I am constantly being surprised by the new things I learn (about England, and just about life in general) every day. I see new things on the street, on TV, and from my friends. And trips to the grocery store are no exception. Recently, I completed an online shop with a few of my housemates. The concept is simple (and not one of the new things I am talking about); browse though an online catalogue of grocery store items, select what you want, check out, pay, and choose a day for delivery. This method of shopping works well if you, like us, don’t have a car or an easy transportation route to a grocery store and are looking to buy a lot of items. Delivery is not free but when you live with several people, like I do, group shops can often be arranged significantly bringing down the delivery charge (sometimes under a pound per person).

I have only done this online shopping once, however, because, well, it’s not a perfect system. If the grocery store happens to be out of one of the items you choose (the website is not always up to date) they can either just replace the item with something that is similar (regardless of cost). (Before ordering you can select an option to forego replacing missing items, if they don’t have what you asked for they will just take the price off the bill – the only problem with this is you can’t specify this option per item, so it’s either all or nothing.) In one instance, Richard ordered salt but the one he chose was sold out so instead the store replaced it with rock salt, which was useless to Richard because he doesn’t own a grinder.

When our delivery arrived, it was very exciting. It was like a Christmas where you knew your parents got you the stuff from your wish list but you’re not sure if they got everything, and you’ve only ever seen it in the catalogue so you’re anxious to see it life size. And perhaps not unlike some Christmas presents, you’re not entirely thrilled with what you got, except on this occasion it’s perfectly acceptable to vocalize your disappointment. Such was the case for me. I had ordered sliced peaches in a can (or a tin if your English) and the can was so small there must have only been a quarter of a peach in there. And, if it’s possible, I got an even smaller can of pineapple pieces. This was, in the end, my fault, because I didn’t read the mL amounts in the description of the item. But that information is so small and hidden, and of course the photos they use have nothing in which to compare scale. I just assumed all cans were generally the same size, like soup can size. I was very wrong. I still have a tiny can of green beans in my cupboard, fit for a tiny feast.

This experience reminded me that I like going to the grocery store. I like snaking through every single aisle, seeing items and coming up with meal ideas. Plus, how do you buy fresh food online? You can’t pick out the reddest tomatoes, or the juiciest grapes, or the perfect sized carrot for the one meal you need it for. Not to mention meat. I like to treat myself to some salmon fillets every once and a while, and I am not about to click a button and have someone else choose that for me. No sir, I like taking my time and looking at every tray on the shelf. Only the most perfect one is coming home with me.

The one thing I have enjoyed from my online shopping experience is something called Boil-In-A-Bag rice. This is a really cool invention. I am terrible at making rice. My parents used to make it with the exact right amount of water, so that when the rice was done the water was gone, like magic. I have tried this and I have failed. Then I tried to just boil a bunch of water and drop in the rice and strain it later like pasta. This worked a little bit better but I never had a strainer with holes smaller than rice, so I always scalded my hands trying to lid over pot draining technique. If I wasn’t so cheap I would definitely invest in a rice cooker; those things have got it down. But since I am cheap, I have to stick with my more economical options. Boil-In-A-Bag rice helps me do this. Each box of Boil-In-A-Bag contains 8 perforated baggies of rice, all you have to do is boil a pot of water and plop the bag in there for 18 to 20 minutes, and presto, side dish done. It’s well priced, too.

Now, as per the title of this post, I created a huge meal from this, unintentionally. The box states that each bag is one serving, fine. But when I poured the finished product on my plate I was amazing at how much rice there actually was. Definitely enough for 2 people, I’d say (although, not the way my housemates portion food). Maybe England has different suggested portion sizes than Canada, but I was overwhelmed. Just eating that amount of rice alone would have filled me up, let alone after I added the stir fry I was making. I put it all on my plate at first, it filled the whole thing and still had some height to it (and we have standard to large sized dinner plates), but I did end up putting half of it in the fridge for another day. The bottom line here is that I was almost embarrassed by the amount of food I had unintentionally made. Also, now I have an enormous amount of Boil-In-A-Bags left because I actually have twice as many meals as I thought! It’s a good thing rice doesn’t expire.