SHARE
COPY LINK

WEATHER

Rain in Spain blamed for supermarket veg rations in UK

British supermarket giants Tesco and Morrisons said they were rationing vegetable sales on Friday as shoppers tweeted their frustration over widespread shortages caused by bad weather in southern Europe.

Rain in Spain blamed for supermarket veg rations in UK
Photo: AFP

Courgettes, broccoli, aubergines and salads were either unavailable or in very short supply in a selection of supermarkets in central London.

“Sorry: Temporarily Out of Stock”, read a sign on the lettuce shelf in a Tesco, Britain's biggest supermarket chain, near St Paul's Cathedral.

“Due to bad weather conditions in Spain, we are experiencing some availability issues, but are working with our suppliers to resolve them as quickly as possible,” a Tesco spokesman told AFP.

“To make sure customers don't miss out, we are asking them to limit the number of iceberg lettuces they buy to three,” he said.

Morrisons, the fourth largest food retailer, said it too was imposing limits of three heads of broccoli and two iceberg lettuces per shopper. 

“We have seen some bulk buying in our stores,” a spokesman said. 

“We have therefore had a cap on sales of broccoli and iceberg lettuce to ensure we maintain good supplies for our regular customers,” he said. 

READ MORE: How the rain in Spain could thwart your new year diet plan

At a Morrisons outlet in south London, one frustrated morning shopper, who declined to give her name, said vegetables were already almost out of stock. 

She said the few courgettes that were available were too expensive at £3.53 (€4.1, $4.4) per kilo.

Prices have risen sharply in recent weeks as supermarkets have resorted to bringing in vegetables from further afield, including the United States. 

Healthy eaters went online to vent their anger, using hashtags including #courgettecrisis and #lettucecrisis, while some younger consumers retorted that a vegetable shortage was no crisis at all.

The Times and Guardian newspapers quipped that the rationing was only “the tip of the iceberg”.

Southern Spain was hit by heavy rain in December and a particularly cold spell in January including snow, cutting fruit and vegetable production this year.

Spain is the biggest producer and exporter of fruit and vegetables in the European Union.

Britain and France are its two biggest export markets.

“Contrary to popular belief it seems the rain in Spain doesn't fall mainly on the plain and a run of unusually bad weather has resulted in availability issues,” said a spokesman for Asda, another large retailer.

By Alice Tidey / AFP

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

FOOD AND DRINK

Why do they pour cider like that in Spain’s Asturias?

The green northern region’s drink of choice is cider but it’s the method waiters have of pouring it from a great height that catches the attention of ‘out-ciders’.

Why do they pour cider like that in Spain's Asturias?

They say Asturian blood is 50 percent water and 50 percent cider, and given the 40 million bottles produced every year in the region, it doesn’t seem too hard to believe.

However, it’s the method of serving cider in Asturias which really captures the imagination. 

The bottle will either come attached to a contraption which sucks up the cider and splurts it into a wide but thin-rimmed glass.

Or the waiter will come out every few minutes to grab your bottle and glass, lift the former high up with one arm and the latter down low around waist height before pouring some of the cider into the glass from at an arm’s length. 

There’s even a verb for this action – escanciar – to decant.  

The objective is for the cider to be shaken and aerated so that its natural carbon dioxide ‘awakens’.

When it is poured from above and hits the glass, carbon dioxide bubbles are produced that make the aroma of the cider come alive.

It’s good and normal for there to be splashback when pouring Asturian cider, but the aim is still to get most of it in the glass. (Photo by MIGUEL RIOPA / AFP)

These bubbles go away quickly so once served, the customer should quickly drink the culín (small bottom) up in one swig. 

The action of escanciar imitates how cider would be traditionally served when it went directly from big oak barrels to the glass, as cider has been the drink of choice in Asturians since before Roman times. 

READ ALSO: Why Spaniards’ habit of drinking alcohol every day is surprisingly healthy

This is after all natural cider which doesn’t come with the sugar, additives and pre-carbonated mixes of brands such as Strongbow, Magners or Kopparberg.

“It took me some time to get the hang of pouring cider, I missed the mark a lot, and my arm used to get very tired at first,” a Latin American waitress at a bar in Gijón told The Local Spain. 

Many sidrerías (cider houses) and restaurants have cylindrical tubes on wheels where escanciadores (the waiters in charge of pouring cider) can put the glass in to avoid making a mess on the floor or splashing customers, as there is always some splatter even if they don’t completely miss the mark. 

A waiter pours cider for customers at a cider bar in the northern Spanish city of Oviedo (Photo by RAFA RIVAS / AFP)

The more old-school chigres (cider house in Asturian) prefer to have sawdust all over the floor to absorb the spilt cider.

To pour, tirar (throw) or escanciar (decant) cider like an Asturian, you should tilt the bottle slowly from above and aim for the cider to hit the top part of the inside side of the glass, which has to be held at a 45-degree angle. It’s this that brings out the effervescence out in la sidra natural.  

So when you visit the beautiful region of Asturias and you tuck into their famously ample servings of fabada asturiana (Asturian bean stew) or cachopo (meat, cheese and ham all together in breadcrumbs), washed down with one or two bottles of sidra, now you’ll understand what’s behind this eye-catching tradition.

READ ALSO: Eight fascinating facts about Spain’s Asturias region

SHOW COMMENTS