Thursday, January 7, 2010

Looking for familiar things

We have been here about 2 1/2 months. There are certain things that I have not been able to find here. Some of it is just convenience items like a normal everday trash can. In America, we use larger trash cans in the kitchen. Here the only cans we have found are for the bathroom and not even 12 inches high. People use the bags from the grocery stores for their trash.


The toilets are different too. That's another story.


Litle P loves pancakes but I haven't found pancake syrup. I need to investigate grocery stores in Messina to see if they sell American items.

Other items I haven't come across:


pecans (I knew I wouldn't find them)


brazil nuts
corn tortillas
elbow macaroni


horseradish


frozen corn - There isn't alot of frozen food here but it seems to be the same items from 10 different brands. Only veg I have seen is green beans, peas and spinach. I did get a bag of frozen stuff to make minestrone.


pickles

ground cloves - found whole ones, though


food coloring
In the US we bought a pasta called orzo. It looks kinda like rice. But here orzo is barley...strange!


I can't think of anything else right now...



But I did find this...




Corn nuts...here they are called mais, tostato e salato. I was shocked!

Boy, are they good too! Best snack food I have found here...







Maybe these are more familiar to some of you packaged this way. I grew up eating these in Texas but I think I only found a few bags in Pennsylvania.
I was surprised to find French's mustard, BBQ sauce, avocados, mangoes, taco shells, flour tortillas and other Mexican foods, worchestershire sauce, soy sauce and Asian foods.

6 comments:

Jane said...

JoAnne, Casey learned to like powdered sugar on his pancakes. Good luck finding syrup.

jmisgro said...

Sophia has been putting strawberry jelly on hers. I have been making her french toast more than pancakes! I love powdered suger on mine because it mixes with the butter and becomes icing!!
The powdered sugar come in such small boxes!!!

Jerry said...

I can only imagine the challenges. I guess it wil force you to cook Italian . . . which probably isn't a bad thing! LOL

jmisgro said...

It's not that bad!!
We don't eat much pasta. We eat a LOT more vegetables than they do here. I guess that's an American thing...don't know. Frank has eaten a ton of fruit since we have been here though!

Sophia said...

CORN NUTS, CORN NUTS, CORN NUTS!!!
I love corn nuts, someday I'm going to marry them!!!!! I will have them everyday for lunch if I have to. Nah, I'll do it anyway.:D

Alyson said...

Now I am enlightened! Nope, never heard of them or seen them before this though! I'll look out for them! Is there a US base on Sicily??