Galleria Market

Galleria isn't as large as Hankook, but they do have selected pork belly meat, fish, noodles, beers, tofu, kitchenware and alot of side dishes (banchan) though not as many as Hankook. Price wise I do find some items fairly cheap and others about the same price range. They do have a wide range of kimchi, seaweed, spicy rice cakes and much more. I liked the hours starting at 8 in the morning and parking never a problem unless you're coming in the evenings. I do all my grocery shopping at several well know Asian markets such as the ones at Mitsuwa and Nijiya in San Jose. Here at Galleria I bought several Korean sausages, fish cakes, mochi ice cream (my favorite), spicy rice cakes and meat along with cabbage, onions, daikon and mung bean sprouts. They do have a lot of merchandise outside by the front entrance reasonably price.

I must have been there on a bad evening.

I ordered the #5--Pollock jjigae and wanted a Jarritos Limón. It seemed an odd combination of cultures. The woman behind the counter was friendly, but her English wasn't overly ambitious and my Korean is poor, at best. She told me that it would be 15 minutes.

Around that time, she prepared a tray with banchan, red bean rice, and brought out the jjigae and told me that it was ready.

The banchan was limp, perhaps because it was late in the day. The jjigae broth was good, and there was plenty.

This Santa Clara Korean market is located in the Lawrence Plaza. And if many of you know that plaza, the market is located next door to Paris Baguette.

But this market is not even as nice or cleaner as Hankook Market, located up the road on El Camino Real on the city of Sunnyvale side.

The market has several different shared businesses in the same market. The market also has a meat market, bakery, gift shops and deli.

I was at the market's deli for my lunch and ordered the a package of Garlic Chicken and Jap Chae for a total of $12.00 (no tax): http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/LwchnQzN3q1e2WdFXqoaYg?select=w8M-jRQeeeuJVYvnExii-A#GUUQzb18oRSEoIB9QwVS-Q

For a later snack, I bought a package of fresh dumplings from the Jimji Dumpling shop. The $4.50 packaged dumpling had chicken, pork, chives and onions wrapped in a dough blanket. Those fresh dumplings also stank up my car. But the dumpling tasted very hearty after steaming them in stove at home. My package dumpling: http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/LwchnQzN3q1e2WdFXqoaYg?select=w8M-jRQeeeuJVYvnExii-A#l0zldIC9veULOrrSD7PmNA

And one unique item I bought from the gift shop for $10. I hope many of you are nice to me and you will get rewarded. My item: http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/LwchnQzN3q1e2WdFXqoaYg?select=w8M-jRQeeeuJVYvnExii-A#uQ4Amhxg5eOP583VrUfgJA

I am not lying either and did bought that tee shirt!

This medium size supermarket is located in Santa Clara's Koreatown in the heart of Silicone n Valley. For parents with Asian, especially Korean, students attending Santa Clara or neighboring universities, this is a good place to find cookware, utensils, dishes, and easy to prepare foods for your kids. This is also a great place to also shop for every day food at relatively good prices in Silicon Valley.

I was comparing the Hankook market kimbap vs. Galleria market kimbap (Galleria is less than a mile down the street). They were both good in different ways, both about $5. I tried the veggie-fishcake kimbaps at both markets. The rolls at Galleria are a bit smaller but nonetheless still tasty.

Note that I had to pay cash for the kimbap at Hankook, and I could pay by card at Galleria.

I was pretty pleased with my dish: Donkatsu with salad. This entree came with purple rice (which is supposedly healthier than white rice). In fact, I believe all the rice-associated dishes here consist of purple rice! I particularly liked the fact that the dish came with soup and side dishes too.

Another thing: the prices are cheaper than that of many Korean restaurants in the area (including its competitor Lawrence Plaza Food Court).

One thing I found unworthy of the full five stars was customer service. Yes, the lady did her job (got the order placed correctly and the food to the right people in a timely manner) but there was no sense of welcome or interaction (it was simply: pay, eat, and go). Now, taking a whole star off would be pushing it (probably would dock half a star for customer service).

Oh and one more thing: this place is pretty self-serve: get your utensils/napkins yourself, get cold/hot water from the machine upfront, take your warm order from the shelf, and put back the trays/dishes&bowls/utensils on the shelf next to the trash can before you leave!

This is a medium sized Korean grocery store that carries all the basics you're going to need for the home and then some. Towards the back, right side of the store there's a beauty area, a home area (where they sell pillows and clothing), and a jewelry store. These other areas seems to be autonomous from the actual grocery store as they have their own names and workers. Towards the back part of the store there is a meat area that looks fairly fresh.

All the vegetables were decently priced. Some things are a little more expensive but definitely competitive to other Asian markets and Safeway. Their dry foods area (ramen) was my favorite area because they carried really strange items, imported from Korea, for really low prices. Their shin ramen 6 pack was only 4.99 whereas in other places I've seen it for as expensive as 8.99.

5 minimum for card purchases.

Only reason why this place is about to go under is because it's so god damn dirty and they have a minimum as a damn grocery store. I understand it's law but damn it's a grocery store.

Edit. Oh yea I had to buy bandaids because I fell in the parking lot because its in sh*tastic condition but had to bleed out because there's a 5$ minimum.

I haven't bought food from here (yet), but I'm giving it 4 stars right off the bat for having large house slippers. I've looked for larger sized tatami slippers in Daiso, Mitsuwa, Nijiya, 99 Ranch, Hankook... all of them only had medium sized slippers (up to women's size 8-9, so men's size 6-7), or none at all. We ended up buying 2 pairs of slippers off amazon (of which only 1 pair was actually the right size) when Galleria had them all along... for $5! sigh. Oh well. So yeah, if you need larger sized house slippers, they're available here!!

Now to find a place that carries Innisfree or Missha products...

They have Sun Caps aka Face Shield that you see Asian ladies drive with, on sale for $2.99 ea. Red or orange visor w/ the crazy-looking face shield. Almost bought some, but didn't at the end.

Up in the front, off to the side.

Picture here: http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/LwchnQzN3q1e2WdFXqoaYg?select=5e43qOq-R_9GxOkbu1y9gQ