99 Ranch Market

Here it is — the big market anchoring the plaza. It looks ordinary now, but in 1995 this was the piece that made everything else possible. This was the very first 99 Ranch Market in the entire state of Nevada.

Here's why that matters. When James Chen was planning this place, he wasn't really selling shops — he was selling a supermarket. The idea came straight out of Southern California, from the San Gabriel Valley east of Los Angeles, where developers had figured out that if you put a big Asian grocery store at the center of a plaza, everything else fills in around it. The market is the magnet. People come every week for fish and greens and soy sauce, and while they're here they eat, they bank, they browse. Anchor the grocery, and you've anchored a community.

So step inside if you like and notice what a store like this carries that your usual supermarket doesn't. Tanks of live seafood. Whole fish on ice. Greens you won't find at a Vons, walls of chili and fish and soy sauces, house-roasted meats hanging in the window. This isn't a specialty aisle bolted onto an American store — it's a different store, built around a different kitchen.

And who's shopping? In 1995 it was mostly local Chinese families and a trickle of tourists. Today it's the whole valley — because the community that grew around this market is now spread across the west side of the city.