packed meat cuts, something not so common in Crete, as people still like to see the blood and guts of the animals they buy for food.

The amount of pastrouma I asked for was sliced freshly and each slice placed individually between plastic sheeting. This care in packaging is unheard of Hania; at any other supermarket, all the slices would have been placed on top of one another, leading to quicker product deterioration. The camembert is ABV's own brand (365); Marmite is imported.

I came to the conclusion that there was no real need to change my supermarket routine just because ABV had come to town. It is a useful place to pick up bread and milk (now that I know that it is priced competitively) and maybe the odd piece of fruit you have run out of at home, but you really need to know what you were paying before you come to shop here. Before leaving the store, I decided to make some specialist purchases, seeking out goods that I knew I wouldn’t find in other supermarkets. I didn’t really need to buy camembert, pastrouma and Marmite*; I've survived happily without them for the last two decades! These purchases cost less than 8 euro, and no one else in the house likes them, but it had that feel-good sensation of pampering oneself; my stroll through the supermarket also constituted a bit of ‘me-time’.

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Compare my ABV shopping experience with my regular supermarket shopping. INKA supermarket is five minutes away from my house. My branch is in the thick of the beach-tourism area of Hania. Last Saturday, Loumidis was serving freshly brewed coffee to everyone. I had some with a friend I bumped into. It gave us a chance to catch up.

Loumidis coffee making everyone a fresh brew at INKA. This is an advertising gimmick; it doesn't take place all the time, as it does in the New World supermarket in Wellington. When I went to this supermarket on my last trip in 2004, I often came across little old Greek ladies who remembered me from my years in Wellington, and I had my coffee with them.

The bread was fast running out and it was only 11am. It's popular with the tourists who also help the supermarket make a fortune in pre-sliced cheese and cured meats. As I drove my trolley to the deli counter, I bumped into the priest who had officiated at my wedding. He was doing his shopping with his wife, and they enquired into the condition of my health and family (όλοι καλά, I replied). I needed some chicken, and patiently waited for my turn to come at the meat counter. Some English tourists were pointing to the lambs' heads in the display while they gawked at the butcher hacking away happily over huge flanks of of meat. My turn came, but before I said a word, the butcher asked me: "Where do I know you from?" I couldn't remember seeing him anywhere before, but hopefully that doesn't underestimate my sense of belonging to my adopted hometown.

The man on the left in the white shirt was cleaning people's car windows. Life is difficult for many people these days; he accepted my donation without asking specifically for it.

When I'd finished my shopping, I queued up at the till where a cousin was working. She may be a few times removed in the family lineage, but that doesn't stop us from bonding. And as it was such a beautiful spring day in May (warm without being overly hot), I decided to drive down to the beach (one minute away) and take a couple of gorgeous photos of happy people enjoying the spring weather in the middle of the Mediterranean...

*Marmite is the UK equivalent of the antipodean Vegemite (which is of course far superior to Marmite, as all good Kiwis will tell you). They taste similar, and bring me closer to Wellington, even though the flight to New Zealand from Hania is 24 hours in duration.

Don't forget to take part in book competition in my previous post!

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