ANNOUNCER: Funding for "Lucky Chow" has been provided by... From the kitchen to the grill, Soy Vay sauces and marinades add an Asian twist to your favorite dishes.

[ Bell dings ] Recipes and more are available at soyvay.com.

MAN: The way of Thai -- our way of unique happiness, and it begins with the people.

ANNOUNCER: And by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

CHANG: Chinese food has long been an American classic.

But right in the heart of the original Chinatown of New York City, where Chinese culture began to flourish generations ago, a new Chinatown is rising, driven by the love of the cuisine, and passionate entrepreneurs, and the global appeal of Chinese food as it evolves beyond boundaries.

Right in the heart of where I live in New York City, on the borders of historic Chinatown and Little Italy, ethnic boundaries are today being blurred.

But Manhattan's Chinatown has been constantly redeveloping itself over the past 150 years.

Today, I'll be exploring my neighborhood with a fresh perspective and we'll meet with a new generation who has successfully revived the past while simultaneously creating the future.

And, in the historic West Village, get ready for some Peking duck with a renowned Jewish restauranteur.

And, finally, stopping in Times Square to visit the global kitchens of Hakkasan, serving high-end contemporary Cantonese cuisine.

[Speaking Chinese] Hi, Danielle.

How are you?

-Good to see you!

You, too.

Good to see you.

So glad you guys opened up in the neighborhood.

Thanks.

We are, too.

Definitely in the mood for a couple of hot dogs.

Great!

-Hey, Steve!

How are you?

How did you guys get the idea to start Asian Dog?

Our friends wanted us to do a barbecue in their backyard and we said yes and he said like -- -At a bar, not like a home backyard.

Yeah, bar backyard.

And we came up with, you know, some hot dog options and we had a great reception to it, so we kept on doing it.

Well, let's try a couple.

All right.

Let's get to it.

This looks great.

Which ones did you bring?

This is a veggie dog, a Sidney, our thyme-mango relish.

MEL: This is the Mel and Steve.

It's our sesame Asian slaw.

And then, this is an organic kimchi dog.

CHANG: Ah, sounds great.

I'm curious like why you guys chose to open your first brick-and-mortar here on Kenmare Street.

There are a lot of restaurants, but there aren't that many quick-service grab-and-go places and we're Asia Dog, so we're kind of like a mashup between different cultures and American food.

Kind of like we're right where Little Italy and Chinatown meet, in a sense.

-Tell me about this one; this has toasted nori on it, and kimchi.

-That's my mom's kimchi recipe.

Oh!

And she taught me how to make it and it's something that's been passed down and I'm very proud of the recipe.

And the one you're eating, actually, is an organic beef hot dog; you know, there's no casing.

CHANG: As I head south towards historic Chinatown, the scenery quickly changes.

The result is a shrinking Little Italy, as an expanding Chinatown slowly redefines its geographic borders.

New York Mart, a bustling Asian market that opened in recent years, is where I can find everything, from roasted meats, seafood, rice cakes, and fresh -- yet cheap -- Asian vegetables.

So this is New York Mart.

It's my local neighborhood food market, where I come and shop as much as I can for my family.

This is kind of an all-in-one stop shop for Asian food.

You know, even though we're in Chinatown, you really have shoppers who come here from all around the city, especially those who know a good value.

But I have to say my favorite part of Asian Market is all of these packaged goods.

Dried squid.

Seaweed snacks.

Salted plums.

Dried Ramen noodles.

I love all this different type of tofu.

These are puffed tofu balls that are actually fried; you can just pop on top of your soup.

These are some of the spiciest and best chili peppers.

So, if you're a Szechwan pepper freak, this whole line of chili peppers is really addictive.

Walking through the heart of Chinatown, I always feel like I'm going back in time.

Doyers Street, one of the original blocks, is home to Nom Wah Tea Parlor, one of America's oldest dim sum joints.

Third-generation owner Wilson Tang, who's revived it, has one foot in the past and one foot in the future.

Nom Wah actually opened in 1920.

It was opened by the Choy family.

They were here as a tea parlor/bakery since the early '20s.

I see Nom Wah as an institution in New York, just like Katz's Delicatessen is an institution in New York, so it's one of these places that's been here forever and, hopefully, for a long, long time.

-I think people come here to get a bit of the old nostalgia for Chinatown.

-Yeah, I've even seen like a family of like four generations dine in here at once, because we've had that longevity.

Well, tell me about this block, Doyers and Pell, that we're on.

The first three streets in Chinatown were Pell, Doyers, and Mott, so this is really where Chinatown started.

You're in a street where the first opera house was in, just very, very early on.

These were the first three streets that were how Chinatown started.

History has it that Doyers Street has the most murder on it, than any other street in the U.S. -That's notorious.

That's glamorous.

Yeah, there was like opium dens here and there's even like a tunnel that leads from one of the stores on Doyers Street that goes into Chatham Square.

Is it still here?

-Yeah, it's still here.

That tunnel would be -- was -- a perfect escape route for rival gangs to like escape.

CHANG: Are there still kind of secret gambling dens and mahjong parlors around this area?

-Yeah, so, if you come past midnight and you just walk down the street, you'll hear like the mahjong tiles.

Such a mysterious allure to this very section of Chinatown.

This tea parlor has been here since 1920, but you've really rewritten its history, in a way, when you took over.

Tell me what you wanted to preserve and what you wanted to change.

Well, what we did was we changed the format of dim sum.

Where, traditionally, it's a brunch/ kind of lunch dining, we had a campaign for dim sum for dinner.

You know, my folks thought I was crazy, but I, for some reason, thought it would work and it worked.

Well, I know that you're also involved in Fung Tu on Orchard Street.

There's just a lot of collaborations that's going on with that.

In particular, we have an egg roll here that's superfamous.

We call it the original egg roll and it's an egg roll that's made with an egg crepe, which is lost, these days.

I collaborated with chef and owner Jonathan Wu with this egg roll and he's got like a version 2 of it.

Before you go, I want you to try our version 1 original egg roll.

I'd love to.

I'm excited.

Wow!

-And you can kind of see the egg crepe around it and all of the filling -- the chicken and vegetable filling inside.

This recipe, as far as I know, has been here with my uncle since the '50s.

This is delicious.

-Great.

I'm glad you enjoy it.

So, tonight, you got to try Jonathan's version, version 2, and that will have a little more texture.

It's got some olives; it's got Thai chilies; it's got pork belly.

-Mmm!

Coriander.

Would you call this a Chinese American restaurant?

Yes and no.

I mean, more yes than no.

As far as dim sum is concerned, that's very, very classic, very, very Chinese.

But you know what?

The egg roll, it's an American product.

-This was great.

Thanks for sharing your story.

-WILSON: Thanks for coming.

It was great having you.

Bye.

-All right, take care.

I'm on my way to Fung Tu and I'm just walking down Orchard Street now.

I cannot believe how much change there's been on this little block.

You know, this is formerly Jewish immigrant territory and, now, I see Chinese language everywhere.

And then, you have a mash of great coffee shops and art galleries.

There's interesting new, smaller boutiques that are popping up.

It's a neighborhood in transition.

Wilson arranged for me to meet his chef partner from Fung Tu, who's a third-generation Chinese American who neither speaks Chinese nor has ever cooked Chinese professionally, yet, he's been inspired to meld his culinary skills with this Chinese heritage to create a new breed of contemporary Chinese cuisine.

Hey, Jonathan!

How are you, Chef?

We're getting ready for service and I could use your help.

Fortunately, I've got this apron here and we can put you to work.

You really want me to?

-Absolutely, yes.

There you go.

-I have to cook for my supper?

Yeah, that's how we do around here.

You can earn your keep.

Well, I don't mind hanging out with all you guys here.

[Laughs] We got an hour to service.

Let's get to work.

All right.

What can I do?

-I'll have you peel these eggs.

Okay.

These are 1,000-year-old eggs, right?

Yes, they are.

They're chemically cooked.

It's almost like caramelization.

-Is there like an ancient Chinese secret to peeling it?

[Chuckle] No, it's pretty straightforward.

There's definitely not a secret to doing it.

The idea is to have a nice, smooth paste at the end.

What is this?

-That is celtuce.

It's a really unique vegetable that has a unique flavor.

CHANG: Soy sauce makes everything taste yummy.

It's delicious.

What's next?

I'm starving.

Pick it up and sort of rotate the pan so that you can try and... -Come on, egg.

Come on, egg!

WILSON: Basically, it's just like a little burrito.

We do something that we affectionately call Chinese crazy glue.

It's a mixture of flour and water.

Your cuisine is totally personal and innovative.

It seems like you're really not following any rules when you're cooking.

-Just make it taste good.

[Laughter] Why don't you go out to the dining room and I'll meet you out there.

Are you kicking me out of the kitchen?

Basically.

Well, I'll see you in a bit.

-Okay.

Hey, Jonathan.

-Hi, Danielle.

So you managed to make the rest of the meal without my help?

I managed, somehow.

-Gosh.

But I've got some snacks for us.

-Ooh!

We have our smoked and fried dates, stuffed with duck.

We dunk the dates in buttermilk and then, there's like a little dry flour mixture that we roll them in before we fry them.

These are amazing.

I've never had dates like this before.

-We've got a beet salad and our celtuce, that you also helped us prepare.

Ooh.

Is that what I made?

-Yes.

You want a little bit of the egg, a little bit of the celtuce.

Uh-huh.

Mmm!

That's really homestyle comfort food.

I think of Fung Tu as hometown cooking culture.

And then the original egg roll, version 2.

-Aha!

What I just had at Nom Wah.

I'll see which one's better.

Is it a competition?

I'm going to remain agnostic on that.

That is a citrus mayonnaise.

I don't know what else to say.

The mayonnaise is good with it.

I can taste the olives in there, which is something I've never had in an egg roll before.

This is great.

I love the both of them.

Well, let's move on for dessert.

-Sure.

We've got our sweet tofu dessert.

-What's this cute little cookie on top?

It's a pistachio and caramel cookie.

Delicious.

It's like crème caramel.

Yeah, yeah.

Would you call it fusion, or what do you think of that term?

-I mean, call it anything you want, just so long as you call it delicious, too.

Whether or not it's delicious, that's bounded by no ethnicity or culture.

I mean, if it's delicious, it's delicious.

This has been an amazing experience, so thank you.

Anytime.

We can always use free labor.

All right, Jonathan, so good to see you.

-Yes.

Take care.

I'm heading out of Chinatown into the West Village to meet with restaurateur Ed Schoenfeld.

Since the '70s, he's been a key player in introducing true Chinese cuisine to the American palate.

He's what I affectionately call Ed Egg -- white on the outside and yellow on the inside.

Hi, Ed.

-Hey, Danielle.

Hi, how are you?

Great to see you.

How are you doing?

Have a seat.

-Along with classic Chinese dishes, he's also twisted a few.

Have you ever heard of a pastrami egg roll?

His latest venture is a Peking duck shop where even the duck fat makes its way into the whiskey cocktails.

Now, you were born in Brooklyn and grew up eating Chinese food, just like I did, right?

-You know, Jewish and Chinese food, you know, separately.

But, yeah, I mean, as a kid, we ate a lot of Chinese food when we went out.

Where?

Where would you go?

-Well, at, you know, in local Chinese restaurants in Brooklyn, but, as a kid, I actually went to the crooked little street in Manhattan Chinatown, Doyers Street, right across from where Nom Wah Tea Parlor is, and I remember my mother making a distinction between chicken chow mein and subgum chicken chow mein.

I don't even know the difference between that.

I think you're like one of the original New York/Brooklyn hipster foodies.

I mean, you've got the beard, you've got the glasses; I bet you have a couple tattoos.

I don't know about tattoos, but I've eaten a lot of egg rolls and I've been chasing after good Chinese food for a really long time.

I think it would be a good point for us to take a walk into our new spot.

It's Decoy; I'll show you what's up and give you a little snack here.

I think I might have done my laundry here before, at some point.

-We had someone come.

We've been a restaurant, now, for a while and someone came in yesterday, trying to do their laundry.

-Wow.

Upstairs, you know, where we have RedFarm, it looks kind of like a farmhouse, but, here, it's a little bit more like a hunting lodge.

CHANG: I love the little ducks.

This looks like a great place for cocktails.

-You know, it's meant to be like a little hidden spot in the Village.

You go down a few steps and we can be open late here and I'm very excited about the bar.

We have a really cool mixology program here.

Check out Igor over here.

-Wow.

Hey, what's up?

Hi.

How are you?

What are you making?

I'm making our Sitting down for Dinner.

Sitting down for Dinner?

That's how the cocktail is called, yes.

That's cute.

Yeah, we make it with a bourbon that we wash with duck fat.

-Duck fat?

How do you infuse bourbon with duck fat?

Okay.

What we do, basically, we mix our whiskey with hot duck fat that we get from our kitchen.

Wow.

-After that, we put it to the freezer and extract all the fat, so there is nothing oily in it, it's just nice, flavored, duck-fat whiskey.

ED: So, Danielle, you have to check out the special little finishing touch here.

We have a stencil of the duck decoy and we spray our logo on the top of each drink.

CHANG: Oh!

That's the perfect touch to the cocktail.

Thank you.

ED: Thank you so much.

-IGOR: You're welcome.

Well, here's to many years of great Chinese food in your future.

-Aw, kampai.

Kampai.

IGOR: Cheers.

Mmm!

Wow.

This is amazing.

We're making our famous Katz's pastrami egg rolls over here.

So you guys order this from Katz?

-Directly from Katz's and I think we might be their biggest customer.

And we mix it with different kinds of fresh vegetables -- snow peas.

We cook the pastrami 'til it gets a little tender and then we chill it so that we can slice it paper-thin.

-It tastes like that Chinese smoked beef.

[Speaking Chinese] Our duck oven's right over here.

It looks a little bit like a tandoor oven.

You know, we had it custom-made just for us.

We rotate the ducks around so the skin gets evenly crispy on all the sides and it produces a really special product.

Show me your secrets.

I know Peking ducks are probably one of the most- loved Chinese dishes, period.

ED: He's going to explain everything to you.

Let's see what he's doing.

Okay.

There's many ways to make a Peking duck.

We have to keep it moist and very flavorful.

This is five-spice salt and we have a star anise, scallion, the ginger.

And this is very important: the Chinese celery, the leaf.

Okay?

We're going to have 3 different steps to making Peking duck.

We have boiling water here and then, we have syrup with white and red vinegar.

The reason why we use it is to try to get the skin as crispy as possible, okay?

If the skin is not dry enough, it won't get crispy, all right?

CHANG: I see.

Wow.

This looks incredible.

Thank you so much, Chef.

We wanted to create a real banquet for you today.

Hope you guys enjoy it.

Thank you so much.

-Thank you so much, Chef.

The Peking duck and the shalom balls?

My favorites.

-Yeah, soup dumplings, right.

And then, we have lobster with ginger and scallion and these are really special.

They're spring rolls filled with ox tail.

And then, we have shrimp with snow-pea-leaf dumplings.

And these are the dumplings that we've gotten so much notoriety for, 'cause they're shrimp dumplings, but they're set up to look like Pac-Man and ghosts.

Let's start with the shalom balls because we have to eat it when it's hot.

Sounds great.

-Wow.

You know, when you eat a soup dumpling, you want to make sure that you don't rip it open, so we pick it up just by the very top of the knot.

That's it.

-There we go.

Gently pull it off.

Mmm.

-That is amazing.

I think that's the best shalom ball in the city.

Why do you think Peking duck is so popular?

I mean, it's just delicious and I think hoisin sauce is very well-suited to Western tastes.

And, you know, who doesn't enjoy eating like a little taco or, you know, a little sandwich like this?

-All right, the pastrami egg roll; got to try this.

It has a really wonderful like a honey mustard, but with this little edge of kaffir lime in it that takes it from a normal place to kind of an Asian place.

Mmm.

That is really good.

This is almost like a personification of you.

No question about it, but, you know, I'm a little the opposite of this, because this is Jewish on the inside and Chinese on the outside.

Oh, right, okay.

And I'm Jewish on the outside, but might be Chinese on the inside.

Well, I have a little surprise for you.

A little something, just to say thank you.

Oh, how nice of you.

-I came across this in Koreatown the other day, when we were hanging out there.

These wooden ducks stand for happy marriage.

Oh, nice.

We'll have to find a place for them in Decoy.

Thank you, Ed.

This has been amazing.

Thank you for all your hospitality.

Here's to many more wonderful meals and to friendship.

Kampai.

-Kampai.

The concept of Chinatown has become a global brand personified with an exotic theatricality.

The high-end Chinese restaurant Hakkasan, which started in London, has now expanded globally, even to Shanghai.

I'm about to meet with their executive chef Ho Chee Boon, who has created their Chinese menu.

OMAR: It's very theatrical visually, when you walk in the restaurant.

Texturally, we have rich, dark woods; glass; marble; and then, we have the signature jasmine incense that we burn.

Audibly, we have the curated soundtrack that's customized to transition from day into night and to progress as the night goes on.

And then, finally, with your tastes, you know, we have artists in the back of the house doing wonderful dishes and our bar program and mixology program -- second-to-none.

-So tell me a little bit about Chef Ho.

Chef Ho has been with us for 13 years?

He's now our corporate executive chef.

He oversees all of our international venues.

He's done a phenomenal job of maintaining our quality and standards globally, which is a tough task.

Chef.

[Speaking Chinese] -[Replying in Chinese] He's making this amazing signature dish and it's a steamed dim sum with shrimp and fresh scallop on top.

So, basically, you fill the wrapper with this shrimp-dumpling mixture and then, you top it with a slice of raw scallop.

So the Hakkasan menu really is his brainchild.

I mean, he created the entire menu and he changes it twice a year, according to the local palate and according to seasonality.

Ooh!

[Ho speaking Chinese] -He's going to make one of their signature dishes today, which is spicy wok-fried prawns.

[Speaking Chinese] -Yeah, everything's like about cooking for a few seconds.

It's done.

It looks so easy, but it's not.

[Speaking Chinese] CHANG: It's too beautiful to eat.

OMAR: It's definitely a showstopper.

We have a like bit of lychee, rambutan; this is all from Asia.

These kiwi berries are phenomenal.

The kumquats are delicious.

Mango's my favorite.

You got the dragon fruit; you got a little bit of everything.

CHANG: Here come the cocktails.

-Fantastic.

So this is our Bird's Eye Margarita.

This is the Blood and Sand.

Chef Ho, that has your name written all over it.

Let's eat.

Thank you.

How do you maintain your quality of food when you have so many restaurants globally?

[Speaking Chinese] He said the traditional Cantonese cuisine that we're eating tonight is universally loved.

Everybody loves 'em, no matter where you put them.

Who cannot love this?

Cheers.

[Speaking Chinese] Kampai.

Manhattan's Chinatown is one of the oldest in America, but, today, the concept of Chinatown can no longer be defined by any one neighborhood.

It's exciting that Chinese food has taken on such a global profile, both geographically and metaphorically, and, because I live here, I can feel the small transformations every day.

It feels exactly like New York City should, with its mashup of cultures and identities and an incredibly innovative Chinese food scene, whose impact can be felt around the world.

ANNOUNCER: To learn more about "Lucky Chow," please visit luckyrice.com.

Funding for "Lucky Chow" has been provided by... From the kitchen to the grill, Soy Vay sauces and marinades add an Asian twist to your favorite dishes.

[ Bell dings ] Recipes and more are available at soyvay.com.

MAN: The way of Thai -- our way of unique happiness, and it begins with the people.

ANNOUNCER: And by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.