Grazing on free food samples at two large Korean supermakets

At $24.99, boxes of sweet potatoes on sale at H&Y Marketplace in Ridgfield still are more expensive than smaller quantities at ShopRite, Costco Wholesale and Trader Joe's.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Fresh fruit, dumplings, tofu and noodles are among the free samples available on weekends at Korean supermarkets in Ridgefield and Little Ferry.

H&Y Marketplace in Ridgefield is smaller than the Super H Mart down the road, but a lot less crowded and easier to navigate on a Sunday.

True, there are fewer samples at H&Y.

But the shopping center at 1 Remsen Place also boasts a storefront where Arirang Kimchi set up shop after many years of turning out preservative-free cabbage, cucumber and other kimchis in Englewood.

H&Y also sells Jun's Tofu, a GMO-free product made in the store, and a refrigerated gochujang, a spicy red-pepper paste made with sugar, not high fructose corn syrup.

I purchased cooked conch, one of the samples I tried ($7.99 a pound).

In a bid to drum up business, H&Y is now offering buy one and get one free on hundreds of items on the first day of every month.

Free samples of fresh fruit, above and below, are among the choices on weekends at H&Y Marketplace, a Korean supermarket at 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield.

After enjoying fresh fruit, cooked conch and other samples at H&Y, I went next door to buy two jars of cabbage kimchi at Arirang Kimchi. 

At H Mart in Little Ferry, a refrigerated case holding panchan or side dishes that are served at every Korean meal. The price of this prepared food from Jinga and other outside Korean caterers has spiked in the past year.

Free samples at H Mart

The shabby H Mart in Little Ferry probably offers more free samples on weekends than any other store in the chain outside of Super H Mart, but you don't have to fight crowds, just navigate around potholes and floods in the parking lot.

Usually, H Mart also has bigger discounts than H&Y.

Near H Mart's fresh-fish counter on Sunday, I tried cooked whelk and octopus, and raw farmed-salmon sashimi.

Elsewhere, there were samples of cold noodles topped with a bit of ice and thick udon noodles in hot broth; two kinds of meat-free dumplings, small squares of fried tofu, curry with vegetables over white rice and more fresh fruit.

At H Mart in Little Ferry, 15-pound bags of Kokuho Yellow Label Rice, grown in California, are deeply discounted until Dec. 31, below.

Also on sale at H Mart were 16-portion boxes of dry Shin Ramyun Gourmet Spicy Noodles for $9.99.

Free samples of cooked whelk and octopus with a small plate of gochujang, a spicy red-pepper paste.

Three of the side dishes I brought home from H Mart in Little Ferry are Stewed Tofu, bottom right, (a dozen pieces for $4.99); Bu-Chu Dumplings filled with noodles and crumbled tofu, left (eight for $5.99), and Japchae, stir-fried translucent noodles made from yam flour ($5.49). I had them for breakfast with a simple egg-white omelet stuffed with reduced-fat Swiss cheese.

Arirang's Mahk or Cabbage Kimchi. Made by hand without MSG or preservatives, a 64-ounce jar is about $11.

A few good buys at ShopRite's Can Can Sale and at Super H Mart

At the Super H Mart in Ridgefield on Sunday, king whiting, front, and red snapper, both wild caught, were $3.99 and $4.99 a pound, respectively. Whole porgy (not shown) were only $2.99 a pound.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Now you see it, now you don't.

That seems to be the nature of sales in such supermarkets as ShopRite in Paramus and Super H Mart in Ridgefield.

At the Paramus ShopRite, the second week of the Summer Can Can Sale doesn't offer the same deals as last week.

On Friday, I used a Super Coupon I clipped from a flier to purchase three 28-bottle packs of Poland Spring for $10 with the store card and the purchase of $10 in other items.

My other purchases were Bing Cherries from Washington State for $1.67 a pound, two 1-pound packages of Luigi Vitelli Organic Whole Wheat Fusilli at $1.25 each and a 3-pound bag of Organic Sweet Potatoes for $5.99. 

We used a second Super Coupon to buy three more 28-bottle packs of Poland Spring for $10 at the Englewood ShopRite.

The Summer Can Can flier that came with Sunday's paper no longer offers the Poland Spring deal.

And the Paramus ShopRite last week didn't repeat the deal on six pints of New Jersey Blueberries that I purchased for $6.99 on July 10.

H Mart -- a week later

On Sunday, I found the usually good prices on fresh fish at the Super H Mart in Ridgefield.

I bought two wild-caught whole king whiting that weighed about 2.5 pound each ($3.99 a pound).

My wife cut them into about eight pieces, and seasoned, floured and pan fried them.

Whiting is a mild-tasting fish that flakes beautifully, and the central spine is just about the only bone you have to deal with.

Baby Mustard Greens or Gaichoy were 88 cents a pound, a discount of 10 cents a pound, and two heads of red-leaf lettuce were 99 cents or half-price.

I wanted to buy another large, heavy watermelon like the one I got a week earlier for $6.49, but all of those I saw were smaller and the price went up a dollar per melon.

The produce section of the Super H Mart, the Korean chain's biggest store in Bergen County.

Super H Mart makes its own cabbage kimchi and sells several bottled brands, but I prefer to go to Arirang Kimchee, which specializes in cabbage, cucumber and other kimchi, at H&Y Marketplace, Ridgefield, not far from Super H Mart.

Details

ShopRite, 224 Route 4 east at Forest Avenue, Paramus; 1-201-291-4180. Open 7 days.

Super H Mart, 321 Broad Ave., Ridgefield; 1-201-943-9600. Open 7 days.

Arirang Kimchee, 1 Remsen Place, Ridgefield; 1-201-313-7975. Call for hours.

For fresh fish, good food and more, shop and eat where Koreans do

For dinner on Sunday night, I enjoyed a whole fresh black sea bass from H Mart -- baked in an aluminum-foil pouch for 30 minutes at 450 degrees with fresh tomato, onion, garlic and lime juice. You'll also need a spoon to enjoy the resulting soup.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The biggest H Mart in Bergen County also is the busiest, and parking in the big lot can be tough.

But on Sunday afternoon, to my surprise, there were plenty of empty spaces at the Super H Mart in Ridgefield.

The shopping challenge was inside -- narrow aisles and customers with carts stopping for free food samples -- every four or five feet it seemed -- more than at the other H Marts in Fort Lee, Englewood, Leonia and Little Ferry (weekends only).

If you've never tried Korean food, here is an ideal place to sample cooked and dried fish and other seafood; tofu, soup, cold or hot noodles, dumplings, meat, sausage and the traditional side dishes that accompany every meal.

Adding to the shopping experience, Korean-American college students and other food samplers call out what they are offering in Korean.

But when I had questions -- such as, "Is there any meat in that?" -- all of the ones I spoke to on Sunday were bilingual.

The night before, we drove to Palisades Park for dinner at So Gong Dong, a popular restaurant for Korean comfort food -- soft-tofu stew with all the trimmings for only $10.

The fresh seafood selection is so big fish is displayed on plenty of ice on both sides of the counter, and customers can chose what they want with tongs, put their purchase in a plastic bag and hand it over for free cleaning. Fish can be left whole, cut into steaks, filleted or prepared in other ways.

A confusing sign on fresh wild salmon lists two species, Sockeye and Coho.

Among the many free food samples on Sunday was cooked top shell, also called whelk or sea snail, dipped in a spicy sauce.

Wild-caught red snapper.

Whole Monkfish Tail was $5.99 a pound. So was the Black Sea Bass, and the four I purchased for our Sunday dinner averaged a little over 1 pound each. 

Organic lettuce

My other purchases included Organic Red Leaf Lettuce for $1.99, a better buy than the same lettuce grown conventionally for $1.49.

A 15-pound bag of Kokuho Yellow Label Rice, grown in California, was $9.99, a savings of $7.

A large, heavy watermelon was $6.49, and three bunches of scallions were 99 cents.

We love kimbap, a sliced seaweed-and-rice roll stuffed with vegetables and fish cake, but a small package prepared in the store was pricey at $5.49.

H Mart Smart Card

If you forget your ShopRite Price Plus Club Card, you can enter your phone number into a terminal and get the deals associated with it on the spot.

But if you forget your H Mart Smart Card, you have to return to the store with your receipt to be credited for the 1% rebate associated with it ($10 after your purchases total $1,000, and special coupons).

A few days after I wrote this, I took back two receipts, but was given credit for only one. I was told no credit is given for receipts more than a month old.

Also, the large Super H Mart lot has only three parking-lot corrals for shopping carts, and your car could be damaged by another customer who doesn't bother returning a cart to one of them.

The biggest H Mart in Bergen County is in Ridgefield.

Details

Super H Mart, 321 Broad Ave., Ridgefield; 1-201-943-9600. Open 7 days, free parking in large lot.

This H Mart is in a shopping center with other Korean businesses, including a bakery, restaurants and an appliance store.

So Gong Dong in Palisades Park specializes in complete soft-tofu dinners, but you also can find B.B.Q. Squid with Spicy Sauce, an unusually hot gochujang, for $12.99, including two kinds of kimchi and three other side dishes. The squid was very tender, but I needed a pair of scissors to separate the rings.

Pajun, a grilled seafood-and-scallion pancake made from rice flour, is $11.99, and can be shared by four to six. 

Clockwise from top, pickled radish, bean sprouts, cucumber kimchi, cabbage kimchi, a dipping sauce for the grilled pancake and seaweed in gochujang, a red-pepper paste.

My wife's stone bowl of soft tofu was bubbling furiously when brought to the table, ideal for poaching the fresh egg that comes with it. This bowl of Pork Soft Tofu is Medium Spicy, one of the spice levels you can specify.

So Gong Dong offers 11 soft-tofu stews with a fresh egg, steamed rice and five side dishes, a complete meal for $9.99 (rounded up to $10 on the check, including tax).

Big tables are designed to accommodate multi-generational families or groups of men.

Details

So Gong Dong, 118 Broad Ave., Second Floor, Palisades Park; 1-201-313-5550. Free parking on side streets. 

Fighting the crowds for bargains at Super H Mart in Ridgefield

I say Kabocha, you say Kabucha. This Asian winter squash was on sale for 49 cents a pound with a store card on Sunday at the Super H Mart in Ridgefield, the Korean chain's biggest supermarket in  Bergen County.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The biggest Korean supermarket in Bergen County also is the busiest food store outside of Costco Wholesale in Hackensack, especially on Sundays.

If you drive less than a mile from the much smaller H&Y Marketplace to the Super H Mart, the contrast is dramatic in the number of cars in the huge parking lot and the number of customers pushing carts through the store.

I fought the Super H Mart crowds on Sunday, picked up a few bargains and tried free samples of tasty Korean food, but I'm not sure it is worth the hassle.

Samples of prepared seafood, including crab and dried squid, are offered free at a table near the store's large fish counter.

Big seafood counter

Super H Mart probably has the largest selection of fresh fish and other seafood in Bergen County, all at fairly low prices.

But my wife had already picked up whole sea bass for our Sunday dinner from the Englewood H Mart ($4.99 a pound).

At the Super H Mart, I sampled several kinds of seafood at a table set up opposite the cases that were packed with fresh fish on ice.

I bought three items that were on sale with a store card, Kabocha Squash for 49 cents a pound, Koimo Sweet Potatoes for 99 cents a pound and unusually large heads of red-leaf lettuce at two for 99 cents.

I saw 5-pound boxes of clementines for $7.99, but that was $3 more than during the Can Can Sale at ShopRite.


Super H Mart, 321 Broad Ave., Ridgefield; 201-943-9600. Open 7 days. Small food court, and a large selection fresh fish and prepared Korean food.

If we are what we eat, what are you and I?

A canned fish salad -- yellow-fin tuna, pink salmon and skinless-and-boneless sardines with their oil or water, all from Costco Wholesale -- gets its crunch from an abundance of diced celery, onion and apple. Instead of mayo, I dress the salad with Dijon mustard, fresh lime juice and ground cumin, and, if the salad is dry, add extra-virgin olive oil.

Editor's note: Today, I discuss the concept of "You are what you eat" and how we think of food, progress on the reopening of Arirang Kimchi, formerly of Englewood; and food samples at Korean supermarkets.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Am I what I eat?

If so, I am low fat (milk), reduced fat (cheese) and no fat (Greek yogurt).

I don't eat butter or cream, and use a lot of extra-virgin olive oil in salads and bottled pasta sauce, and to fry eggs sunny side up or make frittatas.

I go organic as much as possible to avoid pesticides and genetically modified organisms (GMOs).

I switched to brown -- in rice and pasta -- regularly eat quinoa, and went from conventional potatoes to less starchy sweet potatoes.

I fill up not on animal fats, but on the heart-healthy fats found in wild-caught fish and other seafood.

When I shop for the meat eaters in the family, I buy antibiotic-free poultry and meat, including grass-fed beef; and preservative-free cold cuts, hot dogs and bacon.

I shop for good food at Costco Wholesale's good prices or food that is on sale at ShopRite and other markets, but I don't buy any one item because it is cheap.

Preparing food at home is the easiest way to control what you are eating, including sodium and sugar.

Since I hit a high of 228 pounds in April 2010, I have lost more than 40 pounds by not eating bread and pizza, and loading up on whole grains, fruits and vegetables.

I'd rather be eating than doing almost anything else, and I agree with a woman I once overheard telling her friends during dinner at It's Greek to Me in Englewood, "I'm happiest when I'm eating."

Earthbound Farm Organic Spring Mix is a great foundation for a dinner salad with Campari tomato wedges, fresh blueberries, roasted almonds dusted with cinnamon and chunks of Parmigiano Reggiano, a reduced-fat cow's milk cheese imported from Italy. All the ingredients came from Costco Wholesale.

The dressing is extra-virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar without added color, such as Ponti Balsamic Vinegar of Modena, available at Jerry's Gourmet & More in Englewood. 

Arirang Kimchi is 'coming soon'

Arirang Kimchi, formerly of Englewood, is renovating a store in the H&Y Shopping Center in Ridgefield, above and below. The construction permit was issued in late April.

Free samples, sales

On Saturday, I went to see if Arirang Kimchi had reopened in a storefront next to the H&Y Marketplace, a Korean supermarket at 1 Remsen Place in Ridgefield.

I found an Arirang Kimchi sign, and a construction permit on the door for renovating the interior that was issued at the end of April.

Since Arirang closed its Englewood factory last year, my consumption of fermented cabbage, radish and cucumber kimchi has plummeted.

The H&Y supermarket offers a limited number of free food samples, but among the best anywhere are warm balls of Mixed 7 Grains (brown rices and beans) that you can wrap in dried seaweed sheets.

The woman preparing the samples handed me one containing pieces of radish kimchi, and it was outstanding.

I did a little shopping. Bunches of scallions were 10 cents each, with a maximum of 10; and two kinds of apples were on sale for 99 cents a pound, with a maximum of 6 pounds.

H Mart

At the H Mart at 321 Broad Ave. in Ridgefield, a box of 15 Ataulfo Mangoes from Mexico were $7.99 or $6 off, and Chinese broccoli was 98 cents a pound, compared to the usual price of $2.49 a pound.

Today, I stopped at the H Mart at 112 Linwood Plaza in Fort Lee, looking for brown rice on sale, but didn't find any.

The store displays bags of rice just beyond the checkout counters, claiming there is no room for them inside.

But this H Mart has the most extensive array of free food samples in the Korean supermarket chain, including freshly cut fruit; prepared noodles, tofu and dumplings; kimchi, pork or beef barbecue and other items.

I had to go to the bigger H Mart at 260 Bergen Turnpike in Little Ferry to find a 15-pound bag of U.S. grown brown rice for $12.99, a savings of $4.

A box of 16 4.2-ounce packages of Nongshim Shin Ramyun, a spicy instant noodle soup made without MSG, was on sale for $9.99 or $7 off.

But I noticed that the box of mangoes I bought for $7.99 in the Ridgefield H Mart was $9.99 in the Little Ferry store.

I'll bet you can't eat just one. A 16-ounce tray of seaweed-and-rice rolls (kimbap) from Jinga in Queens is $6.49 at H Mart. They contain egg and imitation crab made from pollock, and come with Korean pickles and jalapeno peppers.

Trying casual Korean food in Palisades Park

Spicy Fried Shrimp at Bunsik Nara, a Korean restaurant in Palisades Park that moved to a larger space on Broad Avenue, below.

Outside, the captions for food photos are in Korean, but inside, you'll find bilingual menus and servers.

Editor's note: Today, I report on a meal at Bunsik Nara in Palisades Park, the closing of one of my favorite Korean restaurants and a visit to the Super H Mart in Ridgefield.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
Editor

I am still trying to figure out how I can accommodate my long love affair with Korean food -- which is based largely on rice -- while keeping faithful to a diet that limits my intake of carbohydrates.

On Saturday, I visited Bunsik Nara, a restaurant in Palisades Park whose name translates loosely as "land of casual food."

At the next table, a man in his 20s said Bunsik Nara is known for serving "street food." 

The extensive menu includes sections for Italian and Chinese food; dishes made with cheese, and lots of traditional Korean items, including seaweed-and-rice rolls, soups, stews and barbecue.

One dish pictured on the menu is a mound of fried rice covered in cooked egg and decorated with a latticework of ketchup or gochujang, a spicy red-pepper paste Koreans use like ketchup.

A deconstructed seaweed-and-rice roll with spicy squid and radish kimchi, and three free side dishes at Bunsik Nara.

I ordered a seaweed-and-rice roll called Choong Moo that came with spicy squid and radish kimchi on the side, and it was one of the few without ham ($8.99).

I also ordered Spicy Fried Squid, a dozen crustaceans that had been dipped in tempura batter and bathed in a sweet-and-spicy sauce ($19.99).

On my receipt, they are called Kkanpoong Shrimp.

Free side dishes were cabbage kimchi, yellow Korean pickles and a crunchy iceberg lettuce salad with mayonnaise.

I liked the roll and the shrimp, but they could serve two or three, and I took home plenty of leftovers.

The restaurant's interior is brightly lit. Most of the customers are young, in their 20s and 30s, as are the servers. The soundtrack is Korean rock. 

Bunsik Nara, 254 Broad Ave., Palisades Park; 201-944-2544. Open 7 days. Meters must be fed until 9 p.m. Free parking on side streets.

The sign on the door of Woochon, one of my favorite Korean restaurants. The restaurant, in a former bank building, had a sushi bar and a tank of live fish. I especially liked the grilled mackerel, and the array of colorful side dishes.

Around the corner in a Korean bar, a separate business that was accessible from the restaurant, the Guatemalan cook said Woochon has been closed for about two months, but he didn't know why.

Woochon closes

Before I stopped at Bunsik Nara, I took a photograph of a sign telling customers that Woochon at 280 Broad Ave., one of my favorites in Palisades Park, is closed "until further notice."

Here is an account of a wonderful lunch there in June 2012:

This lunch made us forget about dinner

Behind the displays of colorful, tasty prepared food at the Super H Mart in Ridgefield, employees fill big plastic bags with spicy cabbage kimchi that is made in the store.

Super H Mart

The Super H Mart is the Korean chain's biggest supermarket in Bergen County, and you'll find more of everything there -- from free Korean food samples to bigger crowds to fewer empty parking spaces -- even on a day like today, when it is pouring.

I drove over after a brief visit to H&Y Marketplace in Ridgefield, a smaller Korean supermarket that was relatively empty.

A large tray of stewed tofu from Pinocchio Catering in Flushing, Queens, was $5.49 at H Mart.

At H Mart, I picked up a 5-pound box of Bagu Clementines from Spain for $6.99, a tray of 12 fuyu from Sharon in Israel for $8.99 and stewed tofu for $5.49. A head of red-leaf lettuce was 99 cents.

At the free fruit station, the woman said a fuyu should be eaten when it turns orange, and she peeled the fruit before cutting it up for sampling.

On the bottom of the box, the instructions say fuyu should be "eaten like an apple," which sounds like the skin is edible.

Super H Mart, 321 Broad Ave., Ridgefield; 201-943-9600.

Sharon calls the fuyu "nature's candy."

Searching for the best kimchi in North Jersey

At H&Y Marketplace in Ridgefield, fresh fish are displayed on plenty of ice.

Women making kimchi in the store offer samples to customers.

By Victor E. Sasson
Editor

Several weeks ago, the Oh family closed their celebrated kimchi factory in Englewood, promising to reopen at a Korean supermarket in Ridgefield.

The family chose H&Y Marketplace, not the much larger Super H Mart down the road.

The Oh family's handmade kimchi is preservative- and MSG-free, and the best commercial product in North Jersey.

I've been eating their spicy, fermented cabbage, radish and cucumber kimchis for more than a decade, and always had a bottle in the refrigerator.

So, on Saturday, I drove to H&Y Marketplace, which I haven't visited since the store opened a couple of years ago, and discovered it's the perfect place for Arirang Kimchi.

The smaller market is far more manageable than H Mart, and on weekends, customers are offered free samples of Korean food made in the store -- including pork sausage, seaweed-wrapped brown rice and kimchi.

Other samples were raw conch, and homemade tofu, also available with black sesame seeds.

Fluke Tang ($9.99) is a container of fresh fish and other seafood, as well as vegetables, for making soup at home.

I saw kimchi being made in the store, but it wasn't Arirang kimchi.

At customer service, I was told the store had invited Arirang kimchi to set up shop, but it still hadn't happened.

I purchased a half-gallon of the Kimganae Kimchi being made in the store ($9.99), and jumped in the car to buy rice and spicy soup at the Super H Mart.

I had to park in the back of the large lot, and the store was a madhouse, compared to H&Y Marketplace.

I usually shop at H Marts in Englewood and Little Ferry, and it took awhile to find the rice and soup I wanted, fighting the crowd all the way.

At the Super H Mart, a 15-pound bag of Kokuho Yellow Label Rice from California was on sale for $10.99, a savings of $3, but other H Marts discount it more.

A 16-serving box of Shin Ramyun spicy instant noodle soup was $11.99, also a savings of $3. Previously, I wrote the box contained 20 servings.

Update

Vicky Oh of Arirang Kimchi says construction in one of the stores at the H&Y mall in Ridgefield has just started.

She expects Arirang Kimchi to open in December or January.

H&Y Marketplace is at 1 Remsen Place, off Broad Avenue, in Ridgefield. Telephone: 201-943-7400.