Fong & Zhou Supermarket

Not a bad place to buy some economically-​priced, delicious salmon for homemade sushi or cooking. There’s a wider range of fresh seafood available over ice, just like a Chinatown fish market would have, but unfortunately a lack of adequate English speakers and no English labels next to the fish, so I can’t really buy or try it without knowing it.
The fruits and vegetables are limited, expensive, and don’t seem very fresh; most of the Asians have figured out that the Russian-​owned Netcost on the other street is a better choice. Not a fan of the Asian-​imported products; the selection itself is nice but they’re all artificially flavored, MSG-​laced products. Nothing I could safely eat if I’m concerned about health.
Just come here for the salmon. A pity I can’t ask if it’s farmed or wild-​caught, but I guess it’s not Fair Foods after all.

u won’t fail here if you are looking for expired produces… make sure you check the dates! Fruits and vegetables are rarely fresh.

Their vegetables are always fresh and cheaper than FeiLong Supermarket’s vegetables for the most part. Sometimes, I do buy from feilong if I’m at Bamboo Garden for yum cha, but I would very much prefer shopping from here instead.
The selection is pretty vast for a small market. The workers at the meat section are very friendly too.
This supermarket is a lot cleaner than most of the markets I’ve been to.

I like Chinese people. I like coming in here and its loud and crowded and there’s a ton of stuff I don’t know what it is but I wish I did cuz you know if you knew how to cook it it would be good. But I don’t.
So I come in here for veggies and Amer/​Asian staples like sesame seeds, raw nuts in bulk bins (SUPER CHEAP!!) and soy products. I have found the veggies pretty much always of decent quality and yes, cheaper than around the corner. But I’ve been coming here since it opened and if you haven’t, and you don’t speak Cantonese, and you can’t read the packaging, you won’t find much help finding something here unless you catch a bit of English spoken by an Asian-​looking shopper and ask them politely how to say in Cantonese whatever it is you can’t find so you can ask someone who works there because none of them speak English. I’ve done that and gotten rolled-​eyed looks because the shoppers speak MANDARIN and how stupid are you to assume they speak Cantonese. HOW STUPID ARE YOU??? But if you are super nice they will pity you and even help you find the tofu. I have never, not a single time, been able to successfully communicate a need with anyone who actually works there, except the fish guys, they speak English but they don’t know where anything is.
Chinese people remind me of the Italians that used to populate this area as densely as the Chinese do now. They have big families, they yell at each other, they have beautiful gardens and they love food. So since my family goes back three generations in this neighborhood I get a sort of warm, nostalgia feeling when I hear them yelling at each other and when they look at me with disdain for doing something faux pas and crass, like assume Mandarins automatically know Cantonese or say something pithy about the weather to the surly checkout women. Its just like when my Aunt Rosaria used to cringe at me for not sitting on the plastic cover on her couch or for touching her Hummels (snif)

dirty!!! that’s alll

Décor: ³⁄₅
–Has the typical Asian market smell
–Moderate selection of meats, produce and frozen goods
–Seems like a fairly busy market though
Service: ⁴⁄₅
–checkout lines may appear long but the cashiers were fairly fast and efficient
Food: ³⁄₅
–Wang Lao Ji Herbal Tea (red can) is my favorite! It is not overly sweet and contains several herbal plants.
–Hung Fook Tong makes a variety of drinks. I decided to purchase four and try them all out. Of the 4, my favorite was Xia Ku Cao (Spiked-​Fruit). The other three had a medicinal herb taste or was too salty. (Ginseng Chysanthemum with honey, Salted Mandarin with Mandarin Pulps, Sugarcane juice)

This place may be good for some non-​perishables but I would not trust their vegetables. I came here for some string beans, and some other veggies for steaming and salad making. Their broccoli is cut to the top, which if you know much about veggies in retail means they are OLD! They cut the bottom and dip in hot /​cold water to keep the appearance of freshness when in reality they are past their expiration date. Maybe that’s just how they prefer them? Note the decaying branches on the top. The fact that they can pedal this disgusting manure unchallenged is beyond me.
The one saving grace is that their other non-​perishable items are usually really cheap. That is all.

Residents of the area no longer venture to 8^th ave for decent Asian groceries.
This place is similar to FeiLong and NY Mart; they have the essentials…
There are the seafood and meat on left side, and vegetables and on the right and the rest in the back.
The fruits are outside in front of the store.
The lines are long on the weekends, so do your shopping on the weekdays.

Before this business opened, I would usually drive all the way to 8^th avenue to get my groceries. There is another supermarket around the corner, Legend Supermarket, but I rarely go there for groceries because the place is small and pricey for their products.
Now to review Fong & Zhou Supermarket.
Likes: I love the size of this place! super big and has so many different varieties to choose from. The price of their products aren’t bad at all. Fruits & Vegetables are for a decent price. The meats & Seafood is similar to 8^th avenue markets.
Dislikes: Since this supermarket is located on 18^th avenue, it makes it even harder to find parking on the streets. Because people usually double park outside to quickly grab the items that they need, it causes major traffic! I drive by almost every day and it takes me about ten minutes to get off the block.
Aside from the parking and traffic, this supermarket is the best one around that area! Legend Supermarket needs to step up their game, ASAP!

This was the Chinese straw that broke the Italian camel’s back on 18^th avenue. The writing’s been on the wall for years, but this is game over…
If you drive down this block during the week you will think you are in the middle of 8^th avenue Chinatown, with trucks double and triple parked in the bus stop area (and the entire block) causing a chaotic scene and a traffic nightmare on a daily basis.
The fruit and veggies are dirt cheap, making this an attractive spot in a prime location. The place is massive, is always packed and they spill the desirable products out into the street with a couple of guys outside taking cash so you don’t have to pay inside.
Not the place I would get my seafood from, it’s dirty as hell inside and while fruit can be washed, I don’t want my crabs around that filth!
Sorry if I’ve offended anyone, this place is probably a great addition for many but you have a perfectly good market in Legend literally right around the corner!

I’m rating Fong & Zhou Supermarket ⁴⁄₅ stars based on a few things:
— The produce is most often nicer than the nearby Legend Supermarket
— I can get a wider variety of products at reasonable prices.
— The seafood and meat counters are well stocked, and they have several people who speak English, which is a bonus for someone like myself.
I can get a few items over at Legend for cheaper prices so I usually go to both places when I am looking for specific things, but you quickly learn that F&Z will take less of a toll on your nerves. Overall there is more room and more cash registers, so even if there are quite a few people ahead of you it doesn’t feel closed in. It’s a great addition to the neighborhood.