While there are plenty of New York City neighborhoods with stellar Chinese food, Manhattan’s Chinatown is still the leading destination for the diverse and flavorful bundled cuisine. Cantonese fare — and its cousin Hong Kong fare — still predominate, though there are plenty of regional cuisines to be found, from Shanghai, Taiwan, Teochew, Shaanxi, Sichuan, and Fujian, plus some very good Vietnamese, Japanese, and Malaysian food. Soups, dumplings, rice rolls, noodles, stir-fries, and fresh whole steamed fish scattered with ginger and green onions are in abundance in this historic neighborhood, with prices that run from very modest to more expensive. This map lists old-school spots alongside some newcomers, keeping remixing Chinatown flavor for the next generation.
The Best Places to Eat in Chinatown
From fresh rice noodle rolls to dumplings, a dining guide to New York’s oldest and most famous Chinatown in Manhattan
New to this map: Hien From Vietnam and the new location for King’s Kitchen that’s open until 2 a.m.. We nixed the location of the latter on East Broadway.
Robert Sietsema is the former senior restaurant critic for Eater NY, with more than 35 years of experience writing about New York City restaurants. Previously, he has written for the Village Voice, Lucky Peach, Gourmet, and dozens of other publications. He specializes in food that’s fun to eat and not expensive, covering the five boroughs, New Jersey, and beyond. These days, you can find his work on Substack.
The Best Places to Eat in Chinatown
From fresh rice noodle rolls to dumplings, a dining guide to New York’s oldest and most famous Chinatown in Manhattan
While there are plenty of New York City neighborhoods with stellar Chinese food, Manhattan’s Chinatown is still the leading destination for the diverse and flavorful bundled cuisine. Cantonese fare — and its cousin Hong Kong fare — still predominate, though there are plenty of regional cuisines to be found, from Shanghai, Taiwan, Teochew, Shaanxi, Sichuan, and Fujian, plus some very good Vietnamese, Japanese, and Malaysian food. Soups, dumplings, rice rolls, noodles, stir-fries, and fresh whole steamed fish scattered with ginger and green onions are in abundance in this historic neighborhood, with prices that run from very modest to more expensive. This map lists old-school spots alongside some newcomers, keeping remixing Chinatown flavor for the next generation.
New to this map: Hien From Vietnam and the new location for King’s Kitchen that’s open until 2 a.m.. We nixed the location of the latter on East Broadway.
Robert Sietsema is the former senior restaurant critic for Eater NY, with more than 35 years of experience writing about New York City restaurants. Previously, he has written for the Village Voice, Lucky Peach, Gourmet, and dozens of other publications. He specializes in food that’s fun to eat and not expensive, covering the five boroughs, New Jersey, and beyond. These days, you can find his work on Substack.
Yi Ji Shi Mo
Yi Ji Shi Mo is one of the neighborhood’s top purveyors of cheung fun, the springy rice noodles that can be rolled up with a variety of fillings. One of the most popular orders is the rice roll with shrimp, pork, and cilantro, although they can be modified with a variety of ingredients and sauces, including hoisin sauce, peanut sauce, and Sriracha. An aluminum container’s worth of them starts at around $3. Cash only.
Hien From Vietnam
This Vietnamese art cafe and coffee shop features an array of Vietnamese coffee styles as well as green, black, and oolong teas imported from Vietnam.
Harper’s Bread House
The decades-old institution remains one of Chinatown’s top bakeries, a place for ultra-affordable Chinese pastries. Hot dog scallion buns are always a smart move, as are the freshly made onigiri rice balls. But the chief draw is a warm egg tart (dan tat), filled with custard dense with the richness of egg yolks and with the top bruleed for a Macao-inspired treat. Also, look out for the ham-and-omelet breakfast sandwich.
Shu Jiao Fu Zhou
Shu Jiao Fu Zhou has perfected the peanut noodle. For $3, the restaurant heaps a large portion of rice noodles onto a disposable plate with peanut sauce. It’s one of the most affordable meals in Chinatown, and videos of the dish have turned this small, cash-only establishment into a social media sensation. The pork and chive dumplings are good, too.
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Royal Seafood
Royal Seafood may only be a decade or so old, but there have been a succession of Cantonese banquet halls at this location, and the glitzy gold and red decor persists. Seating is at big communal tables as the dim sum carts roll by until early afternoon. Evening lists a menu of Cantonese and Hong Kong standards, many featuring seafood, chicken, or pork. Few places give such a good picture of Chinatown’s historic vibrancy.
Spicy Village
Wendy Lian and Ren Fu Li’s gem of a Forsyth Street restaurant is a temple to a spectacular dish: big tray spicy chicken (da pan ji). The preparation involves dousing thick, hand-pulled noodles in a stew of chicken, garlic, potatoes, cumin, chiles, and star anise. With the capacity to feed at least two, the feast ranks as one of the city’s best large-format deals. Also go for a pork pancake, where stewed pork comes in sandwich form as a must-get appetizer. Spicy Village is BYOB.
Phoenix Palace
Sibling to Potluck Club, the dressed-up Phoenix Palace offers dishes like salt-and-pepper cuttlefish, a flavorful baby bok choy salad, chilled tofu, lobster sticky rice, and chili crab noodles. It’s housed in a space that opened in 2024, with a marquee sign that displays the name, and a host stand that’s built inside a box office.
Uncle Lou
Uncle Lou is one of several restaurants remaking Cantonese food in Chinatown, taking traditional recipes and kicking them up a notch — served on big round tables with turntables in the middle for easy sharing. Chef’s specials are called lo wah kiu (“the old timers”) and include steak cooked with chives, vegetarian tofu skin wraps, and homestyle chenpi duck, with an unusual sun-dried mandarin-orange-peel sauce.
Maxi’s Noodle 3
Until recently, Flushing was the spot to go to for some of the best wontons in New York City. But thankfully, Maxi’s Noodle has opened a third outpost in Chinatown.
King’s Kitchen
The latest location for King’s Kitchen has opened on Mott Street, with an array of noodle soups and claypot rice options. Close to Canal Street, this location is open nightly until 2 a.m., while the one on East Broadway closes at 9:30 p.m.
Bo Ky
The city’s premier Teochew restaurant has occupied a prominent storefront on Bayard since 1990, serving Chinese food with Southeast Asian flair. There’s a version of pho using pork instead of beef, notable deep-fried shrimp rolls, and a fish noodle soup in which the noodles are actually made of fish. But the flagship of the fleet is “country style duck,” in which the quacker is braised rather than roasted, and quite a contrast to the other ducks of Chinatown.
Joe's Shanghai
The latest edition of Joe’s Shanghai is on Bowery, around the corner from the first Chinatown branch on Pell, and it occupies a much grander space, with multiple dining rooms arranged around a carryout counter. The soup dumplings — first popularized in the city in the ’90s at the original branch in Flushing — are as good as ever, served with or without a lump of crab, eight to a giant steamer. Other Shanghai delights include braised gluten, eel with chives, and fish fingers with seaweed.
Mei Lai Wah
Though it moves fast, Mei Lai Wah is consistently the longest line in Chinatown, where everyone wants a taste of this pork bun — an affordable snack anytime of day. Fans differ on whether it’s really Chinatown’s best — you can get great buns on nearly every block in the neighborhood — but it is certainly the most well-known and the first name if you’re just visiting for the first time.
The Original Chinatown Ice Cream Factory
Follow a visit to any of the restaurants on this list with dessert at this petite ice cream shop that’s one of New York’s oldest and most distinguished. Specialty flavors like green tea, black sesame, lychee, and a highly nutty zen butter — that’s peanut butter ice cream with toasted sesame seeds — shouldn’t be missed. Any flavor can be packed in a pint and taken home.
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Chang Lai Fishballs Noodles
Unlike the rice rolls at Yi Ji Shi Mo, which are thin and ripple-like sheets, Chang Lai’s rice noodles are more stubby and chewy — a buoyancy that’s joyful to eat the whole way through. Formerly a longtime rice roll street cart, in 2023, the married duo decided that they were getting too old to deal with the weather. They opened a storefront on Bayard Street where regulars have followed. It’s a must if you’re looking for an easy, affordable breakfast — a small with all the sauces and curry fish balls (around $5) is plenty for a filling meal. Sit at one of the few stools inside or do takeout.
Mee Sum Cafe
This Chinatown tea shop dates to the 1960s. It’s an old-school spot for inexpensive dim sum, servings of over-rice chicken, duck, or pork; and steaming bowls of congee. Diners can either sit at a counter or a few tables in the back of the parlor or simply grab a leaf-wrapped bundle of sticky rice, known as joong, to go. Don’t miss the wonton soup.
Great N.Y. Noodletown
Great N.Y. Noodletown is one of Manhattan Chinatown’s classic restaurants. It has been open since 1981, and it found some notoriety outside of New York after appearing in an episode of the Layover, hosted by Anthony Bourdain. Its roast meats are a must-order — duck, char siu, and chicken can be acquired over a plate of rice, together or separately, for about $10 — and we recommend the wonton noodle soup. Cash only.
House of Joy
House of Joy is one of the largest dim sum parlors in Manhattan’s Chinatown, and one of the only restaurants in the area that still delivers its dim sum on carts. Grab a number from the host at the front and wait patiently to be called — which, if you don’t arrive before 11 a.m. on weekends, might be an hour or more. Once inside, plates of rice noodles, pineapple buns, pea shoots, and chicken feet cost a few dollars each, and there’s a full menu of larger meat and seafood dishes.
Wo Hop
Founded in 1938, Wo Hop is the second oldest restaurant in Chinatown. The old-guard Cantonese American menu remains largely intact. This is one of the only restaurants in Chinatown where you can still find chop suey. The walls of the subterranean space are lined with snapshots of patrons, including celebrities.
Taiwan Pork Chop House
Though there’s plenty to choose from, most fans of Taiwan Pork Chop House seem to sit down for one of the two specialties of the house, offered with abundant quantities of rice and pickled mustard greens. It can be a difficult decision to choose: the epic, thin-cut pork chops with a sweet glaze, or the bulbous chicken leg, briny and delicious. Both are equally good. Closed Tuesdays.
North Dumpling
This bare-bones inexpensive dumpling destination makes a selection for dine in and frozen for takeout (the latter is 40 for $10). Go here for pan-fried and steamed options ($4 to $5 for a plate), along with beef brisket soup, fish ball soup, and noodle soup with ribs $6.50 to $9).
M Star Cafe
M Star is one of a new crop of Hong Kong-style cafes to open in NYC. As with the cuisine of New York City, the menu incorporates global influences. What that means in practice is lots of noodles, egg breakfasts, Spam, hot dogs, fish balls and beef balls, and plenty of other casual food skewed toward breakfast.
Pho Ga Vang
In the part of Chinatown, now dubbed Two Bridges, owner Tony Le’s Pho Ga Vang has become a regular part of our rotation. This no-frills spot serves some of our favorite renditions of pho ga in the city — no surprise given it was given accolades in D.C., where the restaurant first opened in the famous Vietnamese enclave of Eden Center of Falls Church, Virginia.
