Victory Produce

🇦🇲 ARMENIA
📍 19801 Vanowen Street, Canoga Park, San Fernando Valley
🅿️ Parking lot
🥤 Wine/beer available for purchase to go

Especially on a weekend, you are likely to see a plume of smoke rising from near the entrance of the Canoga Park Victory Produce. These are the smoke signals common here in the Valley and Glendale, advertising rows of Armenian kabobs being grilled over charcoal. Even after you have finished a full meal, this kind of marketing is too difficult to refuse, and you find yourself in the parking lot to see what is available.

A series of wave-aways by various staff at the grill, checkout lane, and then the meat counter at first made it seem like the store had no desire to sell food to strangers. But there was one employee that worked on the grill and eventually explained the process. A later look into online comments shows that this is not unusual, plenty of self-absorbed Yelpers left their nasty reviews in their normal "I'll show them!" way.

But show up with a little patience, and you will have a good meal, or three more likely. This grill is not setup for immediate purchases, they are working on call-in and catering orders. From the sound of it, a lot of Valley families get large platters of kabobs from this market, and for good reason. But if you do want something to go, and do not need to eat it right away, check out the top of the prepared foods counter at the back of the store.

On this day, there were beef and lamb lule kabobs and also pork ribs. The friendly guy who showed the options said everything was cooked today and could be purchased for takeout. If something freshly grilled was desired, you could select uncooked kabobs from the meat counter and have them made in about 25 minutes. Since the three bellies that came on this day were already full, some of each of the three options were selected along with some groceries and bottles of Georgian wine from the market.

Both of the lule kabobs ($6 each, above) and pork ribs (sold by weight, below) were easy to warm up later in an air fryer, but would be even better if you had a grill that could be fired up back home. Raw red onions and parsley are garnished on the meat and you get some lavash with any order. Warm that up as well and you have a perfect and economical meal.

The star of the market is their pork ribs, which seem to be marinated with liquid magic. The three pieces purchased below came to the princely sum of $6.42, and next time the same mistake of such a small amount will not be made. These are fantastic, and must be amazing served fresh off the charcoal. Call in and place the order when you are about 20 minutes away and life will be very good to you.

As you wait for your order to be placed in containers, you might start looking around and find other items that find their way into your cart. There is an array of pickles available that look good, and depending on the season you will also see pickled tomatoes, apples, watermelon, and more. This appears to be a popular place to shop for these, so turnover is likely enough to keep them fresh.

Back at the prepared foods counter, there are big containers of fresh soups like borscht and kharcho, a stew of beef and rice with walnuts and a cherry plum kick. The borscht ($7, below) came full of large cubes of beef in a rich and flavorful broth. Make sure to have some fresh dill on hand to sprinkle on top. The container was enough for two bowls like the one shown, just about the cheapest meal two people can have in 2023. If you have other favorites from the market, please let everyone know in the comments.

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