By Sarah Zorn
Brooklyn Eagle

The Heights Casino in Brooklyn Heights welcomed food historian (and Casino member) Andrew Coe to their Speakers Program on Monday night to talk about the state of Chinese food in Brooklyn. He spoke to a capacity crowd in the Governors Room, as members noshed on Sichuan spicy chicken, pork egg rolls and shrimp toast, all made in-house.

Coe has written for Saveur, Gastronomica, and the New York Times, and recently released the book Chop Suey: A Cultural History of Chinese Food in the United States.

So what sparked his interest in Chinese food?

“I was writing a lot about New York history, and looking at lots of photos, particularly of Chinatown in the 1930s and 40s,� says Coe. “One thing I noticed was that there were big chop suey signs over all of the restaurants, but as I was walking down present-day Mott Street, I saw that all the signs were gone. And I thought, what happened to chop suey? So I wrote an article, which snowballed into a book, and the rest is history.�

History played a big part during the evening, as guests were taken on a slideshow tour of Chinese food through the ages, from the bland pre-Nixonian ‘chow mein era’ to the current profusion of Sichuan, Hunan and other regional eateries. Provoking laughs from the Brooklyn Heights crowd, Coe pronounced Montague Street as stuck in the former era, citing its five Chinese restaurants as inauthentic and interchangeable.

So where can one go for the real stuff? Coe fully contends that the best Chinese food he’s had outside of China can be found in Brooklyn’s own Sunset Park. He particularly recommends the dim sum at Pacificana (813 55th St. at 8th Ave.), soups at Lanzhou Hand Pulled Noodles (5924 8th Ave.), Cantonese dinner at Lucky Eight (5204 8th Ave.), and spicy cold rice noodles at Yun Nan Snacks (775 49th St.)

And is there a meal that stands out amongst the rest in his mind? “I had a chicken and chestnut stew with mushrooms the other night at Lucky Eight,� says Coe. “It was so deeply flavored and rich that it could have been made by some great French chef; just a superlative, cold weather, thick stew. That’s really the kind of excellent food that you can get in Brooklyn’s Chinatown right now.�

Do you have questions about other lesser known cuisine in Brooklyn? E-mail news@brooklyneagle.net.

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