9 travel tips that work for COVID food-gathering adventures

We embarked on our first COVID food-gathering foray after our 14-day isolation with some trepidation. All the advice and tips from friends and family rang in our ears: Get in and “get the hell out” asap. Don’t squeeze the mangos before choosing. Good luck finding flour. 

Armed with Purell and Dettol wipes, we joined the long cold line-up outside No Frills in Arnprior. But as we waited, it occurred to us that we already knew much of what’s required. We’ve travelled a lot in developing countries and elsewhere and know, as anyone like us should, the basic food-gathering tips to stay safe. And many of those tips work equally well in this new COVID world.

Granted, there are some new rules now, like one-way grocery aisles, standing six feet apart in lines, and only one household member in the store at once. But we were relieved and reassured to discover that we weren’t complete newbies.

Here are our nine tips from developing-world travel that cross over to the brave new world of COVID food-gathering adventures – in grocery stores and take-out restaurants.

1. Clean your hands often. Wash with soap and water whenever you can or use hand sanitizer, such as Purell.

2. Don’t touch your face. Enough said.

3. When you’re unsure about anything, hang back and watch the locals to understand the prevailing culture. Where do people get carts or baskets, and who cleans them? We sat in the No Frills parking lot for a minute to see if shoppers got them from the parking lot roundup or the shelter near the entrance. Bill cleaned it himself before going into the store. Do fruits and vegetables get weighed at the cash or in the department? In Boquete, Panama, I had to run from the cash back to the vegetable department to get one onion weighed. The clerk slapped a price sticker right on the onion skin. Things aren’t always done the same as in Canada.

4. Know that you won’t necessarily find everything on your list. Be prepared to substitute on the fly with what you can find. Flour seems to be in short supply now that everyone is at home baking, so we bought bread instead. In Panama, we couldn’t find baking soda, so substituted it with triple the baking powder. In Argentina, we substituted squash for pumpkin and dulce de leche for condensed milk.

5. At the cash, join a long line-up so you can watch and learn before it’s your turn. Lineups have their own particular cultures in different countries, and things have changed here in Canada. Do people bring their own bags or are they supplied? Who packs the bags? How do people pay – cash only or cards? Will the cashier insert your card in the reader or do you do it?

6. Boil it, peel it, wash it, or forget it. This basic travel mantra applies especially now to fresh fruits and vegetables. Wash them with soap and water or rub with hand sanitizer before peeling or cutting, to ensure COVID or any other germs on the outside aren’t transferred to the inside. Avoid lettuce and berries that are hard to clean.

7. Clean the tops of drink bottles and cans before you open and drink from them. In the new COVID world, this applies to all groceries, not just those you intend to put your lips on.

8. Make sure restaurants or take-out joints look clean. While you can’t always assume cleanliness means germless, if it’s openly dirty, and especially if it has flies, avoid it. If the customer area isn’t clean, the kitchen likely isn’t either.

9. Look for busy restaurants or take-out food joints. Busy means high turnover of food, which means it’s more likely to remain hot and less likely to sit around cooling off into the temperature danger zone for bacterial growth.

We’ve always followed these tips when travelling anywhere, but especially in developing countries, and have rarely been sick – nothing that we thought was food-related anyhow! We’ve now transferred them to our COVID food-gathering adventures.