I walked in and saw the food counter to my right. I was immediately pulled in.
On the counter near the register were whole Dungeness crabs. Hanging in a display case to the left were slabs of pork and whole roast ducks, just hanging there. The kind of thing I’d only ever seen before in Chinatown in New York City. Three or four men were working in the back, cooking and prepping. One woman out front, handling orders, keeping things moving.
It’s a small operation. Focused. There’s no extensive dining room, no host stand, no laminated menu with photographs. You walk up, you look at what’s available, and you order. The efficiency of it is part of the charm.
Why I Seek Out Food Like This
I want to say something before I get into the food itself.
I’m probably never going to spend a month traveling through China, eating my way through different cities. But if I can spend time eating the food here, learning a little about the culture, understanding something about who these people are — I’m all for it. Honestly, it’s one of the things I seek out most in my life. To know more about people who are different from me, and to start with their food.
I met a restaurant owner once — he was from Beijing, ran a few places in New York. If I asked him directly about life back home, he’d answer, but you could tell he’d rather not. Put a bowl of noodles in front of us, though? He’d talk for hours. The food unlocked everything. The traditions, the stories, the meaning behind what we were eating. The significance of a dish at a particular celebration. The way certain flavors connect to certain memories. None of that came out in a sit-down conversation. All of it came out over food.
That’s what food does when it’s done right. It opens people up. It’s the most honest version of a culture you’re ever going to get as an outsider.
Asia Food Market does that for me every single time I walk through the door.
What’s on the Menu
The menu at Asia Food Market is built around what’s being prepared that day. Roast duck. Crispy pig. Whole crabs. Various cuts of roasted and barbecued pork. Rice plates. Vegetables. The kind of menu that changes based on what’s ready and what’s been sold out, which honestly makes every visit feel a little different.
On my first visit I ordered both the crispy pig and the roast duck, which both came over a bed of rice with bok choy. Simple presentation, nothing fussy about it. The food does the work.
On a more recent visit they were sold out of the crispy pig by the time I got there. That’s the thing about a place like this — if you want something specific, you probably want to get there earlier rather than later. The crispy pig goes fast, and for good reason.
The Roast Duck
So I got the whole roast duck — $35, and it feeds at least four people comfortably.
Here’s what makes this duck worth ordering: the skin on the outside is crispy. Immediately after you bite through that, there’s a layer of fat that is deeply flavorful and juicy. Then you hit the meat, which carries this wonderful soy, ginger, and garlic aroma that fills your mouth completely. Every single bite releases juice from the fat. Crispy skin to juicy fat to savory, aromatic meat — it’s almost a perfect bite of food.
I’ve shown pictures of this duck to too many people who were, to put it nicely, grossed out. I understand the reaction. A whole duck hanging in a window is not what most people around here are used to seeing. But I genuinely think this is something everyone should experience at least once. Not just eating the duck — but walking in and seeing it hanging there, seeing the pork being prepared, watching the cooks work in the back. Understanding that this food takes real time, real skill, and real care to produce.
There’s a reason the duck at Asia Food Market tastes the way it does. It’s not a shortcut operation.
The Pig Prep I’d Never Seen Before
On my last visit, one of the cooks was preparing a whole pig to be cooked. The pig was hanging by its hind legs, and the cook was working over it with a small wooden paddle — striking it methodically, all over the body. The paddle had tiny needle-like points on the end of it.
I stood there watching, trying to figure out what I was seeing.
What that technique does is pierce the skin all over, which gives the fat somewhere to go when it renders during cooking. That’s what creates the bubbly, crackly texture on the skin of the finished crispy pig. It also helps prevent blistering in the wrong way. It’s a method of controlling the final texture of the skin before the pig ever goes near heat. A food prep technique I had never seen before and didn’t know existed until I was standing there watching it happen.
That moment is the whole reason I keep coming back to Asia Food Market. You step through those doors and you’re in a completely different world from the parking lot you just came from. For people from these cultures, this is normal — this is home cooking at scale, the same way their families have always done it. For me — a white guy raised in New York and Kentucky — it’s as close to stepping into a foreign country as I’m going to get on a Tuesday afternoon in Henrietta.
I am absolutely here for it.
Getting There
Asia Food Market is located in Henrietta, just outside of Rochester. It’s worth noting that this is not a sit-down restaurant experience. You order at the counter, you take your food, and you eat it. I’ve eaten in the parking lot more than once, which sounds less appealing than it actually is. Something about eating roast duck off a plate on the hood of your car in a strip mall parking lot just feels right.
Go hungry. Order more than you think you need. And if the crispy pig is available when you walk in, don’t leave without it.
Asia Food Market
1885 Brighton Henrietta Towline Rd.
Rochester, NY
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