Jojo Oriental Store

I had not been in, in a while. Stock was way down. No air condition running. Had some expired items on the shelves. And to top it off there was a steel pan with chicken thighs sitting out on one of the shelves.

There is no Thai market in CR or Iowa City area. No wonder the Thai restaurants are terrible. They would have to go to Chicago or Minneapolis weekly to get a truckload of fresh supplies. I found kaffir lime leaves but they were frozen. There was no galanga. I didn’t find sweet paprika. This store is a mish mash Asian grocery. There is a small Japanese Korean section. There is a small SE Asian section. There is a Philippine and Chinese section. There was fresh longan fruit. Unfortunately, no Asian store in the IC/​CR area has everything I need, so I have to go to 3 different stores to get all my ingredients which includes a 30 minute trip to IC/​Coralville. This store did have pork belly which was a surprising find. They had fresh fish and squid the day we went. So far I have been unable to find ground pork for making dumplings. There must not be a large Thai community in CR/​IC. I am very thankful for Jojo’s and Saigon Market. Or else I would have to order everything online or make monthly trips to Chicago.

Wow. This place is pretty big and has such a wide range of items. I could spend an hour just checking out all the exotic items they sell at Jojo Oriental.
Tucked away in a pathetic strip mall it’s a lot larger on the inside than I’d have guessed from looking at the exterior (this particular strip mall must be magic, other stores here are deceivingly large). They have fresh produce, fish, frozen items, tons of shelf-​stable or dry goods, snacks, sauces, drinks, desserts, sweets, pretty much everything you can think of.
Their prices are fairly decent too. Considering what they are selling and the city they are in, I expected the prices to be a little higher. It’s nice to know I can pick up things for my thai recipes here that Hy Vee doesn’t carry while I’m in town, instead of having to bring them from Chicago.

I spent about 40 minutes in this store just looking at everything! So many items, sauces, drinks and produce that are not available at a regular grocer. And I couldn’t believe the price for fresh ginger (only 1.99/lb) and red peppers (0.99 each). In fact, everything I would usually buy at the store was lower in price; things like soy sauce, rice, asian noodles, wonton wrappers, basil (HUGE package was only $ 1.50), peanut sauce, sesame oil, pita bread, the list goes on and on. Let’s just say that Asian cookbook I’ve had every intention of using will be getting a lot more attention from now on.

I go to JoJo’s shop to get my sweet chile sauce and a few other things. I always enjoy browsing through his shop at all of the exotic things that I don’t see at Walmart and Hyvee. They definitely cater to the immigrant crowd, as I walk through the store I can tell I’m the only customer in there whose first language is English (which seems kind of logical and reassuring for an Oriental market). It’s not huge, but the selection is pretty decent. They have fresh and frozen meats and vegetables, canned items and boxed foods. I used to work with JoJo before he opened his store, and he was a pleasure to work with. He seems to have transferred his good relational skills to his shop, his customers seem to like him and I’ve noticed when I’m there that I sometimes recognize people from previous trips so he’s getting repeat business.