Carolime Time

The Good Things, Dubai: Grocery Shopping

Yesterday was the first time I’ve gone grocery shopping in Dubai. Previously, I’d quickly grabbed snacks at Spinneys and stopped off at the Carrefour for necessities, but nothing more. And, though Spinney’s is apparently good for meats, the rest of the items are overpriced. So we headed onwards to Lulu Hypermarket and started picking at the oh-so-many goodies there. I was literally salivating in the fruits and vegetables section.In Canada, though I shop at Toronto’s Kensington Market or China Town for the most part, there is still something unnatural about the crayon-red, waxy perfection of North American tomatoes. Even our local tomatoes don’t seem like they’ve roughed it out the way the veggies and fruits here in Dubai do. Maybe I have a thing for survivors that look like they fought a battle into those supermarket baskets;) Anyway, here’s how even the grocery shopping differs in Dubai.

You don’t buy everything in bulk all at once. Apparently, everything spoils here in a matter of days. That includes milk that would last weeks in Canada, eggs that would last months, and so on. I think the eggs last a few days longer. My immediate reaction to this was irritation. I mean, geez, how annoying is it that I’ll have to go back and forth to the grocery store, which is like, a 10-minute walk from my house in Toronto and a 5-min drive from our place in Dubai, or a 2-min walk to the convenience store.But this sentiment was just as quickly replaced by delight. The nearness of expiration dates meant less likelihood of preservatives in my food and more pressure to buy small quantities, i.e. waste less. Studies have shown that buying in large quantities for a single-person household leads to more wastage. I must say I’m guilty of this, as much as I try to eat the last dried garlic or push the date on the yogurt. All in the spirit of not wasting..

Supermarket gardenia

After realizing I could only buy in small quantities, I continued on my bee-line (yes, bee-lines break for thought) to the fruits and vegetables section. There were Jordanian apples, Omani broccoli, local tomatoes and more. I was drooling at the thought of biting into an apple and picking a shriveled up bug from my teeth:P Kidding, kidding. But seriously, these apples looked like they’d been plucked directly from my dad’s backyard (though he specializes in bushels of pears, not apples) So I grabbed small quantities of each.

Milk, glorious milk

The kicker came with the milk. I reached down to grab the largest jug, envisioning my brothers and I playing a tug-o-war over who gets the last glass. The milk label had a simple logo and accentuated the title “Fresh Milk.” How glorious! My mother had told me of her childhood in India where they delivered milk daily, and I remembered going to a cart at 5am as a child myself, with a cousin, to grab glass containers of milk. The nearness of such fresh, homegrown products makes me happier than the purchase of most items available at the mall (even more than that purple skirt I bought yesterday, soo cute! and on sale..) Chris  frowned at the jug in my hand, though, questioning why I didn’t choose a smaller one. He showed me the labels and I realized each jug was made on the day of or the day before, and expired within 3 days of being made. Now THAT’S fresh. I think it’s for this reason that everyone keeps a tub of powdered milk or a few cans of Rainbow brand milk around. I can’t figure out if there are hormones in the milk here, but for now, I am pleased that it is not loaded with preservatives. Before I go, I must add that the food here is exponentially cheaper than in Canada, organic or not, imported or not. I will come back soon and write about restaurants and dining here. Must get back to work!!