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| - What the hell was I thinking wandering into this place before dinnertime? I think I just committed myself to grilling bulgogi and kalbi for the rest of the summer. Jesus.
Also? A 5lb bag of cayenne pepper. GET IN MY CART.
A "wtf is this?" box of jalapeno & cheese naan and an
even more "wtf is this?" box of frozen pizza samosas. GET IN MY CART!
A giant container of hot sriracha peas? GET IN MY CART!
Jufran extra hot banana sauce. GET IN MY CART.
15 kinds of Pocky, including chocolate banana and flaked coconut - two flavors I've never had before. GET IN MY CART - THE WHOLE LOT OF YA.
Anyway, you get the picture.
Asiana is a well-organized market in Glendale with pretty attractive prices - very competitive with Lee Lee in that sense and nowhere near as manic. While Korean goods are the main star in this store (hello giant jar of super hot kimchi...which I put in my cart), they are far from the only items. A good amount of Chinese and Japanese food and quite an impressive selection of Indian foodstuffs - from refrigerated sweets, to frozen kulfi, pistachio and falooda flavored ice cream, 40 kinds of frozen naan/chapati/paratha/roti, and an impressive dry goods aisle, including a wall of spice mixes. In fact, if you see far more Indians shopping here than anyone else like I did, you know the prices are damn good.
Everything in the produce aisle looked fresh and not remotely wilted, rotten, and bruised. I also put a Chinese eggplant in my cart.
There's also a boba stall right at the entrance and a Pakistani snack counter next to it which I can't tell if it exists anymore (no one was there yesterday).
So, all in all, would I recommend shopping at Asiana Market?
Yes.
Would I recommend shopping at Asiana Market before you've had your dinner?
No.
Unless you want to end up back home with 4 kinds of Chinese hot mustard and a rack of beef short ribs to grill when it's 5 billion degrees outside like me. Or if you're starving and the middle aged Chinese lady in line in front of you is obviously a restaurant owner with 3 shopping carts full of tubs of soy sauce and is trying to haggle with the cashier over the 15 lbs of green onions she's buying. But whatever.
4 stars.
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