To market, to market

In keeping with the fact that I spend too much time thinking about food, I've been orienting myself in Hamburg by figuring out the food situation first. It turns out that my food vocabulary is much better than the rest of my vocabulary so it's one of the easier things for me to navigate. (Much easier than figuring out which SIM card to get for my cell phone, for example.) There is a grocery store nearby that is quite well stocked, including a decent selection of organic (bio) foods and a really good wine selection. I haven't found a go-to organic grocery store yet, but I have a list of options I can start exploring.

I have been taking advantage of the weekly street markets (Wochenmärkte). They're listed in the yellow pages (gelbe Seiten), with the days, locations and hours. Of course, I only discovered that after I went wandering around randomly trying to find one.

Even before we left the US I tried googling "Hamburg weekly market" and various permutations, to no avail. (It turns out there isn't much information in English about Hamburg online.) We have a guidebook that lists two markets, so on our second afternoon here I set out to find one of them. Despite the market's location on the other side of the city and my rather late start I was spurred on by the pathetic vegetables at the grocery store. (I have since found a grocery store with less pathetic vegetables, but it was good motivation!)

A short ways into my walk I noticed people carrying bags of vegetables and fruit that were too big for them to have walked from the market I was aiming for, so I headed in the direction from which the bags were coming and lo and behold there was a market! I was quite pleased with my ingenuity, and also pleased that I remembered the word for garlic (though of course not the gender). I bought some very tasty LARGE apples, as well as some fresh spinach-ricotta ravioli. And indeed, the produce was much perkier than at the grocery store.

My triumph was rather diminished that evening when I was looking for a laundromat in the yellow pages and found the very clear and obvious listing of all the weekly markets in the city (about 80 in all), including what I think are the organic markets (Ökomärkte). It's extremely useful though, and now I have a list of all the nearby markets I want to visit.

On the past two Saturdays we have gone to the main market in Eimsbüttel (our neighborhood) - it's the largest I've visited so far and has stalls selling fruits, vegetables and flowers, cheese, meat, socks, fish, spices and dried things (lentils, beans, etc.), slippers, fresh pasta, printer cartridges, clothing, and of course sausage. I was very relieved to see the spice vendor - for some reason I was concerned about being able to get spices and lentils and such in bulk. (I know, the things I worry about.) Many people seem to get their breakfast or lunch at the market, either from the sausage stands or from the other stands with prepared foods. There's even a stand with "vegetarian specialties"!


Today for lunch we had food from yesterday's market - some seriously stinky brie, dried ham, bread and fruit. Oh, and some tasty rosé. Wine with lunch, we must be in Europe!