Tomorrow I will have some friends dining at home, so I decide to prepare for them my famous coffee panna cotta . So, I have to go to Selam’s shop to buy fresh cream, the only one I found here in Addis that is not sour and that does not make my desserts taste like a cow’s cheese.
Why I chose it
For the freshness and the quality of the products they sell (I have had to accept the idea of buying dairy stuff without a production or expiry date) and for the fact that I make a good action while shopping.
What I usually buy
Fresh cream, yoghurt and, if I am very lucky, the best butter in town. Freshly baked bread (white, bran, soya, rye…), samosa and potato chips, donuts, cookies, and cakes. A good range of different vegetables: baby sweet carrots, crunchy salad, new potatoes, cherry tomatoes, cabbage, cauliflowers, mushroom, apple, radish… and even rhubarb. Pots, clay containers, jebena, apron and kitchen towels.
At the flower compound, I bought wonderful flowers, in pots or for the garden, and trees. I found there my fake Xmas tree, a nice araucaria that now is waiting for another Xmas season in my garden.
Sometimes I have lunch at the restaurant (open from 12 to 13.30) where the girls that are studying at the vocational training center prepare nice international dishes. The menu varies every day and the tables run out quickly.
What I don’t like
If I want to find a good range of product displayed, I have to go there at the end of the morning and if I want to be sure to find cream, or whatever else, it is better to call 011 646 29 39.
Where it is
From Maganagna roundabout, I take CMC road following the indication to Ayat. I pass the Beshale Hotel on my left and reach a big roundabout: I turn left and at the end of the road I arrive at a T junction, then I turn right. After about 1 km I a big antenna on the right and on the same side there is a wall that divides the main road from an unpaved, secondary road. I take this narrow road and turn right on the first street: Selam’s shop and restaurant is on your left. The flower exhibition is at the end of this road. Here it is a map.
I find Selam’s products also at the NGO market, that is held the last Saturday of each month at the evangelical church near Puskin Square.
Expat in Addis 