Yeah, I don't think I can get the exact equivalent of your vegetable shortening in regular supermarkets here. Wikipedia informs me that here it's only used in industrial bakeries here in Germany (though apparently there exists some brand in Austria that's sold for non-industrial household use). But I've never seen anything like that. Recipes here always either say butter or margarine. (Or lard in some cases, but I don't eat that because I'm vegetarian so anything directly from dead animals is out.) And then there are the hard vegetable fats like palm/cocos fat that you can buy in blocks. And of course oils.