Montville ― Around 2 p.m. Wednesday at the recently-opened Stop + Go Mini Market, about 10 customers perused the front of the store, hovering around a freezer that held such items as fish balls, bao buns and dumplings.

“One second, it just got really busy,” said Kaia Lu as she cashed out three customers with a bag of chicken wings, other meats, vegetables and beverages.

In spite of its name, Stop + Go Mini Market, which opened inside the Monvtille Center Mall at 220 Norwich-New London Turnpike on Oct. 10., offers customers quite a diverse selection of everyday household, Asian and non-Asian food items.

“We have a lot of foods that our neighbors have never seen before,” Lu said. “But we will tell them how to cook it. We’ve got a lot of positive feedback from customers saying they’re willing to try it.”

The market stocks a variety of more exotic produce, both Asian and non-Asian, along with Asian sauces, desserts and snacks, such as the Chinese Lays potato chips, which feature flavors like pork belly or spicy hot pot.

“You won’t find them in the supermarkets here,” Lu said. “A lot of people are interested in trying these flavors.”

The market is owned by Tian Xiang “Billy” Liu and Yan Fang “Linda” Lin, of Whitestone, New York. In New York, the two have been in the restaurant business for 25 years, and currently run a fast-food restaurant in Queens.

Liu said he was drawn to the peace and quiet of Montville because it reminds him of his original home in the rural area of Fuzhou, the capital of China’s Fujian province. He said he has decided the town might be a good place to retire.

Laughing, he said right now, he’s in his “half-retired stage.”

Liu purchased the mall in August 2014 for $170,000.

At the time when he purchased the mall, he had noticed a lack of grocery options in town. Options then were either Stop and Shop or Best Market, which had opened in 2014 and closed a year later when it failed to reach an agreement with the landlord for the property, and its lease expired.

But Liu said any time he would go there, or to stores like Dollar General, he couldn’t find all the items he and his wife were looking for, which included traditional Chinese staples, Asian snacks and produce.

He wanted to open a convenience store that would feature a wide variety of items ― mostly household essentials ― along with some limited Asian foods and snacks. He laughingly referred to the idea as the “Asian Dollar General.”

“He said that he wanted to benefit the people living here, because he wants to carry whatever they need,” Lu said, translating Liu’s Mandarin into English. “So they have a place to buy all the things that they need.”

“Basically, the owners are taking requests from customers on what they want to see,” Lu said.

Satisfying different tastes

“Not only Asian people eat these things,” Lu said. “Everybody eats the Asian snacks and foods. We have a big audience.”

Lu said the amount of customers at the store is “slowly increasing,” but there’s a lot of people who still don’t know they’re there. Since the opening, customers who have visited the store have requested more food items for the market.

The market wants to cater to the community, and the community has a variety of tastes. Lu said the the Chinese population alone has “different needs and different tastes” for food.

“So you need to have a good variety just to satisfy Chinese tastes,” Lu said.

Liu said many of the market’s customers have told him they used to have to take trips to Boston and New York City to shop, but can now come here. The market’s suppliers are in New York. But Liu says he wants to see more vendors and local farms reach out to them to discuss carrying their items in the store.

“They’re new to the business and don’t really have these contacts,” Lu said. “But they want to bring everything into the store.”

And in terms of customers, she said, the store welcomes “any feedback and suggestions” on “if there’s anything we could do better.“

“We want to serve the community,” she said.

Editor’s Note: This article corrects the address of the market.

What you can find at the market

• Honeyglow Pineapple ― Lu says it’s a limited production pineapple that’s hard to find. It has a honey-sweet flavor.
• Rambutan ― a Southeast Asian fruit similar in sweetness and texture to Lychee.
• Golden Honeydew Melon ― a subtly sweeter cousin of the traditional Honeydew, with a firm texture.
• Long string beans ― also known as Chinese long beans, were brought in at the request of one of the customers at the store.
• Baby Bok choy.
• Taro ― a root vegetable commonly used to flavor desserts and drinks, such as bubble tea.
• Leeks.
• Daikon Radish ― a milder version of the classic radish that has a flavor that is slightly peppery and sweet.
• Pomelo ― a green or yellow citrus fruit with a taste similar to a grapefruit.
• Cactus Fruit ― the fruit has a soft, juicy interior with sweet flavor and edible seeds. It is also known as Prickly Pear.
• Fish balls ― a fish paste formed into balls meant to be boiled or fried.
• An assortment of different kinds of sausages, including ones from Taiwan that are “a little bit sweeter” than regular sausages.

d.drainville@theday.com