Glazier’s Food Marketplace helps Las Vegas transplants find favorites from back home

Over the past eight years, William Glazier has transformed his supermarket in the southwest valley into a haven for those from New Haven lusting for lobsters, Pennsylvanians pining for Herr’s Potato Chips and New Yorkers frantic for Fox’s U-Bet syrup, an ingredient essential to the creation of a proper egg cream.

Among the more than 100 mainstream grocery stores in the valley, Glazier’s Food Marketplace is the only one that is independently owned, and likely the only one with a piano in its seated dining area. (It’s an electronic player piano, and a sign asks customers not to touch it.)

What really sets it apart is the wide variety of specialty foods catering to the tastes of residents from the East Coast, Midwest and Texas, which are not carried by the major chains and often hard to find even online.

“Our job is to go get what they want us to get,” said Glazier, who moved to Las Vegas in 2008 after selling his ShopRite supermarkets in Greater Philadelphia. And they let customers know what they’ve gotten with the help of an emailed newsletter.

Many of the items on the shelves are a direct result of customer requests and are identified by green tags. The sheer variety is impressive; for example, there are nearly 70 mustards, including chipotle, sriracha and wasabi. Other displays contain more than 100 types of regional and nostalgic candies, from Jelly Bellys to Mary Janes, with Bonomo Turkish Taffy and Black Cows in between.

“I had no idea of some of the products available until I saw some of the things at Glazier’s,” said Ann Brown, a Las Vegas native who discovered the store early because she lives in the area, and who makes it a point to visit at least once a month.

Every day, Glazier arrives at about 9 a.m., most days crossing the line of protesters picketing the store for hiring nonunion workers. He makes his way to his regular seat at a table near the store’s food court, where he does paperwork and conducts business.

Few shoppers know he is the owner, but many regulars recognize him. “I get a lot of waves,” he said.

Over in the deli area, a neon sign trumpets the “Mrs. G’s Chefs to Go” section of the store, and Helen Glazier’s stamp is on many of the food items.

“These are all Mrs. G’s actual recipes,” said Glazier’s vice president, Bill Megill, who happens to be William and Helen Glazier’s son-in-law. “We try them and if they’re good, we put them in the case.”

And that brings us to the vast array of foods, many of them well out of the mainstream, to be had in the 68,000-square-foot store.

The Mrs. G’s section alone has 18 employees, who create the grab-and-go foods that fill the cases. There’s baked ziti, Cincinnati three-way chili, eggplant Parmigiana. There are mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes and mashed cauliflower, which Megill calls “components of dinner.”

“You can make an entire meal out of them or just pick a certain component,” he said. Say you’ve got a pot roast in the slow cooker and want mashed potatoes to go with it but don’t have time to make them. Glazier’s is your place.

And the made-in-house food isn’t limited to grab-and-go. The full-service deli offers 36 varieties of salad, including five kinds of potato salad, sweet potato salad, pasta salad and old-fashioned dishes such as cucumbers in sour cream and four-bean salad; in fact, Glazier’s is a treasure trove of foods that are no longer trendy. The salad bar has more than 60 items.

The produce department boasts guavas, Buddha’s hands, rambutans, sweet young coconuts year-round and a dizzying assortment of fresh peppers.

“Carolina reaper to ghost pepper, we’ve had them all,” Megill said. “If there’s a demand for it, we carry it.”

In the bakery are crumb cakes (including one Megill said is “90 percent crumbs and 10 percent cake; true New York”), napoleons, cream puffs and pudding cakes, all made in-house. And “adult cakes,” which aren’t what you may think but made with, say, Baileys Irish Cream.

In what Megill said is the largest meat and seafood case in the valley you’ll find prime boneless rib-eye and prime fillet. Four types of raw shrimp, two types of clams, lobster and frog legs, the latter a rarity locally. Sausages made in-house, and what Megill called “semi-prepared foods,” such as clams casino, split stuffed chicken breasts and carne asada.

Before the recession, Glazier had planned a second location in Henderson, but he said those plans are long gone. But residents of other parts of the valley can take heart, because he said he’s still looking for another spot, “when opportunities arise.”

Contact Heidi Knapp Rinella at Hrinella@reviewjournal.com. Find more of her stories at www.reviewjournal.com, and follow @HKRinella on Twitter.