Downtown Lunch: Spend Chinese New Year at Nice Green Bo
Midtown workers shouldn’t have all the fun, so to even the score, I’ve brought on Daniel Krieger as an official Downtown Lunch Correspondent to write up some of the tasty stuff you can get in the lower half of Manhattan. He’s a great photographer (ensuring good food porn), but more importantly he is a lover of cheap, unique and delicious eats (or as I like to call it- Midtown Lunch’ish food.)
In celebration of the Chinese New Year which is this Monday, Jan 26th, I wanted to review what I consider one of Chinatown’s elite restaurants, Nice Green Bo. Formerly New Green Bo, the ownership changed hands last March and the “New” became “Nice”. Whatever. As long as they don’t mess up the food they can call themselves Big Dongers Chinatown Food Hut (I think that name may actually already exist).
The outside of the restaurant is riddled with articles from pretty much every publication imaginable, and in this downtown lunchers opinion they’re all justified. If you don’t believe me go in there and try an order of the fried tiny buns with pork. You get 8 of these things, and at $4.75 an order you’ll have enough of an appetizer for a group of people (or if someone wants to tackle all 8 they wouldn’t need to order anything else.) They’re the perfect blend of soft smooshy dough with a crispy bottom where they’ve been fried.
Try the Shredded Pork with Salty Vegetable Soup, a hearty bowl of beautifully colored soup with tender slivers of pork in a saliva inducing salted broth. (Yeah I just said that.)
Another interesting item on the menu was the Mixed Meat & Shrimp Rice Cake ($5.50) which consists of coin sized rice flour that has been pressed and boiled, and then sauteed with a few vegetables, some chicken and shrimp. Great flavor but a bit greasy.
Both soups we had were really outstanding. The Shredded Pork and Szechuan Cabbage noodle soup comes with the thicker spaghetti style noodles and ample pork shreddings. On previous visits I’ve had the best General Tso’s all white meat chicken I’ve ever tasted (an out of town guest ordered it so shaddup). Also the soup dumplings are damn good. And for $1.75 you get a giant scallion pancake.
That wonderful salty soup though, I’m still thinking about it.\
Nice Green Bo, 66 Bayard St. (btw. Elizabeth & Mott), 212-625-2359
Photos and post by Daniel Krieger
Posted by Daniel Krieger at 10:00 am, January 23rd, 2009 under Chinatown, Chinese, Jury Duty Lunch, Nice Green Bo.
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18 Comments
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Try the Tang Po pork. If your heart can handle it, it’s possibly the best item on their menu.
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that Pork and Cabbage soup is truly incredible!
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It’s 66 Bayard Street, by Mott Street.
Charles is right, the Tang Po Pork is a delicious hunk of pork and pork fat smothered in a sweet barbecue sauce with some sort of green vegetable and soft buns for making little sandwhiches.
The scallion pancakes are also top notch, although the key is to ask for them with the dumpling sauce instead of the vinegar-y sauce they normally come with.
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This place is amazing. Haven’t been there in about three years, but the food is delicious and the prices are cheap for the fportions they give you!
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i need to go see what this Tang Po pork is all about.
This place used to be more awesome a few years back…
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The tiny buns and vegetable dumplings are the best. They’re one of the surlier joints in Chinatown, but I do appreciate the effort to at least appear to be “nice.”
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Thank you Daniel for a wonderful write up – I’ve never been inside there because… well it’s a long story. Anyway, thank you again for the disclaimer about the General Tso’s “an out of towner ordered it” – is that “spaghetti” actually udon though? lol. I’ll be hitting this place soon… anyone want to join me? :)
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Sad to say but I’ve never eaten here either. [covers face in shame]
I think that is udon, haha!
Hey Yvo when do you plan on going?
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I had some sort of roast duck soup there about a year and a half ago while on jury duty…it set off a mad year of eating duck like I never had before!
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“Big Dongers Chinatown Food Hut ”
LOL! Big Dongers!
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@ Yvo and Gordon:
That’s not Udon. It is Shanghainese noodle. They use this type of noodle for both Shanghainese styled soup noodle or stir-fried noodle dishes.
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@ Downtown Luncher: Ah ok, thanks for the correction.
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~IS it me…or is Mamacita turning into a very lovely Benny hill?
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Damn dude. That looks good! And I didn’t go there because…?
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Those steamed dumpling look like Dogs Arses.
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Actually, no – I see a LOT of dog asses in my pet hair removal clinic, and can say that without a shred of doubt these do not look like dog asses at all.
On a related note, my delightful hubby (he of the multiple faux educator’s credentials) asked me to point out that you, Mr McBeagle, are the biggest horse’s ass on the planet. He promised me an impromptu romp under the covers if I did so, and we just had all the mattress frame springs reinforced, so toodles you wonderful lunchers!
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It’s the same owners– the woman in front is exactly the same. I understand they just changed the name because they weren’t so ‘New’ anymore.
My personal recs, based on years of patronage and comparing to my recent trips to shanghai:
tiny juicy buns (xiao long bao)
scallion pancake (cong you bing)
stuffed bean curd skin and minced pork with preserved vegetables soup (double)
diced chicken with peanut and chili (gong bao ji ding) — on a good night, best gong bao i’ve ever had.
tung bo pork (dong po rou)
beef with shanghai cabbage over rice (niu rou cai fen)
sesame beef (this is actually an authentic shanghai dish)
shredded pork with bean curd skin, green beans (edamame) and preserved vegetableThough for all this same stuff, you can also go to Shanghai Cafe on Mott St– some dishes are better there (xiao long bao, shredded prok), some are better at Nice Green Bo (soup, gong bao, scallion pancake). Haven’t tried the dong po rou on mott st yet.
address?