For this Hong Kong girl far from home, Asia Market is a place of comforting refuge on any given day. The supermarket stretches far beyond its small shopfront on Drury St, and the bubble tea stand at the entrance sells the best tapioca milk tea in Dublin – I have tried my share, so this is no small claim. While there are an increasing number of East Asian food stores popping up around the city, Asia Market remains a popular favourite due to its vast product range and reasonable prices.
New Year festivities in China are at least as important as Christmas is in the West. Also known as the Spring Festival or the Lunar New Year, Chinese New Year is by far the most anticipated holiday in the country’s calendar. Families reunite over great distances to celebrate the occasion, and many make dumplings (“jiao zi”) together from scratch. In accordance with this ancient family tradition, the Asia Market put on a special Dumpling Day to ring in the Year of the Dog.
The market held a fantastic celebration of the national delicacy, with a dumpling station set up outside to entice hungry passers-by and several more stations lining the perimeter of the shop. While I arrived full of dumpling hubris, thinking myself to be quite the connoisseur, the station outside was actually serving delicious Japanese chicken dumplings which I had never tried before, and the less-traditional filling made me curious about the selection within. The usual happy bustle of Asia Market was amplified by the festive crowds: on entering the warmth of the shop, I noticed a large costumed panda that a troop of children was chasing around the aisles.
Five stations were dotted around the shop, at which friendly staff cooked and handed out tasty dumplings, meanwhile identifying the various fillings and sauces. While the majority of the stations were handing out “jiao zi”, a speciality of the Northern regions of China, I found one that was actually giving out Hong Kong dim sum, and the shrimp dumplings, “ha gao” and “siu mai”, helped to abate the homesickness which I inevitably felt while away from home during such a enjoyable festival. The dumplings at every station were served warm and fresh, and there was a range of different meat and vegetarian options available.
While Dumpling Day is regrettably over, Asia Market is holding a Food Extravaganza, with the chance to sample a wide range of authentic Chinese food and drink.
