I hate auchan (but it is very cheap)

And then what did I do but end up - for the first time in Moscow - in an enormous, packed Auchan/ашан supermarket where I found myself buying (much cheaper) valenki anyway...

getting the boot(s)

As the Moscow News guide said, there is a street market alongside Donskaya Ulitsa, selling mainly food but also these valenki - traditional felt boots. Sorely tempted even though my luggage is already stuffed full. And what can I do with valenki in Islington, north London?

Cant believe it! So excited - I thought I found an organic fresh foods delivery service last year, but it turned out to be in Moscow, Idaho. Then just found one here. I was following up a reference to an american guy called Jay Close who is making his own cheese on a farm not far from Moscow and that led to Lavka Fresh Food from Local Farmers (image from their website). Haven't tried it yet as I am back in London next week... but then...

And then, close to Rimskaya metro itself, I found a good fresh food and miscellaneous indoor and outdoor market. The smells of fresh herbs - dill and basil - were just glorious. More pickles, this time laid out neatly, but also vegetables, fruit, nuts, fresh teas and spices. Fab. I was actually planning to get on a mini-bus at the metro stop to go to ашан/Auchun (finally) - which together with Ramstore - is a chain of Moscow hypermarkets; the places I am told where you can get those things that can be difficult to find elsewhere, like lightbulbs.

But once I was in the market, I couldn't be bothered. 

My hunt for local food markets has also taken a decided turn for the better, partly because with the weather improving more places are opening up. I found this one - near Rimskaya metro - entirely by mistake.


I was actually looking for a flea market in Shkolnaya Street - which is famous enough to get its own page on Wikipedia. It is a heritage protection area, a street of 19th century row houses and what were coaching inns now pedestrianised - like the much more famous Arbat - and with massive Khrushchev-period tower blocks looming behind. The story goes that the plan to attract more shoppers and tourists was unsuccessful, and so instead permission was given to host a flea market. Whilst the Arbat has become - to my mind - a boring tourist trap, Shkolnaya Street remains an ordinary, if slightly artificial because neatly decorated, Moscow street.


There was no sign of  the flea market on the Saturday I went, just a few food and clothes stalls  - like the pickles van above - but an interesting walk all the same. 

market time

Went to Cheap Sunday last weekend (which, confusingly, was on Saturday). Just like London, the many redundant factory buildings in Moscow are busy being converted into alternative arts venues and hosting miscellaneous 'pop-up' events - this one a fashion market. Cut-price designer labels, cheap mass-produced jeans and young designers making their own clothes and accessories mainly. I still can't get used to fashion here; too much of the very tight jeans (men and women), extreme high heels (women) and pointy-toed shoes (men), together with lots of fur, shiny fabrics and things that glitter.

I know I am being unfair - people are probably to close to a recent history of not having stuff to want to dress down in that insouciant way you see in many other European cities - but I just cannot get used to how starched, stiff and self-consciously posed most 'fashionable people' look. 

I don't know why I find this funny but I do....

hat time again...

life is a bowl of...

Whilst still not being organised enough to buy basics efficiently (light-bulbs, washing powder, saucepans (!)) I am getting better at buying fresh fruit and vegetables from various markets. I agree with a fellow blogger that you can eat healthily this way; in fact really beginning to get into seasonal produce (although I might say something different come the depths of winter.)

So right now, of course, it is berries and mushroom time. Shown are dogwood or cornelian cherries and I have been told just to add a bit of sugar, leave for ten minutes and then boil up quickly with water to make a drink, with the combined taste of cherries and cranberries.

It tastes good and fresh and has already put me off buying readymade fruit juice in a box. Any other recipes welcome, before the berry season ends....

turning food shopping into a big deal

Getting a bit worried that I am only writing about (and from the inside of) my new flat - my excuse being a combination of being very busy at work, and the excitement of so many local comings and goings.

I did go out last weekend, trying out one of my standard methods for exploring new places - randomly getting on public transport and finding out what happens at the end of the line. The 24 tram this time, to Novogireevo (pretty ordinary). But really, I was just trying to find a decent cheap supermarket, of which there seems to be a serious dearth around my new location. I did find an okay open-air market en route, but  still had to lug my shopping back a considerable way. So, then on Sunday I ended up taking a 2 hour walk -  again in search of such a supermarket -  this time leading inexorably back to the two good, cheap(ish) food shops near my old flat. Followed by another long walk back with bags.

more on food

Think I have finally gone native in my eating habits. Well, actually that is wrong on two counts. First, I am not sure that anyone else in Moscow is sitting down to a plate that looks anything like this for dinner. And, second, I really wanted more of a frankfurter type sausage, but have too frequently accidently purchased the ones that are basically made out of condoms and have to be boiled, rather than the ones that can be fried - and on trying to fry them, have been left only with a plastic-coated disaster.

And since I was buying the sausages at my local outdoor market (which is brilliant) I could only ask for ones that I could pronounce, because my Russian is still terrible. So in fact what I have finally gone is lazy.

Cold weather, frozen veg

When the temperature stays in the -10s for weeks if not months, I guess it is a quite ordinary thing to sell solidly frozen vegetables from an open stall....

Pet shopping

Beyond the gates of VDNKh there is a straggling single line of people, mainly older women, standing silently offering a few things for sale such as sweaters or embroidery. Near the gate itself, though, the goods turn out to be almost all kittens and puppies, bundled up inside each person's coat or bag, with only their little heads sticking out.  Sooo cute....

Moscow hats time- and what a choice!

Going mental

This place, the electronics market at Savyolovskaya/савёловская , as one of my colleagues put it quite factually "a bit mental'. You come out of the metro (on the grey line, just beyond the ring) and find yourself in an extremely brightly lit and narrow corridor with one electronics shop after another on either side which, I swear, is about three-quarters of a mile long. And that is just the beginning of a huge maze of stalls offering stuff to buy.

It certainly challenged my assumptions about what you can buy in Moscow and the high prices of everything imported. It is true that there are odd things that are hard to find for no particular reason - like particular sorts of batteries and blutack for example - but here there were more contemporary electronics than you would ever need, and which didn't seem more expensive than Europe (although I got mainly obsessed by 1.) Digital SLR cameras and 2.) iPod accessories so I can only speak for those particular products). It felt like Tokyo, not Moscow.

It did make me think about how I interpret conspicuous consumption here. Of course in London and the UK shops do that fully-glazed/please come in/look at all our goods and are focused in high streets and hypermarkets. Moscow is more like other European countries, where shops are often surprisingly hard to identity - not just because of language, but also because doors are often shut, windows no different from offices, and location not always obvious. And, increasingly, I am finding places like Dmitrovskaya. Huge areas which are half-way between a market and a department store. Huge being the operative word.