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Seven Days Until Christmas – The Best Chinese Restaurants in New York City

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‘Twas the week before Christmas, when all through the shul
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mule;
The shmatas were hung by their menorah with care,
In hopes that their Christmas Dinner soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds;
While visions of Chinese food danced in their heads;

New York City ManhattanAnd for all our brethren in New York City who have suffered as they drooled over our list of best Chinese restaurants on Long Island, now is your turn.  G-d forbid you have to fight Christmas traffic and sit on the Long Island Expressway for hours on end before you can get your Chinese food, we bring the Chinese food to you.  No, we’re not delivering.  But, we are going to deliver to you the list of our favorite Chinese restaurants in New York City.

So, since time is running out that you need to make your plans, without further ado let’s get right to our recommendations (to read our complete review, click on the name of the Chinese restaurant):

Joe’s Shanghai, Flushing, NY – This was a real authentic Chinese restaurant.  The kind we’ve been looking for.  No sugars and sweeteners to go with the tea.  No fried noodles to munch on.  No spare ribs on the menu (Heaven forbid!  What were we to do without our staple for comparative purposes??).  Joe’s Shanghai has a few different locations, including one in Chinatown, one in midtown, as well as in China and even Japan.  But, it all started at this very location in Flushing, NY.  Joe’s Shanghai is famous for Soup Dumplings!  But, that’s not all they should be known for.  We had a veritable feast of Braised Pork Shoulder, Soft Shelled Crabs, Chicken w/Hoisen Sauce, Water Spinach w/White Bean Sauce, Scallops & Prawns w/Garlic Sauce, Scallion Pancakes.  And as if SIX entrees wasn’t enough for FIVE hungry Mee’s, we ordered a SEVENTH entree, Lobster w/Fried Rice Cake.  And finally, for dessert they made us a special dish of Fried & Steamed Mini Buns w/Sweet Sauce.  YUM!

Asian Jewels Seafood Restaurant, Flushing, NY – We truly had a meal fit for Kings tonight, and we were treated like Royalty.  From the moment that you see Asian Jewels Seafood Restaurant you feel like you’re walking in to some place special.  The place was immaculate.  The service meticulous.  The waiters attentive.  And, the bathrooms were the best I have ever seen.  We highly recommend for appetizers, Salt & Pepper Fried Squid (This dish, in my humble opinion, made the night.  The Squid wasn’t what you’d find in a fried calamari, but tasted more like shrimp.  It was a huge winner and got our meal off to a galloping start), Vietnamese Shredded Chicken, Crispy Spare Ribs.  After completely whetting our appetite for our entrees, we recommend Lobster w/Black Bean Sauce  (most excellent! The lobsters were 1 1/4lbs.  We had two.  The lobster was already cut up in to pieces, and was relatively easy to get out of the shell.  Which we greedily picked up to get each piece of succulent lobster meat in to our appreciative bellies), Duck w/Taro, Sea Bass w/Vegetables, Crystal Crab Meat Fried Rice, and, House Special Fried Rice.

Spicy & Tasty, Flushing, NY – This was one restaurant that we wouldn’t have ever stumbled in to even if we were just looking for a pot to pee in and every other store was closed.  This restaurant was situated in the heart of Flushing amidst a thousand other Chinese restaurants.  The menu was filled with such unfamiliar dishes that we relied heavily upon our servers recommendations to regale us with an authentic Chinese meal.  Fair warning:  Some of the staff didn’t speak English (in fact, when you call you’re greeted in Chinese).  But this is just the kind of Chinese restaurant that we seek.  Warning #2:  These dishes are hot, Hot, HOTT!  And Tasty!  For appetizers we had Seaweed with Fresh Garlic (Very nicely offset the hot spices in all the other dishes we had), Cucumber in Sesame Oil Salad, Chicken Bo-bo (Gosh that was one spicy chicken dish.  Yet, quite tasty!  Hmm… perhaps that’s where the restaurants name came from!), Slicked Pork with Garlic Sauce – (YUMMY!   Almost like under cooked bacon.  Tasty without the salmonella).  Our entrees were: Shrimp with Black Bean Sauce (Out of this world!), Spicy Double Cooked Pork with Black Bean Sauce (A little dryer than the sliced pork in our appetizer, yet had a more distinctive smoked taste and went down just as smoothly.  The dish was served with leeks – perhaps the best vegetable of the many accompanying vegetables), Sliced Beef in Fresh Hot Pepper (Like butter.  My favorite dish!), Dan-Dan Noodle w/Minced Pork (This was a nice surprise.  It’s a good thing our server served up this dish.  I don’t think we would have known to have mixed it all up before doling it out.  I loved the taste of these noodles, and it had a little hidden kick at the end.  We ordered two of these dishes they were so good!)

It was VERY hard to limit this article to just three Chinese restaurants in New York City.  And as you’ll notice, all of our choices were located in Queens in Flushing.  Though, as noted, there is a Joe’s Shanghai in Manhattan that Mee V. Stoogas went to.  We have already resolved that next year we will make it a point to get down to Chinatown at least a few times.

And as a reminder, if you live way out east, please check out our article on the best Chinese restaurants in Suffolk County, and if you’re in between, please check out our article on the best Chinese restaurants in Nassau County.

So there you have it.  Our complete guide to dining out Jewish-style on Christmas.  We hope you enjoyed our recommendations, and please feel free to comment on them as well as add to the list your favorite Chinese restaurant.

Humbly submitted for your consumption,

Mee Magnum  (“Chop!  Chop!”)

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