New 168 Market, Ottawa

I was craving red bean cake today, so CK and I paid a visit to Ottawa's biggest asian market, New 168 Market.

Right at the border of chinatown, this market offers just about anything you need. I prefer coming here over the other asian stores mainly because of it's vast selection, and cleanliness. Their fruits and vegetable section is not as big as some of the other chinatown stores, but they do have a better selection of just about every thing else.

I decided to take pictures of the store for this post, and the whole time, CK was shaking his head, asking me to put my camera away. He said he felt like a tourist in his own city, and people were blatantly staring at us.

Despite his badgering, I did not put away my camera and managed to get some good pictures. WARNING: I am not trying to gross anyone out in any way with my photos. I just decided to focus on things you wouldn't see everyday. Here is a little tour of the market:

I started at the dried snacks section. Here you will find a great selection of dried and preserved fruits and meat such as preserved kumquat and dried squid.

I ended up buying these preserved licoriced mandarin peels. I get motion sickness really easily, and the mandarin peels are good for that. I love the taste of them.

Next are the sauces and soup section. They have just about every asian hot sauce available, and offer many ingredients to make traditional chinese soups.

What you see below is black moss or fat choy. It is an ingredient that is commonly used during Chinese new year cooking because 'fat choy' in cantonese means to be prosperous. When cooked, it has a very soft texture, and looks just like black human hair.

Next stop was the fruits and vegetables section. This was actually the first time I saw real bamboo shoots that were not canned.

Their noodle section is where the radish cakes are kept. I buy these all the time, and they taste great when pan fried.

Beside the noodle section is the cured meats section. Below are cured porked belly sticks, and chinese sausages, called 'lap cheung'.

These are cured duck legs.

Last stop was the seafood and butcher section. They have a variety of meats including fresh fish, pork liver, fish balls and beef tripe.

These salmon heads are great for making soup broth.

Chicken feet look kind of creepy uncooked, but they are tasty as a dim sum dish. There's not much meat to chicken feet, so you mainly eat it for the skin.

Beautiful fresh fish.

I found this sign absolutely hilarious!!

I bought CK's dad some Japanese red bean mochi.

And finally, the baked red bean cakes that I was craving!

New 168 Market

1050 Somerset Street West

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

613-729-8895