We did manage to get up early (thanks to unadjusted body clocks at 4am), and head into Putney town centre, as Jam outlined last night. As most of you know, we love food, I especially love talking food, and so I will detail our Sainsbury supermarket experience.
We ended up walking up and down each aisle and checked out the novel goods in this different country. Two of the major things to note (1) was that half the products in the shop were labelled Sainsbury products, much like Signiture range at Foodtown (Bastics….family joke). (2) Almost everything is packaged for convenience …or maybe is packaged so you don’t have to learn how to cook! Much like when you go to New World in Hamilton or most supermarkets in Auckland, except here, its much more extreme!
Like Jam was saying, they have fresh mash potato (or frozen) ready to eat! Also Baked potato, scalloped like potato, and uncooked peeled potato. I think its great because I hate how it takes so long just for the cooking a potato process! They had a massive section of ready to eat precooked foods…mmm, they were top quality. The deli had the finest looking curries. And ham wasn’t presliced, but sliced for you at the time you want to buy it.
We found lots of turkey meat, and massively undersized fresh rainbow trout (illegal according to Lake Taupo standards) in packages!
Cadbury Favourites, as we know them, are almost in identical packages but labelled Cadbury Heros. Im guessing due to legal reasons, by the fact that a box of Nestle chocs had a label that said ‘what’s your favourite?’
Chips: ready salted, chicken, marmite…..marmite? I don’t think I want to go there after yesterday’s experience.
Long life milk. It was packaged in a Janola like bottle.
A tiny can of Coke (I think it's used for mixes), 150ml.....GULP.... what was that?!
Milk doesn't sell by the litre the new fashion way, its still in pints.....but at least labelled 1.136L for our generation.
Heres an exception to ready to eat pre-prepared food. This one you have to decorate yourself.
mmmmm......real looking bacon for tea....just like in the movies.
I also got a pic of a bottle of what we know as Jif cleaning product, but I’ll post it later. Its packaged identical, except its label was Cif!?!
Interesting to note that there are products that we used to have in NZ, but failed to sell. Such as microwavable fries, and toothpaste in a stand-up pump action bottle with the button you press to get the toothpaste out….food techies, beware, copying other countries products may end up being a flop at home :)
There also seems to be a big market for cakes. Cadbuys and many other lolly companies get into making a lot of hybrid cake bars – mix of cake and choc bar things….mmmmm…chocolate.
The last aisle felt like home, with NZ wines stacked on the shelves. I couldn’t help notice a couple of wine brands had their arm twisted by Sainsbury marketing, by having an extra word printed on the top; ‘Sainsbury’. They also sell hard liquor in the Supermarket here.
So many novel things, but a few items, such as Toblerone, had their novelty worn off at home. I did manage to find a can of V in a Dairy (Offys they call them here).
It still feels a bit surreal and doesn’t feel like we’re in London. Maybe it’s because we haven’t heard too many British voices, but when we do, we prick our ears up. And I guess that’s because no one bothers to chat when comuting. It's quite funny cos we here kids on their way to school in the morning and they are always chatting on with British accents though!
Anyway, that’s it from me. Jam’s still snoozing away next me(well was at the start of the post but since I wrote heaps she is now correcting my smelling).
Bev
PS. We lived thru 2 Saturday the 15ths of Septembers, weird eh?….but, mainly in transit.
PPS. If you’re wondering where Putney is, its close to Wimbledon.
1 comment:
They had those little cans in Japan too, along with fanta and other random stuff like ice tea, and "aquarius" which is like a white powerade
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