Scenes From the SE Belmont H Mart Grand Opening in Portland

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The new sign at the new H Mart on SE Belmont. Wednesday, April 10 was the date of their grand opening. Note the Belmont Dairy cow image is still there.

Many of us have been anticipating the opening of Korean grocery store chain H Mart for many months, and it was such a nice experience to finally be able to visit the store and shop there. The place was constantly busy, extremely clean, and very tidy. I’ve shopped at my share of Asian grocery stores over the years (mostly in NYC), and overall really enjoyed my experience here in this shiny new store; to contrast, Manhattan’s K-Town location of H Mart feels like you’re going into a dingy cave.

While it was really easy to get distracted, I did manage to take some photos, which are below. My haul yesterday was frozen kimchi pancakes; a rice cake and noodle kit; chili crunch; Ota Tofu (firm); a softball-sized Cheon-an pear; a block of chicken ramen; a Korean melon; a can of Aroy-D coconut milk for chia pudding; a bottle of cold Itoen Hojicha tea; and a pack of Vietnamese rice paper wrappers for summer rolls. As I left there was staff situated in the vestibule, checking your receipt to see what they could offer you: a flower, a hard plastic tray, sweetened aloe drink, among others. I chose to pass because living in a small space means saying no to a lot of extraneous things.

I will definitely be back. I love wandering the aisles of grocery stores, so I expect I’ll be doing a lot of wandering around this H Mart in the months to come (and trying some of their bibimbap).

H Mart
3301 SE Belmont Street, Portland