In Galicia the local fresh produce markets are referred to as Praza de abastos or sometime Mercado de abastos. During our time here we have ventured to the local market most weeks. It has an amazing fresh vegetable area that just has local produce picked that day from local gardens but only whatever is in season. Whenever possible this would be where we purchased our vegetables and salad. Tasted so good just like home straight from the farm or Dad’s garden. In the general market outside, there are other stalls that stock fruit and vegetables from all over Spain.

There is also a seafood market that again is stocked only with fresh local produce. Most would be from the Ria Arousa or the atlantic. We can see the mussel farms in the ria arousa from our apartment – 1kg of mussels €2.40 about $4.

We had a favourite butcher that we disovered when we first arrived and she was really lovely and the beef was always excellent. We had to learn what the cuts of meat here are called as they are all different to home and only the entrecot (looked like porterhouse) and the ossobuco looked familiar. So a bit of experimenting to start with.

Most of the stallholders in the vegetable, seafood or meat sections were nearly always women.

You can also grab a loaf of amazing galician bread (you pay by the weight) or some cheese and smallgoods.

We have a deli/cheese man that had a van just outside the fresh produce building and we first noticed him because there were always lots of people waiting to be served. We figured we would check him out and he was one of our best discoveries. Always giving us and everyone else waiting a slice of cheese with quince paste to taste or whatever other cheese he was cutting up for someone else again gave us all a taste. So for us who had no idea about Galician cheese types and names he was a godsend. Our favourite was queso tres leches (cheese from 3 milk – cow, goat and sheep). He sold great cheese, smallgoods, quince paste and honey. We will miss him.