Number One Supermarket

:(this place is closed down.
I drove across town just to see an entirely empty building.

This place is no longer in business.
Drove across town just to see a deserted building :(

Where sauce is boss, this is my one stop shop. I go here rather then get half an isle of Asian product at twice the price at a Vons or whatnot. Curry delights, oodle noodles, and a lot of things I cant pronounce.

I give this place 3.5 rating. I like that they have all the SE asian vegetables I often use. Especially that they have green papaya, which is weird for Bako considering I am probably the only Laotion from here to LA. Anyways couldn’t get any service from the «meat» department. Which I might add is really skimpy looking. All they have is a few odd cuts of meat and sausage. No other meats that you should be able to get from a grocery store in general. Everything is pretty much frozen and covered so you cannot see the quality. There is also no expiration dates on anything. Their meat balls were 4.99 for a package worth 1.99 at most places. I mean come on… there is another asian store. Not to mention they sell egg rolls, shrimp salad rolls, etc up front by the register at room temperature! Is that even legal? California sure has lenient laws on food safety/​production/​sales. Who would buy shrimp that is sitting out at RT for who knows how long? Please No. One Supermarket, make your meat department look nice, with actual fresh meat! Then it would be a true one stop shop.

I did not expect such a well stocked and clean Asian market in Bakersfield. It’s not a Ranch 99 but, it’ll do. I come here mainly for the sauces, spices, Asian veggies, and treats to change up my usual dishes.
Prices are higher than LA but, that’s the premium you pay for stuff that’s not in high demand here. One thing that irks me is that their dry goods sit on their shelves for a long time, as evidenced by the dust rings on the lids. Since their products aren’t in high demand, they stock their products less often. I can forgive this since most of the goods I buy here have a long shelf life however, it’s a shame these products have wasted a good portion of their lives on the shelf. That’s the only thing that keeps this place from a 5 star rating.

Cool place. If your looking for some Asian ingredients that you can’t find at your everyday grocery store than this place is probably going to have it. They have a crazy large spread of seafood and meat products which consist of most things you’re probably not going to be interested in but cool nonetheless. My only beef is their produce selection when I was there was not fresh. Most everything looked old and brittle. There were a few things that looked very fresh but they were things that are commonly used like Thai basil, green onion and cilantro.
They also have a real boba tea stand right when you walk in the door. I’m not a big boba tea fan but my girlfriend who is Japanese loves it. We are glad we found a place she can get a legit boba tea fix. What makes this place even better it’s right next to Saigon Bistro (New Saigon) which is one of my favorite places in town.
Even if you don’t have any intentions of buying anything here it is just an awesome place to explore and be mesmerized and the things some people eat.

If what you want is Asian… it’s here. Seriously. Want parts of an animal that are normally thrown away? BAM! Want eggs with duck fetuses in them? BAM! Ever had REAL Ramen noodles? No? BAM!!!