Guerilla Marketing: Chive flowers and the Pacific East Mall

All I want for Christmas is some pork shank, pork butt, pork heart, hock, loin with skin on, bung, belly, ear, blood, brain, spare rib, snout, liver, kidney, marrow guts, pork tongue, tocino, something called pork melt?, and fish sauce on the side. (for stocking stuffers)

Fortunately you can get this for me all in one place... It's called The Pacific East Mall, and it's in Richmond. (Not the Richmond District, you snots, the actual city.) It's an ENTIRE MALL filled with Asian stores and restaurants, including milk tea joints, Banh Mi sandwiches and pho, pottery barns, dim sum, toys, candy, books, even a florist. 

I'm sorry if this is getting obnoxious, but I'm having trouble containing my enthusiasm. I LOVE THIS PLACE!!! It even has a Korean karaoke bar like Jaguar in Oakland, but apparently they serve drinks here. The mall is anchored by 99 Ranch Market, a gigantic grocery emporium that I later found was a chain with locations across the Bay and beyond. No matter: This place was bomb. I barely bought anything, but I spent hours wandering around taking photos, snacking on pork buns and Chinese olive candies, periodically using the bathroom, and reaching for my phone to check various social networks and websites/blogs I subscribe to and enjoy browsing. 

My most tangible goal was to find an obscure grocery product to write about for my new feature project, Guerilla Marketing. In the future, I'll explore the Bay's (mostly mom-and-pop) ethnic markets and seek out obscure ingredients. I started small with some eye-catching chive flowers this time, but hope to really eat some crazy shit. 

Anyway, I hope these pictures make you a tenth as excited as I am. Hit me up if you want to explore together! 

AROUND THE MALL: 

Candy Box is crammed with kitschy sweets and anthropomorphic backpacks 

Pockymania

product in the herbal store World Ginseng Herb Company

strange dolls in the dehydrated fruit store TW Bestway

Santy

ChinaVille, an upscale pottery shop, imports their intricate pieces from Jingdezhen, China, "the porcelain capital of the world."

cool sign in the bakery

urchins!

99 RANCH MARKET:

Fuzzy melons in the city of produce: looks like a squash, feels like a peach, tastes like a gourd. 

Sad

You can buy the fish this way...

Or this way...

This is the RAMEN aisle. This is all ramen. 

Of course I bought some. My favorite was this seafood Ottogi Ramyon with nori broth and super plump noods. Almost to the udon level-they were that fat. I threw in some springy shimeji shrooms I also purchased at The Ranch. 

Okay, here's where it gets sexy. These chive flowers caught my eye because they looked too ornamental to eat. Snappier and more durable than regular chives, they can stand on their own in a stir fry, or act as a secondary flavoring ingredient. (The flavor is somewhere between garlic and green onion.) I didn't realize it at the time, but in addition to being used throughout Asia, they also pop up in European/Cal-Med/bistro food around here. (Let's do it!) Here are some quick links showing how the flowers are used in different cultures...

Flowering chives in Thai food: with recipe for stir fry with shrimp and oyster mushrooms

courtesy of Thai Food and Travel Blog

Malaysian/Chinese mom's recipe for stir fried garlic chive flowers with frozen tofu

From Little Corner of Mine

Example of chive blossom fusion food, made in the Philippines

From PetitChef

But beware: they stink! After a couple days in the fridge, it became harder and harder to justify using them. So far, I've managed to plop them in ramen noodle stir fry, ravioli dinner- and when I discovered there was no garlic in the house- a Spanish aioli. I've still got more, for better or worse...

Everything but the kitchen sink - because it's filled with dishes and disgusting rotting food - ramen. I made this in a hurry, so it wasn't unbelievable. It's got egg, ham, shimeji mushrooms, nori and chive blossoms for some crispy zing

More successful: I boiled some ravioli from work (works best with more savory flavors like porcini mushroom, beef or gorgonzola cheese) and made a butter sauce with the Parmesan and the chives. Just heat butter on low and add ingredients as desired. The fatty butter and rich cheese tamper the zingy chive, giving you a simple sauce with sophisticated flavors. Top with arugula, and you've got yourself a fantasy!