European Markets Are So Much Better Than US Grocery Stores

Just back from Europe, I find myself wish­ing that US super­mar­ket chains pri­or­i­tized fresh­ness, taste and qual­ity over the finan­cial mar­gins. Com­pared to almost any local Euro­pean mar­ket, Amer­i­can pro­duce is pretty but bland. It’s sad that the chains have pushed the grow­ers to evolve their crops to sur­vive long trans­ports and sup­ply chains, rather than the con­sumer’s expe­ri­ence.

Take straw­ber­ries, for exam­ple. When they arrive on gro­cery shelves, Amer­i­can straw­ber­ries are hard, rather than burst­ing with juice; have almost no smell, and taste like card­board. At the farmer’s mar­ket in Nice, the straw­ber­ries were tan­ta­liz­ingly ripe.

The only way to expe­ri­ence straw­ber­ries as they should be is to shop at a farm­ers’ mar­ket where grow­ers sell berries picked that morn­ing — old-fash­ioned straw­ber­ries ripened all the way through. That’s a lux­ury I’ll have to wait until late June to savor.

Peo­ple liv­ing in the south of France have already begun to enjoy local let­tuce and early aspara­gus — two months before local greens will reach farm­ers’ mar­kets here in Seat­tle. The Niçoise salad ingre­di­ents were so fresh, so full of fla­vor, that I could have hap­pily eaten noth­ing but salad while vis­it­ing friends who live in Nice.

After a week­end in France, I flew to south­ern Ger­many for busi­ness. On Wednes­day my client brought a small group of us to the local farm­ers’ mar­ket where we could shop for lunch.

This mar­ket is a twice weekly insti­tu­tion in Kempten, even dur­ing snowy win­ter months like early March. The ice and snow were melt­ing on the side­walk as we strolled to this mar­ket, only to be greeted with vibrant col­ors and pun­gent aro­mas.

The mar­ket spe­cial­izes in local pro­duce, cheeses and other dairy prod­ucts, honey and beeswax can­dles, Ger­man noo­dles, and processed meats (sausages and so on).

Unlike what you’d find in the US at this time of year, every­thing was very fresh. Kempten is in the All­gäu region, near the Alps, an area that prides itself on the qual­ity of its cheeses and other dairy prod­ucts.

Before vis­it­ing Kempten, I used to think that Ger­man food was some­thing for oth­ers to enjoy, but now I’m find­ing it has its own spe­cial charms — espe­cially the cheese.

After enjoy­ing what Euro­pean farm­ers’ mar­kets have to offer, it’s tough to set­tle for what QFC (my local Kroger chain) has on its shelves. And the local farm­ers’ mar­ket won’t open up here for another 3.5 months…