Colorful containers of snacks, condiments and grocery staples populate a downtown Providence corner, as bright lights and bustling dishes usher in packs of passersby. This is Maruichi Japanese Food and Deli: a local market specializing in Japanese produce, pantry items and other goods.
Tuesday morning marked the beginning of the store’s six-day food festival, which welcomed students back to campus by offering common Japanese street fare. In-house cooks prepared staple items like okonomiyaki — a savory pancake adorned with condiments and bonito flakes — and kakigori — a Japanese shaved ice.
The festival runs until Sept. 8 and hopes to draw in students at Brown and nearby colleges, according to Josh Nakama, vice president of operations and expansion at Fuji Mart Corporation — the store’s parent company.
Students can prepare many of the store’s sale items in their dorm rooms and without full kitchens, Nakama explained. “We have some instant Yakisoba and things like that,” he added. “Snacks and a lot of our drinks are also on sale.”
The event also hopes to highlight Maruichi’s presence within the Brown community and introduce Japanese culture to local residents, Nakama said.
“Students are probably some of our more frequent clientele,” he added. “We tend to look for locations that both have a growing or active Asian community, as well as something that has also a vibrant student community, and Providence has both of those.”
Maruichi first opened in the state, on Washington Street, in late April. The grocery chain began in 1991 as a small business called Fuji Mart in Greenwich, Connecticut. Fuji Mart Corp has since expanded into New York, Massachusetts and New Jersey.
Megan Chang-Lee GS and Siddarth Kannan PhD ’23 live near North Main Street and came into the store to find mentaiko — or pollock roe — a popular ingredient in Japanese cuisine. They first learned of Maruichi on Monday, when they drove by its storefront.
The couple planned on making mentaiko pasta, and “were scared that when we went back to Providence, we wouldn’t be able to find it,” Kannan said. Lucky for them, several mentaiko options lined the refrigerator section of Maruichi.
“We found the mentaiko, so we’re sold,” Chang-Lee said, adding that the pair definitely planned to come back.
Nakama said that the store has formed many relationships with smaller companies and producers to source harder-to-find products. Maruichi also maintains partnerships with various import-export companies for items traditionally found in most Asian grocery stores.
Outside of its grocery offerings and its “welcome back” food festival, Maruichi hopes to host more events highlighting traditional Japanese holidays like Setsubun in early February or Tanabata over the summer.
“Hopefully we can build a nice spot for not just students but everybody to come in and enjoy … learning about Japan,” Nakama said.
Tom Li is a Metro editor covering the health and environment and development and infrastructure beats. He is from Pleasanton, California, and is concentrating in Economics and International and Public Affairs. He is an avid RIPTA passenger and enjoys taking (and criticizing) personality tests in his free time.
