Lost City Asks "Who Goes to Wo Hop?"

As stated before, I'm still doing the "Who Goes There?" columns for Eater. Here's the latest:

Who Goes There? Wo Hop

The first time I ever went to Wo Hop, the 72-year-old Chinatown restaurant, I was chastised by readers as having gone to the "wrong" Wo Hop. There are two spaces on Mott Street, you see, a roomy ground-level restaurant at 15 Mott, visible from the street, and a harder-to-spot basement place down a long flight of stairs at 17 Mott. (Chinatown must have more mysterious subterranean eateries and businesses than any other neighborhood in New York.) The upstairs joint is for tourists and suckers, and the food stinks, I was told. Go downstairs for the real experience.

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Trillin's Chinatown

Maybe I've been reading too much Calvin Trillin, but lately I've been overcome by the culinary urges he desribes so well in the books of his "Tummy Trilogy." Trillin makes you want to pick up and pursue that hidden delicacy nestled in a small hill town halfway across the world.

Since I can't afford to do that, I settled for Chinatown. Trillin writes about New York's Chinatown more than any other food destination in the world, with the exception of possibly Greenwich Village (where he lives) and Kansas City (his hometown). When two friends who had recently moved from Los Angeles to New York expressed a desire to dine in Chinatown, I decided to let Trillin be my guide. He mentioned a restaurant called New Chao Chow in at least three of his food essays. I did some research and found it was still in business. (Some others he had mentioned have since closed.) So I told my friend to meet me and the wife there.

New Chao Chow is located on Mott Street just above Canal. The signage was encouraging: old style and simple without being garish. I don't know how old the place is, but, since Trillin mentioned it in an essay from the mid-70s, it's at least 30 years old. He harped upon the Seafood Noodle Soup and other reviews recommended the duck, so I ordered both. On reflection, the place might not have been the ideal choice for my guests, who, I had forgotten, are both vegetarian. So is Wifey. And New Chao Chow didn't have much to speak of in the vegetarian column. Just Buddha's Delight and other standards. However, they said their dishes were fine, if not spectacular.


New Seafood Noodle Soup was not just fine, but truly spectacular. Shrimp, fish balls and heaps of fine vermicelli noodles in a flavorsome broth. Every spoonful was a symphony of intermingled tastes. The duck was a surprise, in that it was served cold. However, it was wonderfully savory and subtley flavorful. On the side, some pickled ginger was a nice accompaniment.

The restaurant is small and does not try to impress with decor: in my mind a sure sign of a serious Chinese eatery. The help is speedy and courteous and kind to children. The food comes up in a metal dumb waiter. I'd recommend it if you eat seafood and meat, not so much if you don't.

Lost City Asks "Who Goes to Big Wong?"

My latest "Who Goes There?" column took me to Chinatown to one of the great cheap-good-eats joints in the City, Big Wong. No lack of business there.

Who Goes There? Big Wong

People walk into Big Wong King holding up fingers, showing how many they are. The maitre d'—if such a high title can be used in this circumstance—then leads them into one of the two big, bare-bones rooms, which are separated by a large circular cut in the wall. "Four—THERE!" he barks, pointing at one communal table. "Two—THERE!" You're almost always going to sit with someone you don't know at this Mott Street Cantonese mainstay, because the tables are so large, and the joint is always crowded, lunchtime and dinner (which ends on the early side).

I was placed at a round table with an extended family of four—husband and wife, their son-in-law and his newborn—and a lone middle-aged man who ordered off-menu, sipped Sprite like it was whiskey and looked like the Chinatown version of Benny Southstreet. The couple said they been coming for thirty years, almost as long at Big Wong has been around. "It's amazing how consistently popular it's been," said the man. "I remember the bathrooms at the beginning," recalled the woman. "They were terrible." The food, however, has always been good, they said. And the prices always ridiculously cheap. "Five dollars?" wondered the woman about one item. "Things are getting expensive."

I ordered congee because everyone at my table was eating congee. Big Wong makes about a dozen different kinds. The husband steered me to one with beef, pork and seafood. (I appreciated more than liked it; porridge is not my thing.) He also spoke to the waitress—he was Chinese—and made sure she brought me a dish of "traditional hot sauce" to accompany my wonderful roasted pork. If he hadn't intervened, I would have been stuck with the Trappey's on the table. The housemade hot sauce made all the difference, and gave me the feeling of inner triumph that is often expressed by writer Calvin Trillin, the Chinatown devotee who always frets he's not getting the best the kitchen's got going.

Around the room was a cross-section of the city. About half the diners were Chinatown natives, who kept quiet and bent over their food. Brokers who hoofed it up from Wall Street and tucked their ties in their shirt, meanwhile, yakked it up. A foursome of college students took up one table. A couple New York City sheriffs were at another. A man immaculately dressed in a gray, pin-stripe suit and a yellow silk tie ate alone. Up near the front door, the line for take-out was impressive. The cash register was operated by a sixtysomething gentlemen with shaggy white hair who identified himself as the owner. (Officially, according to City records, the proprietor is one Judy Chan.) The married couple stated that the family that ran Big Wong wasn't necessarily the founding family, but a relation of some sort.

Big Wong bustles. The bell in the kitchen that announces the readiness of dishes never stops ringing. "Ping! Ping! Ping!" Carts of hot sweet crullers are wheeled out and carts of dirty dishes are wheeled in. "Ping!" Glasses are filled at the huge tea dispenser and slammed down on the table as patrons sit down. "Ping!" Near the front window, chefs yank down duck after duck, place the browned fowl on a cutting board that looks like a slice of oak trunk, and hack speedily away with a giant butcher knife. They can assemble an order of roast duck in sixty seconds, and not lose a finger.

—Brooks of Sheffield

A Walk Down East Broadway

In case you haven't noticed from my postings, I've been spending a lot of time in Chinatown lately. I've unfairly ignored this neighborhood as a tourist trip for years. But lately, as the City gentrifies and homogenizes, I've come to recognize Chinatown as one of the few Manhattan neighborhoods to retain a fierce grip on its historical identity. Things change slowly here. Old buildings survive, and a low-scale architecture dominates. There is also still a sense of mystery and willful isolation to the area which one simply does not get in neighborhoods brimming with chain stores and fresh condos. One really doesn't know what's going on behind certain doors and hesitates before entering an unknown establishment.

I've mainly been walking around the tight knot of street that once represented the heart of old Chinatown: Mott, Bayard, Pell and Doyers. The other day, though, I went further south to the stretch of East Broadway between the Bowery and Manhattan Bridge. I've learned since that, in the past 20 years or so, this street has been a commercial hub for more recent waves of Chinatown immigrants. Vibrant and teeming, it certainly is.

But I was most struck by how the strip reminded me, more than any other street in Manhattan I can name, of what an immigrant commercial stronghold must have been like a century ago. People rushed to and fro, communicating mainly in their own languages. Liquor stores, countless barber shops, restaurants, a hole in the wall tea purveyor featuring a wall of wooden drawers, each containing a different blend. The street throbbed with an activity all its own that didn't have anything to do with the rest of the metropolis. The district seemed akin to an Essex Street or Hester Street circa 1900. (Granted, I can only base this opinion on photos I have seen and written accounts of the time.)


A block south was Henry Street. It, too, impressed me as a time capsule. The north side of the street boasted was an unbroken, unmodernized sting of tenements that surely had not changed in more than 100 years. Take a black-and-white picture of this streetscape and you could well imagine you were looking at the Lower East Side of the late 19th Century.



The details on many of these buildings are quite singular. One, well-maintained, five-story tenement bore twin carvings of roaring lion's heads on each floor and a cornice that read "Manhattan." Another has two rather lurid carytids on either side of the front entrance. I think the families living in that building have had to do a lot of explaining about those figure to their small children over the years.

On the Trail of Carlo Bacigalupo

It's adventures like the following that make running this blog occasionally rewarding. I was wandering aimlessly around the border of Chinatown and Little Italy when I decided to give a good look-see at the Most Precious Blood Church on Baxter near Canal, a gaudy Roman Catholic edifice I'd never given much thought. It's official address is 109 Mulberry (and most people enter that way, too), but the church faces onto Baxter. Inside, a half dozen ancient Italian woman were saying Mass. The place was renovated in the mid-90s is a particularly garish, vulgar manner, so the architecture and interior design isn't much to look at.

Outside, on either side of the entrance, I noticed two sculpted depictions of events from the life of Christ. Under each were the words "Charles Bacigalupo. Sexton Undertaker. 26 1/2 Mulberry St.—208-210 Spring St."

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The Lost City List

Inspired by recent lists of places to go posted by Eater, the New York Times and others, I've decided to post a simple tally of classic, utterly New York places worthy of your patronage. Who knows is extra business will do them good and keep them open in this economic, political and cultural moment that is so aggressively hostile to history and heritage. But it can't hurt. I've divided it into Restaurants, Bars, Stores and Bakeries (because I love bakeries, and think every neighborhood should have fresh bread). (Last updated 7/15/10.)

RESTAURANTS

Peter Luger (Williamsburg)
The Oyster Bar (Grand Central)
Four Seasons (Midtown)
Sammy Rumanian Steak House (Lower East Side)
Totonno's (Coney Island)
Di Fara's Pizzeria (Midwood)
Bamonte's (Williamsburg)
Brooks 1890 Restaurant (Long Island City)
Mario's (Arthur Avenue)
Dominick's (Arthur Avenue)
"21" Club (Midtown)
John's Pizzeria (Greenwich Village)
Fedora (Greenwich Village)
La Grenouille (Midtown)
Le Veau d'Or (Midtown East)
Sardi's (Theatre District)
Second Avenue Deli (Murray Hill)
Sarge's Deli (Murray Hill)
Stage Deli (Midtown)
Carnegie Deli (Midtown)
Smith and Wollensky (Midtown East)
John's of 12th Street (East Village)
Lanza's (East Village)
Katz's Deli (Lower East Side)
Donovan's (Woodside)
King Yum (Fresh Meadows)
Keen's Steak House (Garment District)
Heidelberg Restaurant (Yorkville)
Zum Stamtisch (Glendale)
Von Westernhagen's (Glendale)
Lombardi's Pizzeria (SoHo)
Grimaldi's (Brooklyn)
Patsy's (East Harlem)
L&B Spumoni Gardens (Bensonhurst)
Yonah Schimmel Knishery (Lower East Side)
Nom Wah Tea Parlor (Chinatown)
Wo Hop Restaurant (Chinatown)
Barbetta (Theatre District)
Sam's Pizzeria (Cobble Hill)
Ferdinando's Foccaceria (Carroll Gardens)
DeFonte's Sandwich Shop (Red Hook)
Skyview Glatt Kosher Deli (Riverdale)
Eisenberg Sandwich Shop (Flatiron)
Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden (Astoria)
Sammy's Rumanian Steak House (Lower East Side)
El Quijote (Chelsea)

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Two Dumpling Houses

It had apparently been a while since I'd been to the Dumpling House on Eldridge, my favorite place in Chinatown for a cheap snack (an order of delicious dumplings is $1, everything else is under $5). I remembered a hole in the wall with unremarkable signage, and the nondescript name of Dumpling House, something you'd pass by if you didn't know better. Now it's twice as big, considerably more polished, with lots of seating and a huge yellow sign—biggest on the block—that says Vanessa's Dumplings. (Vanessa is the owner)


The renovation apparently happened earlier this year, and Vanessa now has a place on 14th Street. According to a sign in the window, she's now a "celebrity chef." (I don't watch the Food Network, so I wouldn't know.) Inside, there's a row of tables and chairs along the left hand wall. The ceilings are high and the space is airy. The appliances shine.

I guess I should be happy for Vanessa, but I can't help but feel that my special little hidden Dumpling House has been homogenized, sanitized and Yuppified. There were hipsters and UPS workers all around. I miss the cramped quarters, the two or three measly stools, the rude but quick help. It could be a Chipotle, the way it looks now. The help's not nearly as rude, but it is much slower. I had to wait five minutes. I know, that's not much. But I used to wait, like, 15 seconds!

And that name. Dumpling House, to me, says "Chinatown." Vanessa's Dumplings says SoHo.

As for the dumplings, they're still good. But the expansion has apparently cost them, because prices have gone up. In the past $1 bought you five piping hot pork-chive dumplings. Now it buys you four.


By contrast, let's consider Prosperity Dumplings. Since first discovering Dumpling House years ago, I have stumbled upon other Chinatown dumpling joints. Prosperity is also on Eldridge, just three blocks south. Dismayed with the new Dumpling House, I walked to Prosperity.

Now, this is what I'm looking for. It's reminds me of the old Vanessa's. Small quarters, a counter, a plain menu, lots of fast Chinese talk, unsmiling service, just business. And FIVE dumplings for $1!! Still!! And, dare I say it, the dumpling were hotter, fresher, better than Vanessa's. Yes, I do dare say it. They were. Plus I waited 15 seconds to get them.

Meneely Bell in Chinatown

On a trip to Troy, NY, two years ago I learned about the Meneely Bell Foundry. The company was established in West Troy in 1826 by Andrew Meneely. That foundry, and the Meneely Bell Company of Troy, founded later by a member of the same family, together produced 65,000 bells before they closed in 1952. The outfit was one of the most famous producers of bells in the nation. Meneely bells went everywhere, and are still in use. Or so I was told at the time.

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Historic Nom Wah Tea Parlor Shut by DOH Again

Around this time last year, a brief shiver was sent down New York's collective spine when the historic Chinatown dim sum palace Nom Wah Tea Parlor was shut down for nearly two months by the Department of Health. Thankfully, the grand old place—a fixture on crooked little Doyer Street since 1920, and the first dim sum parlor in Chinatown—rose to the challenge and corrected its 58 violations.

Now, a reader wrote in saying she had heard from "several people in Chinatown" that the famous tea parlor was closing for good. A call to the parlor on Sunday night, however, discovered that it's just another DOH shutdown. DOH files state that a new inspection was conducted on Oct. 3, with the parlor clocking in at 51 violations—almost as bad as last year. It was reinspected on Oct. 27 and earned only 16 violations. Not sure why it's still closed with only 16 points against it, but the owner said he's waiting for another inspector in order to reopen. Let's hope it's soon.

Chinatown's Ancient Nom Wah Tea Parlor Closed by Dept. of Health

Oh, horrors. The ancient and right honorable Nom Wah Tea Parlor on Doyers Street—a piece of ur-Chinatown if there ever was one—has been closed by the Department of Health.

The landmark, occupying a place of the former "Bloody Angle" of Doyer Street since 1920, calls itself the first dim sum parlor in Chinatown, and it probably is. If not, its certainly the oldest ones still around. The facade's a classic, little changed over the years. One could imagine an opium den being tucked in back.

The DOH notice is fresh: it was posted on Sept. 2.

Chinatown's Classic Mee Sun Cafe Closed by DOH

Chinatown's ancient Mee Sun Cafe, on Pell Street, has been felled by the Department of Health. The small storefront is shut up tighter than a drum. A notice on the door said the City came knocking on April 27.

In 1971, New York magazine described the hole in the wall as "a busy, fast-moving, noisy, sloppy establishment with a good Dim Sum repertoire." Yes!

Ho Ho Florist

Ho Ho Florist is an old school Chinatown business on the corner of Hester and Elizabeth. By the looks of the business—note the green-painted wooden cornice—things haven't changed here in decades.

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Beef Jerky, Chinatown Style

How do you not go inside a shop called Malaysia Beef Jerky Inc.?

I happened upon this Chinatown store the other day during my wanderings. Evidently, I'm not the first. The clipping from Zagat's and Village Voice in the Elizabeth Street window praise the business' way with handmade, Asian-style beef jerky.

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Nom Wah Tea Parlor Back Open

The historic Chinatown dim sum palace Nom Wah Tea Parlor, which was shut down earlier this month by the Department of Health, is back open as of Sunday, Nov. 29, according to a reader who ate there. Nom Wah has become a regular target of DOH in recent times, having been shut down for nearly two months last year. The place has been on Doyer Street since 1920, and is the first dim sum parlor in Chinatown.

Colonial Chinatown

New York history can surprise you. You might assume that the oldest standing townhouse in Gotham might be somewhere in the Financial District, where the City began, or in Greenwich Village, which was really a separate village once upon a time, or a lonesome home near the north tip on Manhattan. But no.

Recently I discovered that the oldest surviving townhouse in Manhattan sits at the corner of the Bowery and Pell Street, surrounding the human tumult and riotous signage of Chinatown. It's 18 Bowery and, despite some Chinese letters on its austere red brick facade, it looks like a building from another planet, completely out of context with its surroundings.

It was built sometime in the 1780s for one Edward Mooney, in a mix of the Georgian and Federal styles. (Owing to the Great Fire, that's as old as Manhattan gets.) How it survived all these years, I'll never know. Being a brothel in the per-Civil War years perhaps helped a little bit. It's a pristine little building I must say (it was restored in 1971). Being a brokerage helped it hold on to its dignity. The spiderweb window above the door is pretty fantastic, as are the ornate windows on the side. It's doubtful that any of the tourists who venture down here for a meal, or the trendoids on their way to the new cocktail joint Apotheke, know what they as passing by.

Can't We All Just Get Along?

Sure we can! For decades now, Little Italy and Chinatown have been fighting a turf war, with Little Italy losing inch by inch. But look at this storefront in Chinatown. Asia Roma Restaurant and Bar! A little bit of both worlds! The menu feature both Italian and Asian dishes, plus some standards like steak and veal chops, and a somewhat trashy cocktail list (Louisiana Lemon-aid, Pineapple Bomb, a dozen Martinis, not one of them made with gin).

Interesting Art Deco Thing in Chinatown

Passed by this remarkable Art Deco edifice in Chinatown, on the corner of Lafayette and Howard, the other day. Never noticed it before for some reason. It looks like one of those sprawling, low-slung, lovely, 1930s filling stations you can still find in some small towns. The sign above the roller-shuttered door says its the home of an office of the General Services Administration, a "New York Interagency." A little research discovers that the GSA services Federal Government vehicles.

A look on Google maps shows the walls were recently covered with graffiti. So they're recently been cleaned. The building is apparently an annex to a bigger warehouse on Centre Street. Still, it doesn't seem like it's ever used.

Regardless, the architecture is quite beautiful and an unusual contribution to the Manhattan cityscape.

A Mysterious Pair in Chinatown

These buildings interest me. Look at them. A couple of narrow, two-and-a-half-story brick boys with single dormer windows. The way they lean on each other, sloping toward the middle, tells of great age and little upkeep. They must be one hundred years old at least. Building of such modest proportions haven't been erected in Manhattan in a century.

This being mysterious Chinatown—the addresses are 298 and 300 Grand Street—I uncovered little about the addresses, aside from the usual reports of arrests of various shady citizens who once lived in the houses over the years. What can have happened here? One can only wonder.

UPDATE: A reader alerted me to a post on Manhattan Unlocked from earlier this year that featured this photo. The photo is from 1932, and the post indicates that the buildings were already 100 years old by then. So they're almost two centuries old now. Amazing. As you can see, the buildings haven't changed much (even the drainpipe down the middle is the same), just then they contained Jewish businesses and today they have Chinese businesses. No doubt before that they were Irish businesses. And way back in the misty past they functioned as modest homes.

I Ate at Wo Hop at Midnight

Not a big deal, I know. A lot of people eat at this Chinatown staple after hours. Well, not a lot. But enough. There was a large Chinese family (complete with kids) and a group of three Euro-hipsters when I was there.

The interior is stark, stark, stark. No frills. Clean, with large, round communal tables in the back, and a row of red booths along the wall, and one of those hideous, backlit, framed scenes of some exotic locale. (Why are those thought to be attractive?). The light was blindingly florescent.


The menu is large; many choices for midnight. My waiter quickly took my order and brought it out within seven minutes. I made few requests, for I had seen how pissed off he was with the Euro-hipsters, who kept asking for chopsticks, and special hot sauce, and this and that, to show that they were cool and knew what to request so as to be authentic Chinatown habitués. I hated them, too.

The food was good, not great. But there was a lot of it. I took my hand-written receipt with me, which panicked the staff. They stopped me at the door and reclaimed it, writing me a new one that I could take with me. Outside, it was dark again.

A Chinatown Institution on Opening Day

Since the day, back in March 2010, when I posted a series of ripe, flavorful photos from a curious 1978 New York souvenir book, readers have never stopped writing to me about them, commenting on and asking questions about them. I have even been contacted by a couple television producers inquiring how to obtain rights to the photographs.

Recently, I paged through the volume again (which was published in London) and stopped at the photo above. I hadn't realized what I was looking at when I first set eyes on the picture. This is actually an image of a newly born Big Wong Restaurant. Today, the Cantonese Big Wong is a Mott Street mainstay and Chinatown institution. But here we see it as the new kid on the block, with plastic flags and red-white-and-blue banners and everything. The place doesn't even have a permanent sign yet.

The now-gone restaurant to the left of Big Wong, Mon Sing, was well-regarded in its day. It, too, served Cantonese food. It was owned by Robert Tsang. Noted composer and arranger Hershey Kay loved the place and used to hold dinner parties there. New York magazine described it as a "good, cheap lo mein parlor that also serves won ton soup and spare ribs."

Another odd historical fact: the building Mon Sing was in, 65 Mott Street, was the first building in New York specifically constructed as a tenement. It was erected in 1824. It is still a residential building.