Chinatown Food Market
Where Far East Meets Midwest
Call it nostalgia or comfort food. Perhaps one of your best childhood memories involves the cinnamon scent of your grandmother’s famous apple pie popping out of the oven or the buttery flavor of your mother’s mashed potatoes. In my own childhood, I often came home from elementary school and opened the door to the mouthwatering aromas of curry and steaming bowls of jasmine rice prepared by my mother. While my classmates chomped on potato chips and Ho Hos for lunch, my brown bag was full of shrimp chips and mochi, a sticky rice cake. I often traded my noodle soup bowls for their Dinty Moore stews, each meal uncommon to the other child.
Most of the spices and many of the ingredients in my mother’s dishes came directly from her native country of Malaysia. When I was nine years old, my parents took me for a trip down the streets of Sarawak, a city located on my mother’s home island of Borneo in eastern Malaysia. We visited open-air markets, where locals bartered over regional produce like rambutans and starfruit, and the combined odors of fresh herring, the putrid but tasty regional fruit durian, and belacan, or shrimp paste, smothered the tropical air. I drank sweet coconut milk and rose water sold from street vendors, and ate special desserts like chendol (shaved ice, coconut milk, noodles, and palm sugar) and ice kacang (shaved ice with sweet syrup and toppings). Being exposed to these delectable exotic treats, I developed a palate that could not be satisfied in the Midwest by apples or peanut butter and jelly alone.
Asia in Kansas City
Since becoming an adult interested in ethnic foods and my own Asian heritage, I have sought out ways that would be cheaper than buying a plane ticket back to Malaysia to satisfy my longing for longans, a sweet Chinese fruit. Modern Chinatowns across the Western hemisphere are often large tourist attractions that seek to replicate the culture of Asian cities with Chinese street signs and decorations, Asian events, corner noodle shops, and street vendors. I’ve visited the Chinatowns in Chicago, Boston, Vancouver, and Los Angeles, to find parallels between my experiences in Malaysia and these small Asian communities in Western urban areas. Cuisine is one of the most distinguishing characteristics of any Chinatown, especially in some of the world’s largest markets located in San Francisco, London and Paris. Kansas City is no different. With fresh seafood, traditional Asian products, and shoppers of diverse ethnicities, I found my own corner of Chinatown in Kansas City at Chinatown Food Market, located at 202 Grand, just north of the historic City Market.
This Asian grocery store carries a high volume of Asian fare, including Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Thai, Filipino, Malaysian, and Indian. Each aisle is charged with smells from spices and flavors around the world, be it boxes of Indian biryani rice, cans of Thai curry paste, or fresh seafood. On a typical Saturday, you can hear an assortment of languages including Cantonese, Japanese, English, and Spanish. You can find anything from oyster sauce to pho noodles for a delicious Vietnamese soup, Japanese miso paste, and wooden Buddhas and incense holders for your living room. Chinatown Food Market offers foods to those who have emigrated from other countries throughout Asia, and to those willing to try new types of cuisine.
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