SEATTLE — The only thing more vibrant than the flavors inside the Asian boutique food store Mixed Pantry is the personality of the man who runs it.
"Oh yeah, I love food!” said a laughing Takeshi Kunimune, owner of Mixed Party in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood.
Takeshi, you can call him "Tak," wanted to create a shop where customers can find gourmet Asian ingredients as well as answers.
"Oftentimes, it's really hard to shop for many Asian items in a large Asian grocery store, it can be [a] really overwhelming experience, you see hundreds of different sauce bottles," said Tak. "I wanted to kind of create a more intimate and more hands on experience in this space."
Originally from Japan, Tak puts his culinary curiosity and food science degree from Oregon State University to good use - highlighting ingredients from all over Asia.
"We have cuisines coming from Japan, China, Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, all over the place," he said.
Besides stocking international brands, he also has products made by local vendors.
"We try to highlight as many Asian American stuff as possible, especially local production Pacific Northwest,” said Tak. “We have some wonderful local artisanal coffees, jam spread, wonderful chili crisp so many different kinds, including cookbooks."
If it's in a jar or bottle, you can try it before you buy on almost everything in stock. For a deeper dive, Mixed Panty provides tasting classes for condiments like chili crisp and soy sauce.
"At the beginning, we go over five official types of soy sauce from Japan," Tak said. "But after that, we go into the blends of the soy sauce, subcategories of a soy sauce, some of the international varieties and things like that here as well."
For Tak, turning people on to new Asian ingredients is one of the highlights of his job.
"I just love looking at people's faces, the delight! They're like, 'Oh my God, this is exactly like XYZ and I can totally use this for something,'" said Tak. "It just makes my day."
Sharing culture through food - Tak hopes folks who come into Mixed Pantry will walk out with ingredients and inspiration.
"I'm really hoping that people are being delighted to find new flavors," he said.
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