Oct. 3, 2019

Dragon Asian Market has started serving Nepali snacks and street food.

The market at 2300 E. 10th St., which serves the Nepali, Bhutanese and other Asian communities in Sioux Falls, installed a kitchen in its storeroom and built a small dining area.

The menu includes panipuri, chatpate and dumplings, which are popular snack foods, co-owner Durga Gurung said. The market will add a noodle soup, thukpa, later this month.

The food is served from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily, and customers can get their food to go.

The steamed dumplings come in three varieties: vegetable, pork or chicken.

For the panipuri and chatpate, customers choose the ingredients and spice levels.

Panipuri is a hollow, crunchy ball of dough that’s filled with a chutney of potato, chiles, dried peas, cilantro and oil. Customers pour flavored water over the filling and pop the entire snack into their mouth to eat it.

Chatpate is a Nepali street food that combines ingredients such as puffed rice, crunchy ramen noodles, vegetables, other seasonings, lemon juice and oil in a tangy, spicy sauce.

Gurung said he and the other market owners hope to buy a food truck and station it in the market’s parking lot during warmer months. It would feature an expanded menu of Nepali dishes.

This weekend, the market is celebrating the Nepali festival of Dashain Tihar and is offering an 18 percent discount on all non-food items.

Editor’s note: The amount of the discount has been updated since the story was first published.