kottke.org posts about Chinatown (kottke.org)

posted Apr 23 @ 04:00 PM by Jason Kottke

A little something for my officemates: a

A little something for my officemates: a guide to bakeries in Manhattan’s Chinatown. We usually go to the Fay Da on Elizabeth, mostly for convenience.

posted Feb 27 @ 12:31 PM by Jason Kottke

There was a big bust in Chinatown

There was a big bust in Chinatown yesterday…32 vendors selling counterfeit watches, sunglasses, and handbags were shut down. All up and down Canal St today, not only are the busted stores closed but all the other shops selling fake goods are shuttered as well. And not a single person asked me if I wanted to buy Juno on DVD.

What’s funny about the whole thing is how open the vendors are about what they’re selling. These are actual physical shops like the Apple Store or the Gap, not a bunch of purses out of a garbage bag set up on a rickety card table. And uniformed police are around all the time, doing absolutely nothing about it. And then all the luxury fashion houses get the mayor’s ear, he can no longer ignore the problem, and Bloomberg ends up at the scene, grandstanding for the cameras and calling the whole thing a big problem that they’re working on tirelessly. A friend said this morning it reminded him of the “dope on the table” scenes in The Wire…little more than constabulary theater.

posted Oct 22 @ 11:27 AM by Jason Kottke

NYC’s Chinatown is Hillary Clinton country.

In April, a single [Clinton] fundraiser in an area long known for its gritty urban poverty yielded a whopping $380,000. When Sen. John F. Kerry ran for president in 2004, he received $24,000 from Chinatown.

posted Nov 1 @ 04:33 PM by Jason Kottke

Melting pot

At one of the few chain restaurants in Chinatown today, I witnessed a Spanish-speaking cashier taking an order from a Cantonese-speaking customer off of an English-only menu. It took awhile, but the woman seemed satisfied as she left with her food.

posted Oct 12 @ 04:22 PM by Jason Kottke

Good Italian take-out in Little Italy?

From the perspective of the outside observer, New York’s Little Italy seems like little more than a chunk of Disney World plopped down in the midst of lower Manhattan. On the ground, the reality is not much better, particularly if you’re out to find a good meal. Unlike neighboring Chinatown, Little Italy’s food reputation is not the best. Since we started working in our new office in Chinatown, a number of forays have been made into Little Italy in order to procure take-out to bring back to the office, particularly pizza-by-the-slice. The results have been disappointing; several slices of blah pizza and a deep-fried risotto ball with prosciutto, mozzarella, and peas (sounds fantastic, right?) that was way not fantastic.

Is there anywhere in this whole small country we can get good Italian food to go or pizza-by-the-slice? As it is, Little Italy is reflecting poorly on the mother country and its excellent cuisine, and it would be nice, if possible, to salvage some of that reputation.

posted Oct 11 @ 03:12 PM by Jason Kottke

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