Supermarket finds in Barcelona
If you know me well, you would know that I always like to visit the local supermarket, whenever I am abroad. It is my way of getting to know the local culture and food. I also like to buy a bunch of groceries and cook my own meals, whenever I can arrange an appartment with a smal kitchenette.
It was my first time in Barcelona, so I wasn't that familiar to the surroundings, but I stumbled upon many supermarkets, while I walked around. I cannot find all the receipts and I haven't taken a picture of everything, but you can find the most notable products that I found in supermarkets in Barcelona underneath (shown in video and a short description in this article).
- Paper napkins (not in video). A necessity when you are living in a rented appartment and plan to cook and eat at home regularly.
- Zü premium cantaloupe melon juice (a bit too sweet for me, not in video) and Zü premium strawberry juice (like the Ola strawberry ice cream sticks, but in liquid form).
- Baguette (great deal of 3 long ones for €1.17).
- Lay's gourmet chips (€2 for bag of 180g). I especially like the one with cream cheese and caramelized onion flavor.
- Lay's honey mustard chips. It isn't as amazing as the Haitai x Calbee honey butter chip, but it has a slight spiciness from the mustard and a hint of sweetness to soften that sharpness.
- Yogurt bifidus drinks (€1,79 per pack of 4 or 5 mini bottles, discount of €0.90 after buying two packs).
- Hacendado assorted cookies (aka Surtido de pastas, €4,19).
- Sunny delight Waikiki drinks. The citrus flavor was nice, but the sweetener flavor was a bit too strong for me.
- Carrefour assorted cookies with individual packaging.
- Rifacli Duetto. These are wafer rolls with half without flavor and half covered with milk chocolate. I liked the ones with chocolate more.
- Canned calamari. The red spicy version was more interesting (different spices) than the black squid ink version, but both are tasty.
- Canned clams (almejones). They don't have too much flavor, besides some fishiness, but the texture is nice.
- Large 900 g can tuna in sunflower oil. The tuna flavor is stronger than the ones that I can buy back home.
- Watermelon and cantaloupe mixed juice. It tastes a bit like candy, but in a good way.
- Orange and mandarin juice. The orange juice was great, while the mandarin juice has a natural mandarin flavor, but isn't that to my liking.
- Pastas de té (assorted cookies without box, just wrapped in foil). It is cheaper, but the quality is a bit lower than the other boxes of assorted cookies I bought during the same trip.
- Coffee and honey-lemon candies. The coffee flavor was nice and I like having lemon candies around, whenever I need to take long bus rides or during long flights.
- Butterfly cookies. It was crunchy and it had a rich, buttery flavor. This was a big surprise.
- Sanpellegrino pompelmo (grapefruit). It was zesty and refreshing.
- Schweppes naranja. It tasted like Fanta, but with a bit more orange flavor.
- soy sauce (not in video). They have small bottles of sushi soy sauce, which was great to dip shrimp in or cook beef with.
- fresh seafood and meat. I love the fresh seafood section and in particular, the red shrimp from the freezer. It is even better than the fresh ones on ice. The chicken, beef, and pork also seems to be better quality and cheaper than what we have back home.
- jamon pate. I tried to find the Casa Taradellas pate with jamon flavor, as I loved that one, when I got a couple of pate as souvenirs from Barcelona. But the one from Casa Taradellas in a different looking jar was not as delicious as I remembered. The jamon pate from Hacendado was a bit better.
- Chorizo extra picante. I really liked the thinly sliced chorizo and iberico ham, I bought before for lunch, on a baguette. I bought this sausage to eat on itself with a glass of wine and the spiciness was not too bad.
- Aliada Turón de Fruta. It looked really Christmassy and pretty on the box, but when I took it out, it was totally different. More like a slice of soap from Lush. It was a rectangular slice of sweet almond paste with blocks of different colors inside.
- Sugar cake. It was a large block of cake with a layer of castor sugar on top. It was quite tasty for that low price. Close to it, in the same corner with bakery products, was also a bag of mini cupcakes, which was even tastier (not in video).
It was my first time in Barcelona, so I wasn't that familiar to the surroundings, but I stumbled upon many supermarkets, while I walked around. I cannot find all the receipts and I haven't taken a picture of everything, but you can find the most notable products that I found in supermarkets in Barcelona underneath (shown in video and a short description in this article).
From Caprabo supermarket:
- Paper napkins (not in video). A necessity when you are living in a rented appartment and plan to cook and eat at home regularly.
- Zü premium cantaloupe melon juice (a bit too sweet for me, not in video) and Zü premium strawberry juice (like the Ola strawberry ice cream sticks, but in liquid form).
From DIA supermarket:
- Box of traditional Spanish almond cookies €4,09 (there was a deal with second one for half price, so I got two).- Baguette (great deal of 3 long ones for €1.17).
- Lay's gourmet chips (€2 for bag of 180g). I especially like the one with cream cheese and caramelized onion flavor.
- Lay's honey mustard chips. It isn't as amazing as the Haitai x Calbee honey butter chip, but it has a slight spiciness from the mustard and a hint of sweetness to soften that sharpness.
- Yogurt bifidus drinks (€1,79 per pack of 4 or 5 mini bottles, discount of €0.90 after buying two packs).
- Hacendado assorted cookies (aka Surtido de pastas, €4,19).
- Sunny delight Waikiki drinks. The citrus flavor was nice, but the sweetener flavor was a bit too strong for me.
From Carefour supermarket:
- Trias ventalls orange chocolate cookies (amazing fan-shaped wafer filled with orange flavoured chocolate).- Carrefour assorted cookies with individual packaging.
From Supercor Exprés:
- Eroski green tea. It was funny to see something similar to Euroshopper, a house brand here in the Netherlands, so I decided to try it. I wanted some tea for breakfast anyway, but it wasn't that special. I am probably too spoiled by the excellent green tea from Japan that I drink often.- Rifacli Duetto. These are wafer rolls with half without flavor and half covered with milk chocolate. I liked the ones with chocolate more.
From Mercadona supermarket:
- Canned sardines. The smaller sardines were nicer than the larger ones.- Canned calamari. The red spicy version was more interesting (different spices) than the black squid ink version, but both are tasty.
- Canned clams (almejones). They don't have too much flavor, besides some fishiness, but the texture is nice.
- Large 900 g can tuna in sunflower oil. The tuna flavor is stronger than the ones that I can buy back home.
- Watermelon and cantaloupe mixed juice. It tastes a bit like candy, but in a good way.
- Orange and mandarin juice. The orange juice was great, while the mandarin juice has a natural mandarin flavor, but isn't that to my liking.
- Pastas de té (assorted cookies without box, just wrapped in foil). It is cheaper, but the quality is a bit lower than the other boxes of assorted cookies I bought during the same trip.
- Coffee and honey-lemon candies. The coffee flavor was nice and I like having lemon candies around, whenever I need to take long bus rides or during long flights.
- Butterfly cookies. It was crunchy and it had a rich, buttery flavor. This was a big surprise.
- Sanpellegrino pompelmo (grapefruit). It was zesty and refreshing.
- Schweppes naranja. It tasted like Fanta, but with a bit more orange flavor.
- soy sauce (not in video). They have small bottles of sushi soy sauce, which was great to dip shrimp in or cook beef with.
- fresh seafood and meat. I love the fresh seafood section and in particular, the red shrimp from the freezer. It is even better than the fresh ones on ice. The chicken, beef, and pork also seems to be better quality and cheaper than what we have back home.
- jamon pate. I tried to find the Casa Taradellas pate with jamon flavor, as I loved that one, when I got a couple of pate as souvenirs from Barcelona. But the one from Casa Taradellas in a different looking jar was not as delicious as I remembered. The jamon pate from Hacendado was a bit better.
- Chorizo extra picante. I really liked the thinly sliced chorizo and iberico ham, I bought before for lunch, on a baguette. I bought this sausage to eat on itself with a glass of wine and the spiciness was not too bad.
- Aliada Turón de Fruta. It looked really Christmassy and pretty on the box, but when I took it out, it was totally different. More like a slice of soap from Lush. It was a rectangular slice of sweet almond paste with blocks of different colors inside.
- Sugar cake. It was a large block of cake with a layer of castor sugar on top. It was quite tasty for that low price. Close to it, in the same corner with bakery products, was also a bag of mini cupcakes, which was even tastier (not in video).
Spanish cookies
I bought three different kinds of assorted cookies and I like the Carrefour assorted cookies box the most. The cookie flavors were okay and although there is more plastic used than necessary, it helps with portion control (just one cookie with my tea, or at least, I try to). I can also take one in my bag for emergency low blood sugar level situations.
The box of traditional Spanish Christmas almond cookies were a hit and a miss. Some flavors were nice and some were hard to eat, even though I barely have any dislikes when it comes to food. But it is a great way to get a taste of all the different kinds of cookies and to find your favorites. At most supermarkets, you can buy the almond cookies separately and you pay based on the weight.
My notes on the almond cookies
- Mantecado de cacao (chocolate flavored almond cookie with hints of cinnamon and vanilla; a bit strange to me)
- Alfajor de almendras (sausage shape, almond paste cookie with a thin layer of confectionery sugar on the outside and with crunchy almond bits and a harder texture; yummy)
- Mantecado de limon (lemon flavored almond cookie with a pressed almond powder texture; yummy)
- Hojaldrada (flaky, buttery pastry dough cookie, but with a very sweet and soft texture instead of a very hard and crunchy texture, what you would expect with pastry dough; yummy)
- Chocolate square (chocolate cookie with a soft almond powder center and speculaas like herbs; okay)
- Chocolate with coconut filling (it takes like a Dutch kokosmakroon covered with chocolate; yummy)
- Rectangular white nougat with almonds inside (yummy, but almost broke my tooth).
- Chocolate donut cookie (okay)
- Oval shaped marzipan with a browned ring on top (okay)
- Almendras rellenas suprema (white almond shaped wafer shell with a sweet and soft almond filling; okay)
- Large round cookies with sesame seeds wrapped with transparent candy like foil (this was the one that I could barely finish, I don't know if the dealbreaker is because it is so dry and big or the spices mix that is too unfamiliar to me).
- Polvoron de almendra (rectangular shaped almond powder cookie with rounded corners, a layer of confectionery sugar on top, and crunchy almond bits in the center; yummy).
- Trufitas al brandy (chocolate truffle with chocolate sprinkles on top and brandy; yummy)
