Where Locals Really Eat In New York City’s Chinatown — MOFAD

New York’s Chinatown is one of the city’s — if not the country’s — most iconic ethnic neighborhoods. Characterized by resilience and adaptation in the face of cultural divides and racial discrimination, it’s home to a near-limitless wealth of culinary options, which Eater and the Museum of Food and Drink set out to explore.

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(Dr. Casey Man Kong Lum)
In New York's Chinatown you see change.

You also see continuity.

Chinese people tend to be very communal.

Chinese food is not about
just eating to fill up the stomach.

It is about the occasion
where people share

the joy, the memories, the stories...

It's a place where people
keep that connection.

There really isn't a particular dish
you can use to describe Chinatown

because Chinatown is so diverse.

There are many, many dishes
I have in mind.

(Bradford Kwong) I came here
from Hong Kong in 1966.

We sell mostly multicultural products:

Philippines,

Thailand,

Indonesian, quite a bit,

and a little bit from China.

The people in Chinatown, they're smart,

they're witty.

The lifestyle here
is really how you say fast.

Go, go, go, go!

I like the Cantonese food.

Cantonese food is
more or less straightforward.

No gravies.
(chuckles)

Less gravy, let's put it that way.

♪ music ♪

In the far away beginning, decades ago,

chop suey, egg foo young,

they are something
that was actually imagined.

When you ask Chinese people

they've actually never tried these dishes.

I've never tried them.

(Wilson Tang) This restaurant
has been around since the 20s.

In the early part of the century

we were a hub for people
coming in from China

to talk about the old times
and even take packages in here.

My uncle while he started working here
as a dishwasher,

in 1974 he became the owner of it.

It takes a dim sum chef
decades to really master

all the dumpling making,

all the marinades,

all the steaming, and all the buns.

(Dr. Casey M.) In Cantonese
dim sum tradition,

the whole notion of yum cha,

it means drinking tea.

When you go to a dim sum restaurant,

you don't just eat
those teeny little dishes,

you sit there for a period of time
to savor the tea,

reading the newspaper,

sharing stories in the neighborhood.

It is a conduit for people
to hang out with one another.

♪ music ♪

(Bradford K.) Chinatown has changed a lot.

There were a lot of gang wars
back in the 70s.

They ran through the street with guns

and at one point, Chinatown
was very quiet because of that.

Nobody wanted to walk
through Chinatown at night.

(Wilson T.) In the years after 9/11,

Chinatown kind of got closed-up
from the outside world

because we're so close to Ground Zero.

(Bradford K.) Chinatown is always,
how you say, ever-changing.

I think Chinatown has adapted
over the years.

I love Chinatown.

It's my home.

(Dr. Casey M.) Chinatown remains
Chinatown for a very good reason.

If I have to describe Chinatown
in only just one word:

"Resilience."

♪ music ♪

English captions by
Jenny Lam-Chowdhury