It’s midday on a Monday and I walk across the street to my local self-service verdulería to buy groceries. 

The shop vendor (verdulero), with whom I am on a first name-basis, asks me how I am and about my favorite president in U.S. history as I hand select my cuarto of cherry tomatoes from a wooden pallet, along with a couple school bus yellow plantanos, a seran wrapped package of hongos, and other random, miscellaneous vegetables I’ll transform into the week’s meals in my little studio apartment kitchen in Buenos Aires, the city I have called home for almost a year now. 

Admittedly, today I am in a rush. But I reply to my verdulero’s previous question with “Obama” and make small talk as I hand him the vegetables to put on the scale and ring up a bunch of espinaca. 

I appreciate the curiosity — an ever present aspect of life in Argentina, this connectedness, these small yet significant exchanges that represent more than just a transaction. 

I am someone who loves grocery shopping. Perhaps my love of gathering ingredients to make into something spans from childhood afternoons spent with my mom in the aisles of the Costco superstore, eating free samples of random packaged foods. 

Maybe it was running errands with my father, stopping at the supermarket to buy sheets of dried pasta, jarred tomato sauce with oregano, tubs of ricotta cheese, and mushrooms that would later become trays full of lasagna for our family’s dinner. 

In Buenos Aires, though, the way you buy groceries can seem a world apart from how you do in the U.S. 

Navigating a new scene

In the name of convenience in the States, you can often find everything you need all in one place and often in large quantities. 

There were the economical one-and-a-half liter bottles of wine I’d buy in my early-20s, the five feet of shelf space featuring a variety of brands and flavors for something as simple as a bag of granola or nostalgic puffed cereal. Or the spacious automated self-checkout stations, so you never have to speak to anyone if you don’t want to. 

In comparison, the less corporatized way of life is something I fell in love with in my initial travels to Argentina a couple of years ago. Of course, in Buenos Aires, there are the bigger supermercados, chain grocery stores, and every kind of corner store or kiosko. But still, if you want particular, specialty items, you’re going to have to get personal — and probably a little lost. 

When I returned to Buenos Aires to settle here, I was excited to get back to a way of living I found to be more relational, and in turn quite meaningful. From my previous times here, I sort of understood grocery shopping in the city. 

This includes navigating the different ofertas at different stores on different days of the week if you paid with different bank accounts, the cash discounts, the two loaves of bread for the price of one, how high quality Malbec and other wines could be found for significantly better prices at the neighborhood “chinos” compared to chain supermarkets.  

Yet even with this base knowledge, upon my return I found myself overwhelmed. 

The paradox of choice will get you when you’re new to this city, and in those early days, grocery shopping in Buenos Aires became something I dreaded. There were a million shops on every corner to choose from and the prices varied greatly. 

I wasn’t familiar with the brands at the supermarket, and it took me forever to find the things I needed. However, I decided to take the necessary time to acostumbrarme and learn how things worked.

Still, it took me months to understand how to shop at a carnicería and which verdulería offers the best quality and prices; let alone how to pronounce what I was buying in Spanish. I learned all of this largely through trial and error — after being charged quite different prices at one vedulería versus another down the street, I started to check the prices more carefully (if they were listed). 

Shopping for meat, I became a pro at signaling to the butcher that I would like my chicken breast (suprema or pechuga deshuesada, for deboned) fileted by creating a thin slicing motion through the air with my hand. 

When I bought carne for homemade spaghetti bolognesa, the butcher would run the meat through a grinder right then and there before placing it in a plastic bag with his gloved hands. To pay for groceries, I’d keep cash or a card on me, since I didn’t have Mercado Pago, which allows locals to pay with their digital wallets.

On one hand, the learning process was rewarding. On the other, knee deep in a grocery list just trying to figure out what’s for dinner, adjusting to the new aspects and language was challenging. 

By the time you finally understand how a carnicería works and the difference between bife de chorizo (similar to sirloin or NY strip) and vacio (flank steak with a fatty layer), the butcher hits on you and you quickly realize that, once again, you’re going to have to shop around. 

Luckily, in Buenos Aires there is no shortage of options. 

Embracing a different kind of convenience

It all got easier about four or five months into living here, when, like the city, I got curious. I eventually found the specialty coffee shop and bakery where I like to buy masa madre bread for sandwiches. 

It was a different kind of shop than the traditional panadería in which I liked to buy my facturas and dulce de leche cookies, grabbing a big metal bowl and tongs to select my pastries before bringing them to the register. 

As an avid baker, I learned I could go to the colorful baking ingredients shop, La Botica del Pastelero in Chacarita, to buy powdered sugar in bulk, rainbow sprinkles, or vanilla extract for a friend’s birthday cake. 

I’d find dry goods like pasta, rice, toiletries, and eight types of dulce de leche at the supermercado. But if I wanted to buy a block of tofu for a good price, I would have to go to a diétetica (health food shop). Then, there was the nearby dairy and cheese shop that sells a version of sardo cheese that reminds me of my favorite manchego I’d buy in the states. 

I could go to the kosher market for freshmade braided challah or Sheikob’s bagel shop in Palermo for comfort food reminiscent of my Jewish heritage and my New Yorker parents. At the Arabic shop, I could buy delicious hummus. New Garden, my friend told me just months ago, was the store to buy quinoa and a variety of spices in bulk. When I needed help finding an ingredient, I could ask a friend or there was the foodie-focussed Whatsapp group that shared tips for grocery shopping, too. 

After the overwhelm faded, I once again could clearly see the things I loved about grocery shopping — and living — in Buenos Aires, like the fact that the verdulería, pasta shop, panaderías, heladería, and pizza place are all located conveniently on my block, a stone’s throw away in my little corner of the city. 

Convenience and efficiency was key to grocery shopping in the U.S., sure. But here, convenience looked different. And soon I began to appreciate it. 

I began to look forward to the seasonal shift of the fruits and vegetables at the verdulerías, enjoying my pick of ripe, sweet frutillas nestled and propped up in pallets (not all verdulerías are self-service, though, and sometimes, the verdulero selects each item for you and weighs the quantities to sell by the kilo).

I now look forward to trips to Casa China in Barrio Chino (Buenos Aires’ Chinatown, in Belgrano) to stock up on sriracha, chili paste, soy sauce, garam masala, and baharat seasoning (except on Sundays, when the stores in the bustling barrio become packed to the brim with shoppers perusing the aisles after having a bao bun, onigiri, or Korean hot dog at one of the many Asian food stands or restaurants). I let myself wander more and see what else the neighborhoods have in store for me, and for my cooking.  

Adjusting to living in Buenos Aires has taught me it’s important to note that the foods you once loved (or even knew intimately) in your home country don’t disappear, they just transform. 

Accepting and embracing those transformations and differences is part of the pleasure of living here. After all, they were what drew me to this city in the first place.

© Buenos Aires Herald