 Cantonese food is still very much around and there are new spots popping up and they are busy. Oh My gosh, that is deeply freshly fried This episode of Chinatown cheap eats 16 is a little different than the rest all of these spots are new and open within the past Year now are they still cheap? Are they still good? Can they compete with the og spots? Maybe they offer something different hit that like button and find out All right, you guys leading off this episode of Chinatown cheap eats We are in front of Haka cuisine now I'm telling you this might very well be one of the best new southern Chinese restaurants in all of America guys the Chef is Haka. They are serving up some of the best Haka dishes I know a lot of people out there probably haven't had a lot of Haka food or maybe you haven't even heard of Haka people But if you have it hopefully you're gonna learn about the food and culture right now It is delicious. It is affordable and it's brand new and it's right in the heart of Chinatown All right, everybody starting off round one here at Haka cuisine We have some very uniquely Haka dishes here and I know that real quick the restaurant looks very fancy But I think you can get some really good lunch special deals right here. You can eat for lunch for 11 dollars This is a lunch portion right here. That's the cheap Chinatown cheap eats part We got our first dish here, which is actually the stuffed tofu Haka style Lydia is off the camera She's going to say the name in Cantonese Mandarin and Haka Yo, the Haka sounds different man, aren't you guys this is the Haka stuffed tofu like we said this dish I never ate this growing up Andrew because we are not Haka a lot of times I actually am not that big of a fan of meat stuffed tofu But I'm telling you it absolutely works in the Haka stuffed tofu, man I'm moving on to the mutual I call you this is a actually braised pork belly And if you know guys about Haka cuisine, they're very nomadic people Andrew They braise and they stew a lot of stuff and they use a lot of preserved veggies and a lot of salty things Hmm, I would say that this is a Cantonese classic, but I guess man, maybe Haka people started it. Yeah, no a Lot of things that we eat as Cantonese people and we don't even know the original origin You know, they could be chilled out or they could be Haka just like the mutual cow. Yo This is a the yim sir guy, which is a salt water chicken Hmm. Honestly, it does remind you obviously and over the years It's been blended a lot with Cantonese food, but I'm telling you Haka food has its own unique flavor profile Moving on. All right, Lydia. We got the fried eggplant, but how do you say it in Cantonese Mandarin and Haka? Yeah, yeah, yeah Man, yeah, yeah And guys as an appetizer, this is only 995. That's a super good deal Yo, I've never actually had do you can't eat before this is my very first time having salt and pepper fried Eggplant like it was squid. Oh, you know what one of my favorite dim sum dishes is of all time though It's the fried eggplant with the the shrimp paste inside So I don't know if the fried eggplant influence came from Haka people I'm ready to put my house in a circle sesame chicken. See, I'm not even good at identifying American Chinese dishes Obviously, you've got the mapo tofu too. Mm-hmm That's a sesame chicken. It's delicious But I would say this mapo tofu based on what I know about Haka food how they use so much preserved vegetables I would say the mapo definitely has more preserved veggies in this so maybe it's got the little Haka twist on it And just a reminder for 1095 or a lunch special you can get the mutual cow You can get rice and a soup all together for like 11 bucks. That's a Chinatown cheapy dude. This is pork Sweet and sour pork balls on ice with fruit. This is like something. I never imagined I would eat before this might be the root dish Andrew of sweet and sour pork and all the takeout spots. Oh my gosh, Haka people. They do like fruity meats Like because in Taiwan Andrew one time we went to a Haka restaurant. There was all like fruit and meats together. Oh My god, I totally forgot about that Ten years ago. We ate a bunch of meat and fruit. That was crazy in time Yeah, because there's a lot of Haka people in Taiwan Haka people are one of those groups of people from like Guangdong that really went everywhere their diaspora is crazy They went to Jamaica. They went to South America India. They went to India, right? Haka Chinese food is really trendy right now Man moving on Andrew um to the fried pork belly Lydia what is this called? All right to line um Andrew I believe the Taiwanese Haka's would make this version a little bit more red So there is even variation like we said Haka cuisine in Chinatown Andrew more of a Kanto Haka vibe Deep fried pork belly. Haven't had this one before Bro, I'm getting on like some sweet apple fritter vibes guys I do like the red yeast versions that are hook-in mixed with Haka, but being Kanto I gotta say I might prefer the Kanto Haka versions All right you guys we've got the minced beef with a fried my fun cake Salted egg yolk pumpkin sliced bits and been fried. I would say Andrew every time I've been to Haka cuisine I've got to get this. I don't care where I am I'm getting this on the menu all right You eat that and in the spirit of New York City. I'm gonna take these slices That's a crispy pie. I'm telling you You have no idea how many egg yolks you have to make to take make pumpkin taste that egg Like how many you have to break down into it is crazy scale of one to five how eggy is that five? Yo, man I think this dish is really interesting because I've had minced beef soup before but being able to put it on kind of a Crispy noodle slice is actually totally different. It changes the texture. I love grilled noodles I love how it's a little bit burnt to this is a really cool dish. I recommend you try this out Oh, you saying this is a different type of Haka New York slice. This ain't a traditional New York slice We know literally, but oh yeah, let's take a look. It's not a cheese stretch. It's a noodle stretch Good all right grilled noodles more Here we have an award-winning dish from their chef roasted chicken skin With taro shrimp paste in the middle so they replaced the chicken meat, bro Guys, listen from here. You can't tell you think it's gonna be chicken meat You lift it up and there's just shrimp and taro. So let's go for it guys. Bye. Bye guy That's good. And our last dish is gonna be these sticky rice stuffed chicken wings Lydia in Chinese though What do we call this? long I learn guy I They they they did not nod at their heads. I got it You know what's really interesting is that most people probably associate stuffed chicken wings with something from Thailand or Laos But here we are getting it at a Haka cuisine. Who knows what what if they all came from the same root influence? Wow, that is like a mini Chinese-American Thanksgiving turkey dinner because oftentimes they'll stuff the turkey in a Chinese-American family with all my guy And this was like a long my guy stuff wing Delicious, there's like a mini ABC things giving him one bite Banger all right everybody and then we got to end off with some Cantonese classics But done in their own Haka cuisine style. Uh, what do we have here? Hoisin Tommy and this is a seafood Tommy and of course you guys know this is a crispy style roasted on the bottom And then we have fried rice here This is the golden fried rice now. What makes it unique. Is it these like golden pieces of egg? Going in for a bite. Take a look at the spoonful guys When you got that many layers and little details in it That's when you know the first guys fire I like omakase as much as the next person but take some of your ok omakase money and come on down to Haka cuisine Whoa Guys shout out to Haka cuisine. I mean they are serving up some exclusively uniquely Haka dishes But along with that they're they're pumping up the classics guys and honestly, it's super affordable the lunch menu looks great I'm gonna come here for lunch only $11. You can't beat it Chinatown Cheap Eats shout out to Haka cuisine All right, our next spot on Chinatown Cheap Eats is guy kitchen in the Mott Street eatery. It's a new stall They are bringing authentic Thai style Kaomun guy, you know high on chicken rice or chicken rice Whatever you want to call it. They're bringing the authentic version to Mott Street eatery to Chinatown. They got fried Thai eggs, that's very popular and then they have different types of wings and stuff So it's all really cheap guys nine bucks can get you a large. Let's check it out guys here We have the authentic Thai steamed chicken rice now Obviously a lot of different countries from Vietnam to Singapore to China They all do their own version but everybody does a little bit differently obviously the steam one the classic is called Kaomun guy The roasted one is called guy up and then the chicken wings are called guy Todd and then they have the deep-fried eggs Right here. I'm gonna show you. Oh my gosh. That is deeply freshly fried At nine bucks for a large protein and carb. This has got to be one of the best deals in Chinatown right now I'm afraid. I don't know if they have to raise their prices eventually That's pretty juicy and the rice is even a little sticky. I Know a lot of people have had the steam version but this is the roasted Thai chicken the guy up and I know that this is very very popular in Malaysia Man, I just like the brown skin. It's roasted nicely. This is a nice piece of dark meat right here The sauce is a little bit different. It's not the ginger sauce. It's a little bit more of the pungent fish sauce dip Here we have the wings ten dollars for five of them. I got them with a little bit of spice on it These are called guy Todd Not gonna lie It's probably my favorite stall here at Mott Street eatery ending off. I got the drinks Usually they have mango sticky rice as a dessert, but they ran out today. I'm gonna try the chicken broth real quick I have a pink drink and I have a fresh ties tea Dude, honestly guy chicken is the perfect lunch food when you're talking about chicken. You have your protein You have your rice It's fairly light fairly healthy and fairly cheap guys It's really hard to beat and I just love to see these concepts come more into Chinatown I know that there's other spots in Chinatown that serve chicken rice, but as a spot that just specializes in it I like to see it Guys, I mean the truth is I think a lot of Chinatowns are turning a little bit more pan-Asian But it doesn't mean that even the people are not Chinese to be honest because there is so many Thai Chinese people And I believe the people back here, even though they're from Bangkok They're probably you know have a lot of Chinese lineage So I think it's just really cool to be opening up new concepts in Chinatown They are very cheap and at the end of the day, it is all part of the Chinese diaspora in a way Dude, this is the most busy stall here. I'm telling you come to Guy kitchen Inside of E-Noodle the new location here on Jefferson Street. We're here with Kenny Who are running this spot? Yo Kenny What do you guys how would you describe the food at E-Noodle because it's a little bit different than other canto spots You're generalizing, you know Hong Kong cuisine is what we specialize in soup dumplings dumplings This is just not just a Business, it's culture, you know, it's a family business all and you know Just trying to make a good home cooked style food generally like generally for the community Yeah, trying to make like kind of this high and expensive seafood accessible to more people Especially abalone because we all know abalone is like little abalone can cost a lot I'm not waiting three days for the Buddha jumps over the wall dish. I'm not waiting three days for it And the sea cucumber also. All right, you need three days and Also the fish more so now we try to make this a more popular dish that you can order now So I like the concept. I like it. You make it something that was premium more accessible All right, here we have some of E-Noodle's signature dishes. What are we looking at? Right this is called both iPhone right you said specifically a lot made both iPhone What is this? It's a fat ma rice roll in Chinese to be famous how turn on and then this is course a classic old one time I mean, it is called E-Noodle. So I'm sure the noodles gotta be good. Yes In Hong Kong, there was a lot of Shanghainese food because a lot of people from Shanghai went to Hong Kong too. So oh That's a good one. This one looks super high quality. This looks a lot like a din tai feng Shaolong Bao versus a Joe Shaolong Bao All right, so starting off with the boats iphone it has like three or four different types of preserved meats I'm gonna put on the sweet soy sauce. This is only $14 for a boats iphone. Look at how big this is Mmm, I might get this little piece. I'm gonna get with the dark soy sauce. Wow All right, next up. We've got the alam right here. Of course this tendon piece is the old gun and Yeah, it's just really really important man because if you get a bad piece of alam You're gonna be chewing on it for like two weeks. Oh my goodness in or that is a big piece of cotton Loki a lot of people don't know this radish this small pop this adds a lot Like it's kind of a sleeper route You know because a lot of people would not put this root very high on the hierarchy, right? It's up there because a lot of people think it doesn't have that much flavor But think of like low Paco, which is that dim sum dish. It's made out of the same thing radish cake mmm One of my favorite dishes here is the feima churng fun. This is not just any other churng fun It's like fatty beef stir-fried in with rice rolls No, this is almost like the chopped cheese of rice rolls What you guys do that's different because a lot of people don't have this dish, right? As you can see the rice rolls are kind of fried on one side right there. It's a little crispy Mmm, what I love about this one ton is like the ends of the skin is still very silky And then the inside is going to be still a little bit farmed though y'all holds together mmm It's one ton mean It's comfort food right here. We got e-noodle uncle here. All right, you don't even know what we're about to look Tell us what we're looking at. That is a very traditional Chinese food. That is the albolan Seekil cumber dry seekil cumber and the fish more Wow So it is a fish more. Yeah, this is probably something that mostly only Chinese people will order, right? Yeah, specifically Cantonese people may are but now I try to make it more popular a e-noodle right here Wow, I'm going in on the bow you That's the cheapest Ceremonial banquet dish you can get that's still good. All right last but not least Kenny We have another one of your guys's signature dishes. What do you call it three meats with pearl noodles in Chinese? Yeah, and what I like about this these pin noodles is very unique Um, I think they're also called what they're called pearl and pin noodles. That's correct. Oh, and pin noodles do stir-fried. It's delicious Mmm, I know dad is a fan of cooking the undone fun. I remember every Sunday morning Well, I like this because it has some bell peppers in there and it has a lot of green onions And there's this kind of a freshness that also comes along with it So definitely guys look at the color of this dish You gotta try it Overall, I love e-noodles new Jefferson location, man It is the definition of a Chinatown cheap eat every dish here ranges from like a 10 to 16 dollars Minus the seafood one of course, but honestly everything is super affordable It's great for sharing lots of good flavor and you will have some dishes that you probably haven't seen others No, you know what I love about it is bringing the accessibility to dishes that you would really need to be at like a higher end spot Down to you know, making it accessible for everybody and affordable for it. It didn't matter who you are All right, our next spot on cheap Chinatown eats is the brand new bow teahouse This is their second location in the city It is something the neighborhood has never seen and yes, they designed this place to almost maybe feel like Japan All right What's cool is they have a whole lot of unique bows and actually warm them up for you Okay, you have everything from the savory to the sweet, the guava, the rice bows and then Also upstairs they have a whole area where you and your friends can go sit down on the short stools hang out and just it looks cool All right, we're about to try all the bows here about teahouse They're about 425 each if you get to you can save a little bit of money there Man, this really just feels like a Kino Kuniya, you know, which is like a Japanese bookstore or like, you know Amomo Fuku, this is the chocolate bow Wow Macha bow Oh, that's the veggie one actually it looked like matcha on the outside Beautiful bows All right, this is the Valentine's one Rose custard in the middle. Oh my gosh Rose flavor to the mouse You know when it comes to formats that are universal to people It's kind of like the dumpling the sandwich the bow These are just things that people just like to eat So it's really cool that bow teahouse was able to do so well with their first location that they really expanded All right. Oh, that was the egg one. I was looking for this one Whoa See what this one is Oh, that's the chicken bow Oh spicy These meat ones are really cool because they remind me of empanadas except they're a lot softer and they have that little sugar topping This is an egg custard bow All right finishing off for two onigiri's you can get it for $8 And then for two pork belly bows that are freshly made. They're about a 50. Let me test these out Mmm. These are small but they taste really good. All right here. We got the chicken curry onigiri Oh very soft. Oh my gosh. It's almost falling apart What's cool about bow teahouses is that you can just get a snack and only spend maybe Four or five eight dollars or you can go all out get a drink a couple snacks Share it amongst friends and then just have a good time Of course starry night with the pea flower We're freshing in form. Hey, it is instagram worthy next up on cheap china town eats This is not the cheapest though. Um, but we are here at michael matcha, which is connected to the new cura ramen Which is on bowery Okay So it and it looks really cool in that cura ramen guys the the seating and like stacks on top of each other And these hexagonal shapes anyways, we're talking about matcha. So this matcha with the gold flake was $14 after tax You can get it with a swirl. So it's half hoji chow half matcha, but anyways, it's premium. Okay Hmm This is part of the wave of japanese companies Getting bought out or for whatever reason being franchise and now opening up in manhattan. This is actually really good It's pure matcha very soft And it's really interesting on this corner of bowery. It's kind of becoming this little mini Miniatured like japanese concept town But basically a lot of these japanese concepts whether it's prince tea house Which is based off of like japanese french or british tea houses and then cura ramen Which i believe it started from the chan uh taiwan But is a japanese restaurant and then you have this yaki koi spot that's owned by chinese over here So it's like all chinese-owned japanese concepts here on bowery street And they're kind of big kind of nice kind of new Check them out Who would have known that the meal that the railroad workers in taipei were eating 70 years ago would still hold up to this day Here, I got some chilled doujang aka soy milk Wow, it's on the hao heo. You think about the trestletious cake Is it delicious on a scale of one to ten? All right, our next spot on cheap china town eats is actually in little italy, but we're here at cappy cappy And don't cap here. No cap it no cap it This is the best trestletious because it is a mexican chain from mexico guys Uh, you know, tell us about it. We have ice cream here. We have the strawberry fashion fruit. Okay, the special cookies and coffee vanilla Chocolate and butter pecan. All right, so what about the trestletious? What is so good about the mexican trestletious at cappy and style and all the other spanish? It's different because the male is concentrating the bread and the dominican is male is on the bottle. Oh So the mexican style of trestletious cake the milk goes into the cake. Yes Trying mexican trestletious in china town and this might be the best trestletious. I ever have in my life This is the mixed fruit one. Oh my gosh. It's super juicy and moist Whoa, that is the perfect blend. It tastes like one of those cantonese Fruit wedding cakes with the light cream and the fruit in the middle except fused with the trestletious That's a beautiful fusion here in china town Here are the cappuccino one Let's see if I feel the caffeine cake Seven dollars a slice It's not the cheapest thing you can buy in china town But share this between two people and you're good to go man. Hey, you aren't capping This is the best very good. Muy bien All right, you guys next up on china town cheap eats We got a stall from mod street eatery by way of taiwan A lot of people consider these the best dumplings in new york city. Let's see if it's true Tell us about sami wago man. Are these the best dumplings in new york city? Yes, it's on the new york times already the last one the most in the in advance restaurant of the 2022 what is so good about this jiaozi machine? I've seen it before All right, you guys so they got a few dishes that they do not have at the other sami wago which is only guotez This is a dong huai soup. This is they said this is a traditional lamb bone soup very popular in mainland china over here is the new ro mian And uh, yeah, this is supposed to be taiwanese style But if you know about taiwanese style even in taiwan, they got a bunch of different versions of it But I think the thing that typifies it Is definitely this noodle thickness and the presence of the preserved green veggies Upon trying this new ro man, I got to tell you it is herbaceous af and that is very authentic Listen, I'm telling you this is for like Chinese people It's very erby, but it's very good. The shank is good. The broth is good, but yes very erby Honestly, you really feel the shi nian kuai lo vibes in here. This is a shrimp guotier This is a chicken guotier chicken is more a little bit more modern You know a lot of people cannot eat pork and of course you got pork and shrimp This is the number one. This is the signature here at sami wago This is actually a pi dan tofu pi dan is this century egg this tofu is you know right here All right, you guys sami wago was rated the number one dumpling spot in new york city So we got to see because sometimes the media tells lies, but sometimes it tells the truth Oh, good. All right, you guys let me know in the comment section below What do you guys think of chicken meat inside of the court? He has traditionally it's always been pork for centuries, but sometimes you got to get get get on with the more modern proteins guys Yeah, the chicken one The chicken one is a five out of five Listen guys, all of these were eight bucks except the shrimp in the pork, which is 10 bucks This is the one i'm about to try right now Guys, I don't know if it's the absolute best, but it might be come to sami wago check it out They don't just have guo teas and dumplings here guys They've got the uh sweet potato joe or chook or kanji whatever you want to call it in whatever language Of course, you've got the peanuts with the sardines or anchovies With this cucumber with the new european, which is just uh like a beef shank. It's very like tendony It's a hard-working chinese man Next up on our newest edition of chinatown cheap eats. We've got tipsy shanghai They got other locations around Manhattan. This is probably one of the most authentic shanghainese restaurants You can get the whole city. We're gonna get xiaolongbao, shunjinbao and spring rolls You guys we are looking at shangjinbao for eight dollars xiaolongbao for seven dollars and spring rolls for seven dollars man I think first of all, this is something a lot of people in new york city don't really know about the shangjinbao Here we go. Oh my goodness. That's like a gigantic xiaolongbao You know, there's a lot of different styles of this Bow around china some people do the crispy skin that's like tough and then some people do the uh Montoskin Listen guys, there are a lot of good xiaolongbaos around the city This happens to be the one that reminds me the most of the street side stalls in shanghai. Oh my goodness. Look at that drip Next up you've got the chunjin. This is six dollars here This spot is brand new to chinatown. It's very authentic. They're playing the shanghai Jiangsu, Zhejiang region water town music in the background. Check it out compare versus the new york style You still might like joes. You still might like four nine eight or whatever, but it's worth a shot to eat season Basically, it's a brand new build out. Uh, it's owned by cantonese now It took over food station that was on canal street guys food station is a super like hole in the wall You probably didn't go there. But anyways, here's what they're serving now. They got a lot of nice roast meat siu mai This is a sam ping fond aka three treasure rice only 11 dollars very hefty got veggies I like the veggies here, man. It's not that chopped cabbage. It's the it's the real uh, gai lan And then you have your meats. Let's take a look at it I like how it's uh, this darker reddish maroon color and not just the bright red Uh, color seasoning, you know that chashu often has mm Just as I expected that chashu was delicious here. I have the Siu op duck. Ah looks a little bit trim a little bit lean. What's she? Okay Duck's not bad. Not the best that I've had though. Let's try the fo yuk aka the siu yuk Oh, okay, a lot of meat a little bit of skin Hmm, look at this I think covering chinatown and all the new spots that always popped up I think there was a sense that people were getting that cantonese food was going away It's actually not this is a fully cantonese seafood restaurant They have all the crab fried rice is everything that you want. So what I'm guessing is that it's just New people. I think a lot of people from maybe guangzhou or wherever they're coming here They're opening up shops Cantonese food is still very much around and there are new spots popping up and they are busy because guess what Actually the type of chinese food that a lot of people in america first had is still cantonese food So I mean that's why there's hence all the non-asians here. The best highlight here was definitely the cha siu It looks different than other spots Let's take a look at it here. Of course, we got our accoutrements Thone in the little bit of basil nice little plate. I like how the jalapenos are cut very thinly You know not too thick. I'm gonna put that in there This oxtail foe was $15 As you can see it comes with about one two Three four Five bones of oxtail. This is actually a pretty good deal. All right. I'm trying the $15 oxtail foe here at Foe pasture over on Baxter street. I didn't even know that they had oxtail foe to be honest because It's it's not something that's well advertised, but let's take a look at it They give you a lot of pieces maybe like five bones for 15 All right, what is my honest review of the $15 oxtail foe here at foe pasture The only oxtail foe in chinatown, I would say it's definitely worth getting but it's not going to blow you away because the oxtail is not super super tender Um, it obviously doesn't match up with a lot of the other oxtail foe spots But shout out to them for even serving this to be honest a lot of foe spots don't even go for it Um, they don't even try to attempt So I got to give foe pasture credit for trying so $15 you'll get a lot of oxtail though All right everybody next up on chinatown cheap eats We got one of my favorite foe spots in all of chinatown nam sun here This is one of the biggest features here is that you can order brown rice noodles in your foe They actually have a different taste a different texture. They're kind of stretchy. I love them I personally pay the extra 250 for them So it does kind of boost the price of this foe, but honestly nam sun by the way has the best meat Okay, maybe I think the broth is one thing but the meat is really good here and then here I have the foe bo call um You know the beef stew and with egg noodles right here take a look at this Oh And then I also got the roll and this is really nice guys the bread at these spots is delicious. Look how soft We just dip that real quick for you Guys i'm not gonna lie I have a lot of vietnamese friends in new york or that visit new york And they always shade chinatown foe because I think it doesn't taste fully authentic, but I will tell you this guys It's still really good. That's and when we're talking about prices. We're talking about manhattan prices here, okay? It costs $700 a month to just park your car. So foe for $15 $16 even with the brown rice noodles That's still a deal Next up on cheap chinatown eats. We got Tria bakery. This is a spot that I've never been to It's over here at the corner of the confucius plaza channel square Let's check it out All right here at triad diner. We have the triad burger. This was about $10. It's on a brioche fund You can pick how you want your patty done. It's got bacon mozzarella mushrooms onions Tria diner could be a jam over a champion square do not sleep on triad diner