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Missing Food

I love Portuguese food, but there are some things I miss dearly, one of them being sour cream. My wife however stumbled across Queijo Fresco Batido, and although it isn't exactly the same as sour cream (it is more like the German Quark), when mixed with a small amount of cream it makes an almost perfect sour cream - just the thing for borsht on a hot summer day! The Phoenicia brand is a good one to get. Also if you have a taste, but not a budget, for caviar, you can sometimes find lamprey eggs (lampreia) in the market, which is the best non-sturgeon alternative that I have found.

Of course if you live in the Algarve you have a wide range of foreign, mostly German, foods to choose from, such as real sour cream (marked "Saure Sahne") and pickled herring, which most Portuguese find disgusting.

I have also been told by Luisa Eckroade that sour cream is not really that big a problem - she writes as follows: "After reading your story about sour cream and how you miss it.  There are several ways of overcoming that:

1. GB Store in S. João do Estoril usually carries it - no problem - all ready to serve
2. Try putting a few drops of lemon juice into a normal package of "natas"  (cream) and there you have sour cream, after you have beaten them  up until fluffy.
3. If not ... well, just do without.  It's healthier and you can substitute mostly everything with yoghurt or good fresh Portuguese cheese bought that day!!"

Alas, doing without is not possible - some people smoke, some do drugs, but I consume sour cream. I am sure that the northern or eastern Europeans who read this will sympathise!

Another food that North Americans really miss is cranberry sauce. Aha! - the German word for cranberries is Moosbeeren, and you may be able to find it in shops catering to Germans. But it is also a Russian favourite, and I have found it in Russian shops where the word Moosbeeren appears on the label along with the Russian name КЛЮКВА.

But be careful about Portuguese translations. My wife, who does not know German, was pleased to find a jar marked Ovos de Lampreia (lamprey caviar, which is delicious) in the market, but it was a German product and the original German name was Seehasenrogen, which means lumpfish. Since lumpfish are not found in Portuguese waters, I suppose that the distributor came up with the name of a local fish, but other producers use the more honest neologism "Lumpo" to describe the product.

I also have a recommendation for those who love ice cream.

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