I love Asian supermarkets. They have all the products you need for Asian cooking, as well as a…read morewhole bunch of products you've never heard of, at ridiculously cheap prices. OK Supermarket is a great example of this. For instance, they sell big tins of quality imported teas for $5 (less than half the price you would pay at T2). They sell frozen dumplings in packs of 30 for $3.80 - again, half the price you pay for a packet of 12 from Coles, and those ones don't taste half as good. Nor can the mainstream supermarkets even dream of having as much variety as these guys - I swear they'd have at least 10 different brands of frozen dumplings and a bunch of different styles and fillings within each brand too. There are 50 different kinds of soy sauce (possible but not definite exaggeration) and a bunch of things that you never knew existed, let alone would have considered putting in your mouth. They also sell Japanese Mocha rice cakes for $1.80 per pack of six. Ridiculous.

The charm of this place is buying stuff that you would never normally get. Or playing Asian snack…read moreroulette and getting something that has no English translation on the packaging. Orange Supermarket certainly has a wide array of the weird and wonderful, with my recent purchase of dried anchovies raising curious eyebrows in the office (N.B. they were crispy, sweet and a little sickly after too many!). And if you're after ingredients for an Asian dinner, the aisles are stockpiled with everything you'll need. They also have a great variety of Asian drinks, my favourite being the lychee juice with little bits of jelly in it. And a can of Coke (in its various forms) for $1, where can you get that in Sydney nowadays?! So if you're wandering down Harris St, and you're in need a of a quick refreshment, don't be drawn in by the overpriced convenience store on the opposite corner of the road, drop into Orange Supermarket instead!

Pretty much what you'd expect from your local Asian food store…read more Has a reasonably large selection of Japanese snacks. Did you know Pocky Midi was a thing? I didn't, and it's awesome. Think the cigarette from Undercover Brother except chocolate on a stick. Also sells cheap 600ml coke products (only place cheaper is to buy two from Woolworths). Staff are friendly and they take eftpos + visa + mastercard.

By the Knights of Columbus these Asian grocers are intimidating for noobs. Lucky I haven't been a…read morenoob for a good half-decade, then. I still get that schoolboy tingle - the one in the spine, you sickos - when I wander the aisles stuffed with colourful mysteries, wall to wall interestings and colourful sometings. Freezers full of exotic dumplings. Shelves and shelves of sauces I don't have names for. I love experimenting here: every time I walk in I buy 3 items that confuse and astound me. Yes, it can be hit and miss, but the hits when I stumble upon them far outweight the misses. Some discoveries so far: some sort of thick green tea cake, an epic aloe vero drink (with chunks), and a packet of something I'm going to go ahead and call wasabi crackle. So. Much. Fun.

No doubt you've often wondered what a takoyaki plate is. I myself discovered the answer to this…read morecommon query when working at a catering company and my head chef requested I hunt one down. Turns out it's an unusual panhandled griddle fitted with twelve semi-circular recesses in which to cook off, specifically, little balls of batter laden with chunks of octopus meat. It also turns out Tokyo Mart is the only place the sells them retail in Sydney. In the heart of the Anglo-Saxon dense lower North Shore, this specialty grocer is like stepping straight into a Japanese supermarket. Stocked with all manner of imported goods, you'd be hard pressed not to find exactly what your authentic recipe demands - there's everything from "saisho" sauce (a condiment especially for roasted eel) to various flavours of instant miso paste, frozen crab croquettes, dried salted sardines, cooked sweet chestnuts in a jar, and pre-sliced seaweed strips for soups and salads. On the left hand side of the store, they also have a range of cheap Japanese porcelain available - including soy sauce containers and tea pots - as well as ingredients for Thai and Vietnamese cooking, like dried shrimps and rice paper sheets.

How could you be a fan of a supermarket? When your family eats as much rice as mine does, and you…read morecan by cheap rice in bulk (as well as supplies for Japanese food), then you would also be a fan. In comparison to other Korean supermarkets, this one is pretty huge. Generally, if they don't have it, you don't need it. Btw, if you sign up for a red card, you amass points which you can use for future discounts.

Great Korean supermarket my friend Chai Sun introduced me to. You name it they have it and this…read moreplace is a must for anything you need Korean, including household products and utensils. Fantastic laundry powder and dish washing detergents the best bamboo toothpaste ever, also a pine-needle toothpaste that I am gradually acquiring a taste for. Their fresh produce is very good and excellent quality (and some imported from Korea at a very reasonable prices, hard to believe I know) The staff are always ready to help and explain any product that you have no idea how to use. When you go regularly as I do, you are given a card and for every ten dollars you spend you receive a stamp, then you can redeem them for different items...I'm saving mine up for a grill plate. Nearly there! There are other speciality food shops in the street that are always worth a visit. I guarantee that once you have been here you will be back. It's so much fun exploring different cuisines. Every time I visit a new city overseas I always spend time checking out the local supermarkets..Japan and for than matter anywhere in Asia is always challenging my senses oh and my purse..as do the food stores in Rowe St, Eastwood

Don't be put off by the exterior, Tan Hong Phat Asian Groceries is packed full of interesting…read morethings to stock your pantry with and shove down your gullet on the way home. If there's an unusual ingredient you need for an Asian recipe, chances are you'll fine it here. From curry powder to tinned jelly to plates to shoes to unusual lollies, you'll have fun browsing the random goods on the shelves. Of course, there's also all the usuals like rice, coconut milk, bamboo shoots and fresh fruit and vegies. There's also a really good selection of refrigerated rice noodles and rice paper sheets of all sizes.

Very helpful. I was looking for pandan paste to make waffles and called to check if the shop…read morestocked it. The shop assistant explained how to use fresh pandan.

I love this place. It's got a myriad of Asian food stuffs - most of which I don't have the…read morefoggiest of what they are. But if I learnt to cook well, went to a Chinese/Korean/Thai/Japanese cooking class I bet I'd find all the ingredients I need here. I walked down the stairs and felt like I was in a foreign land - blonde and blue eyes I stood out like a sore thumb. A bit of a stickler for looking at ingredients on packaging I need to befriend someone who reads Chinese/Japanese/Cantonese/Mandarine so that I know what I'm buying exactly. Perhaps I should start learning to cook first! They stock everything from fresh fruit and vegetables with a range of Chinese vegetables, noodles, sauces, condiments, frozen dim sum, snack foods, iced teas and drinks.

When I die, sprinkle my ashes across some fried bread and leave it in Asian City for someone to buy…read moreand devour. This is how much I love this place. Okay, so, thing the first: CHEAP-ASS FRUIT & VEG. We're talking $1.99kg tomatoes, $2.50kg cucumbers, $1.20 bunches of coriander, $1.50 bundles of delicious garlic shoots that I've only just learned how to cook, and every kind of almost-costs-more-not-to-buy-them bok choys, choy sums, and about a billion other variant of the same. I buy all my fresh schtuff here now, way cheaper than Coles & Woolies and really good quality. Freezers, entire freezers, of dumplings! Welcome to the promised land, son. Pre-packed, wafer-thin beef and pork rolls to drop into your instant ramen noodles, millions of soy and oyster sauces, billions of chilli oils, gummis, Poki, bamboo shoots, it's happy hour at the freaking flavour factory and you've got the golden ticket. Of course, at least half of this place is things that I don't recognise and will probably never try (read: weird, so weird) but I try one new thing every time I come here. Doesn't always pay off, but 1 in 3 times it does. Like the chilli oil with cured pork chunks that's now my new favourite condiment, holler. Just don't buy the garlic that's imported from China - it's bleached, and the girl at Cornersmith Picklery told me it goes bright blue when pickled, naaaasty.

Ok so this store is probably a-dime-a-dozen in Chatswood or Cabramatta, but I probably wouldn't…read moredrive that far to stock up on frozen prata and tinned bean shoots, but they are cupboard (or fridge) staples in our house and I'm glad to have this Asian version of a corner store a bit closer to home. Think I'd pass on the fresh vegetable section, which sits out on Military Road and looks like it has worn the exhaust fumes just a little too long, but inside it's like being back in Chinatown ... a wealth of Asian ingredients and flavours that you can't find in Coles. I'm not a fan of Asian sweets, but there are plenty of those on the checkout counter, and some of those odd sweet/savoury mixes that seem to be so popular there. Plus rice in large quantities and a choice of ice cream flavours from durian to red bean.

This was one of those gems I found using Yelp. Let me set the scene for you: I'm in Woolies…read morefrantically looking for vegan oyster sauce, mirin and these salty PKU,s I don't remember the name of. Do you think I can find any of the above ingredients? No! So I open Yelp, I type 'Asian grocer' and this place is only 200m away. So I hop skip it out of Woolies and end up here, Passing the "fresh" selection of veggies out the front, I made my way in and as a very white male, had no idea where to start. My deer-in-headlights look must've been obvious because the shop keeper came out from behind the counter and asked if he cold help. I rattled off my list of ingredients while he scoured the store and came back with everything I needed - some with multiple options! I also walked out with a solid collection of tea, enough rice to feed a small nation and some vegan ice cream. Since then, I've been back a number of times and always have a brilliant experience.