The following is the third installment in a four-part series profiling the city's ethnic food markets.

It would seem that expatriates, no matter what their country of origin, seem to miss some of the same food stuffs from their native lands. Walk in any of the city's ethnic food markets and chances are good you'll find native coffee, as well as an array of native sweet and savory snack foods.

This is certainly the case at Siberia Food Market, a tiny Russian store at 100 Willow St. But Siberia also has something I didn't see in any other of the city's dozen or so ethnic food markets I visited recently:

That's right: bottled water. Now I've probably had bottled water in a dozen or so countries myself and I can tell you one thing: it all tastes pretty much the same. Which makes me wonder: what is about Russian bottled water that would create such a demand for the store to stock it? And how much do they sell? Is it really that much better than, say, Aquafina?

And the more I looked around Siberia, the more mysteries I encountered. Along one wall there is a veritable pharmacy, stocked with what appeared to be both natural and pharmaceutical remedies of all kinds. Again, it was something I didn't find in any of the other ethnic markets I visited:

Mysteries abound in Siberia's food selection too. Take, for instance, these frozen blintzes:

"Meat" is a fairly vague term. According to the package, they're all natural, but all natural what?

I am similarly curious to know what these marinated tomatoes might be marinated in:

Things were a little more straight forward at the European Store, 310 Maple St. Catering primarily to the city's Bosnian population, the European Store's wares are mostly eastern European stapes and snacks, including Slovenian mackerel salad:

Bulgarian feta cheese:

and Croatian coffee:

Of course, there are several western European items too. Of those that caught my eye, I found this tube of mayonnaise the most perplexing as at first glance I thought it was toothpaste:

More western European (well, Greek anyway) products can be found Bakolas Hellenic Agora, a Greek market at 110 Spruce St. The owner, seen below, told me there used to be 10 Greek markets in this neighborhood behind the Verizon Wireless Arena. These days, he's the only one left.

"No one wants to work 10 to 12 hours a day anymore," he said.

Bakolas, as one might suspect, carries such Greek staples and specialties as olive oil, feta cheese, Greek coffee and baklava. Also on hand are Greek beverages like tasty Amita fruit juices:

and Cretan wine:

But like Siberia, Bakolas also has a few unique items not found at any of the other ethnic markets, including chewing gum:

and vegetable oil shortening: