 Sometimes as ABCs, we bought into their narrative about us. That's why I see so many ABCs push away from the culture. That's what I hate, too, man. All right, everybody, welcome to a very special episode of Feng Bro's Food. We are in the middle of New York's Chinatown on Mach Street at a brand new restaurant called Charhouse, and they are bringing a new concept to the game. It's like a Chinese steakhouse, something, in my opinion, and through my travels, I've never seen before. But we got chef Eric, and we got local business owner Chris here, and we are going to be not only having a feast, but having a very interesting discussion today. Of course, we're going to be talking about the food. We're going to be talking about how Chinatown, New York, is changing, and of course, we're going to be talking about the controversial G word, gentrification. All right, starting off, Eric, you actually cooked all this food, man. What is Charhouse, and what are we looking for? The steakhouse concept is very American, so we wanted to do something unique, and because I grew up in Chinatown, I wanted to represent where I come from. Here, we have the classical Tamahawk steak. It's done, salt, pepper, real simple, dry-aged, fat, just five-spice, chashido peppers, red wine sauce, or Pua sauce, that's French wasabi butter, that's just different. Here, we have our salad, the dragon slaw, we call it. It's inspired by a salad in Malaysia and Singapore. Here, we have the whole fish, and the whole fish is a representation of longevity in the Chinese culture, so we kept that traditional, but instead of steaming, we did grilling and roasting. Here, we also have the scallop and foie gras, very classical French combination, but we tied it together to be Chinese with the sweet potato puree and some black garlic and lotus chips. Here's our classical steak tartare, very classical American steakhouse dish. Here, we have a traditional steakhouse crab cake, jumbo lumps, and we have our green sriracha and ginger remelade to Chinese the fire. Exo sauce is a very famous sauce from Hong Kong. We make it here in our own fashion with dried scallops and shrimp, and we bind it with a tomato jam, and we have some prosciutto chips. Here, we have a classic Caesar salad, except wanna represent the chrysanthemum green. In Chinese, we call it ho, ho. So it's a very traditional dressing, parmesan cheese. Chris, have you ever seen a Chinese-inspired steakhouse before? No, I've eaten a lot of places, but this definitely takes the case. I think you wanna let people know that they can get a very fine steak in Chinatown, served and conceptualized by a Chinese person. I feel like we would be remiss in not starting off with the steak. This is dry aged. Dry aged. Here at Chara House, we do 28 days. It's gonna have a little funk, so dry aged meat is not for everyone. I like it with the exo sauce. What are the two sauces that we're looking at here? We got a ho, ho, ho, and a red wine. It's so good. What does it mean to bring dry aged beef to Chinatown? You're talking about price here. What's the people that live around here can afford? So here, we're using prime cuts. That already, when you buy it in, it's already that much more expensive. Dragon salad. Eric, when it comes to authenticity, right? I mean, a lot of these dishes are maybe not authentic in the traditional way, but they're very authentically personal to you. It's not authentic in the way that stuff was cooked maybe 50 years ago. Fusion was a word to describe two cultures on one plate. People started using that term in the wrong way. They just carry Thai food and Jack with Yam Sushi and Thai Thai in the same place. That's not fusion. That's like having two different restaurants in the same restaurant. Yo, you gotta go at this foie gras. So it's a fattened duck liver and it's very unctuous and rich. That is like a texture battle in my mouth right now. It seems as like Asian, do you try to put like that umami in everything? Or like it's just... Not everything, but you know, there's those fat pounds that you know. It was unctuous and it was scrumptious. That's my Jesse Jackson. It was unctuous and scrumptious. We got the beef tartare. We're gonna throw the quail egg and then we'll also... Some people don't like raw eggs, so they'll just do without it. Y'all down with raw eggs? Yeah. Also a lot of the people who started businesses that built Chinatown started businesses for so many other reasons other than just like the love of food back then. You know, immigrant, you gotta bring your family over. Unless you're a grandfather then from before, you know, like it's very hard to make a living in Manhattan, especially not just to mention New York, but we're in Manhattan. And that's why you see them moving out to Flushing, Brooklyn. That's why the food is better there. And that's why it's not as exciting here. But you know what? I'm here. We're gonna make things happen. Hey, I talked to every... Talked to every... Give it here. Yo, let's keep it moving with the food, man. We gotta try this exo shrimp. This is like a plate on like guacamole and salsa kind of thing with the shrimp. Wow. That's good, man. This is so good. That shrimp is delicious. I've never had exo sauce with avocado. Wow, that tomato jam? That's that fusion. Tomato jam? It's fusion, like you said, but done the right way. And so few places can claim that. Like you said, that word is just like... I mean, I still hate that word, honestly. As a business owner, I hate the word. I call it like inspired, maybe. The last thing you want is Asian fusion on your Yelp description. That's exactly what it is. Like, for a Russian owner, it's not fusion. It's inspired. Like I'm trying to stay open for tomorrow, bro, too. I gotta say though, when I saw the brand Xeno, I didn't think it was gonna taste like a Cantonese steamed fish. But it totally did. This was even elevated one notch up. It was like extra ginger, extra spices. What did you do to this to even take the classic Cantonese steamed fish? Ron Xeno is a type of European bass. Puree, ginger, and I train the juice. And I just spoon the juice all over the meat before cooking, and then put the lemon inside. Chris, you own a couple of businesses. You're involved in a Chinese concept coming up soon, right? Chinos, New York, 23th Power Street. So we're gonna be the first rotisserie in Chinatown. We're gonna do some flavors. We have like a Szechuan style. We're gonna have like a sugarcane tide style. You know, lemongrass. Peaking chicken. Peaking chicken. I'm about to steal the idea right now. I'll give it to you. Cut that up. I'll blow the skin up. What can like the Chinese take away from maybe the way the Japanese and Koreans price their food? Chinese food is always considered so cheap, but just the amount of work goes into it. I mean, the Chinese love value, you know, we're at a time where if you don't charge the prices, like the right prices, you're just gonna lose all these restaurants. They're not gonna even have that to taste anymore. Do you think that's gonna change? I think it's gonna change. I don't think anytime soon, but I mean like when I go to other places, I mean like California, I mean places a little better. I think sometimes, and I don't know if you guys agree with me, sometimes as ABCs, we bought into their narrative about us. Like we started to believe what everybody believed about us. Like that we are only like low end or we are only blah blah blah. So that's why I see so many ABCs push away from the culture. That's what I hate too, man. Because it's almost like you bought into other people's perception of you instead of having your own self-identity and knowing, yeah, I can see why you see that about us, but we just not showing our full, our full, at least. Coming soon, $15 Chashu bow. He doesn't have to be that cheap. Tiny's Tuxedo down there, $28 Chashu. That's a really good Chashu though. It's good Chashu. I had it, that was pretty good. It is a good Australian guy. Some people feel some type of way about that, but I'm like, that's Chinese. Hey man, I'm Chinese, I cook French. I don't mind. Right, right, right. Cause if I say an Australian guy can't cook Chashu, I'm saying the Chinese guy can't cook steak, right? Right. How would you want people to view New York's Chinatown? Yeah, I want this Chinatown to kind of like lead all the world's Chinatowns all over, to be an example of how beautiful it can be and how good the food can be and how diverse it can be. If you will come to Chinatown, I think you should start with what makes Chinatown sort of from the bottom, the food stand people, the guys in the back of the kitchen, you know. Those are the guys that make Chinatown Chinatown, really, you know. Chinese culture is sort of like the original Asian culture. Due to being the originator Asian culture, it's also sort of the most conservative. Will that mindset shift or is it just so ingrained in Chinese history to be like dominant and non-adaptable? My dad, he escaped China, right? Like he wanted to get away from the communists, but he's still telling me, I love the Chinese culture. There's so many great things about China. Like don't overlook just because of that bad leader. That period. Yeah, that period, like it was a lot of little tougher for him. God gives the biggest players daughters. That's the only thing I say, that's that's that's. Yeah, I thought I was gonna say that. I never heard that. I like that. I mean, that's definitely what it is. I mean, especially when you have more resources, you have, you know, more connections, you definitely can get back a lot more. Thank you so much to Charhouse. Thank you, Eric. Thank you, Chris. All right, everybody, thank you so much for watching that video. All right, in the comments below, let us know what you guys think about the idea of like a Chinese inspired steakhouse, something that's very uncommon to the world right now. And also let us know how you guys feel about, you know, maybe your local Chinatown or Asia town changing. Thank you so much for watching that video. Shout out to Charhouse once again. And until next time, we out. Peace. And then my grandmother was like the Victoria's Secret. She had like four trucks delivering lingerie. Ma was not about the sexiness. Ma was not about the sexiness. He didn't want no women looking sexy. Who knows? Ma Mingdong. Ma Mingdong.