BEST Cheap LATE NIGHT Food In Chinatown at 2AM!

Where people are literally stumbling through those doors and just be like, hey man, you getting some noodles? Hear this crunch? Yeah, we putting honey on the pinwheels now, but we ain't sweet, okay? Yeah, let me tell you this, we got more in common with Tony Soprano than Tony Romo. Mango. This spot is open till 4 a.m. Not gonna be hungover tomorrow. Chinatown, New York was always a late night destination. And while it hasn't been the same since the shutdown, there's definitely a new energy that's bringing it back to its late night hall of fame status. From the fresh skewer cart, to mala xiang guo, to bone marrow pho, and even dim sum, this is your late night tour in Chinatown, New York. All right, starting off our late night Chinatown video, guys, I gotta talk about this spot called Cha Qi. It is open till 3 a.m. Wednesday through Sunday. And on the weekends, it's until 4 a.m. Let's check it out. Hey everybody, staying up late night to tour Chinatown does require energy. That's why I gotta talk about our sponsor today, G Fuel. And in my hand, I have PewDiePie's flavor. They don't actually specify what flavor it is, but considering he's Swedish, I think these are lingonberries. Oh, that's pretty good. Listen, there are a lot of energy drinks out there, but just try to find the one like G Fuel that puts some actual ingredients inside. Strawberry fruit powder, papaya fruit powder, and then here you have green coffee bean extract, green tea extract, turmeric extract, tart cherry, blueberry, broccoli, kale. While I'm not saying that this constitutes a salad, I'm just saying it's got some salad elements. All right, let's check out this one from the boys, Compound V. I like the tub powder because you get to choose how much you put in. Mm, kind of like a white gummy bear. Up next, peach rings. Smells like the candy. Oh, wow. So if you're thinking about getting a holiday gift for like a gamer or a student or a Sonic the Hedgehog fan, then go on gfuel.com and use our code FUNBROS for 30% off. I am continually impressed by the fact that G Fuel is able to make that flavor accurately taste like what it's supposed to. But the question is, does Tetris Blast actually taste like Tetris Blocks? I'm gonna have Gen Z gamer behind the camera, Fred, try. Yo, make sure that lid is on tight, bro. I can taste the teaspoon. So you're looking at the venue and you're wondering, is this a regular Hong Kong cafe? Is it a late night cha cha tang? It is, but it's elevated. It's got a lot of Japanese dishes and actually some really good Vietnamese ones. I'm getting their phone. I'm super excited about that. Here, we have the Hong Kong milk tea. This is the lychee. Check it out. Good classic. Now this is iced lemon tea, like dongling cha, but Thai style. Ooh, that's a little different. I like that. Right off the bat, you got two dishes you will not find at a lot of late night spots. Here we have the kimchi fried rice, but what's different is it has the Cantonese lap yuk right there. That's kind of the dried bacon. And then here you have the pork belly buns and they have like the little radish in there too. And they have a lot of different elements in there and a little pieces of kale. What's going on here? Mm. This funky fusion right here is very, very HK taking pan Asian flavors, fusing it together, but just making it delicious. And right here, I got one of my late night Chinatown friends, Hong from the Bronx. Yo, try the pork belly bun, man. Hell yeah. You see that bite? Late night, but elevated Dan Dan Man, guys. It has a poached egg. You've never seen one that looks like this. They actually use ramen noodles here as the bed. Here we got some minced pork. I'm gonna just mix it up. Ooh. I can smell the Sichuan mala numbing sauce right there. Imagine, it's 2 a.m. and you're eating a bowl of $16 Dan Dan Man that you've never had before. Bro, this type of flavor at this time of the night? Ridiculous. All right, here we got a nice bowl of tender beef brisket over egg noodles, ao la min. It's looking very... I mean, to get this this late is crazy. So much flavor. Just like a good cha cha tang should serve it. You guys, there is a reason that cha qi was our lead off late Chinatown cheap eat. There's bone marrow here. There's beef brisket falling off the bone. All types of pho noodles. You know how hard it is to get late night pho in New York City? Outside of very strong Vietnamese enclaves, there is not that much 24-hour pho available. This spot is open late, late, and this pho is authentic. It is very difficult to get a great pho late night from a spot that doesn't specialize in pho, but I heard that the chefs who made this actually are from a pho shop, and they just came here after their other restaurant job. Guys, the last time I saw Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese, and Korean food served at one spot, I was in San Antonio, Texas, and I'll tell you this. They didn't do any of them that well, but it's 2022, it's New York City, and people have the capacity to pull it off. This is late night gyozas right here. Boom. You guys, this is yuzu brown butter edamame. I'm not saying they're gonna do it exactly like your favorite ramen spot, but I'm telling you, it's 2 a.m., it's late night, Chinatown, all this stuff is valid. Two years ago, it looked like late night in Chinatown wasn't gonna come back, but with Cha-Ki opened this late, feeling like it's some type of fusion between the Hong Kong choy-wa and a Japanese restaurant, the future of Chinatown is looking good. On to the next spot. Probably the most famous, or one of the most famous late night Chinatown cheap eats is the twar cart. Twars are these meat sticks. Obviously, guys, they come from Western China, but nowadays, they're all over. And as you can see, there are people from all walks of life here. You know, I don't even know if they know what it's called. To be honest, they probably just call it meat on a stick. I saw some Spanish people calling it Chinese pinchos or Chino pinchos. It's just twar to me. So this is chi-rou, and this is yang-rou. That's lamb, this is chicken, two bucks each, $4. You can't beat this. I remember the first time I was in China and I had these 15 years ago. It's crazy to find it now in Manhattan. It has the authentic cumin flavor from Xinjiang on it too. Yunnan Guochao Man. Guys, we're here at Yunshan Rice Noodle. This spot is open till 4 a.m. Does everybody here even understand the name of the dish, the over-the-bridge noodle? I don't know. But they're eating rice noodles and soup until 3.30 a.m. every day, so I got the mixed mushroom one. Let's check it out. All right, guys, Yunshan Mixian is a chain from Yunnan. I'm here with my guy Ryan here, man. Yo, can you explain to the people how to eat this very quickly? So basically what you'll have to do is just put in everything, the ingredients in here. Once you've done that, basically you put the noodles ready to go for dining. Dude, do you think a lot of the non-Chinese, do they know what they're eating? Or is this just like a noodle soup to them? You know how it has this whole background of over-the-bridge noodles? Yeah, they sometimes think it's hotpot because the bowl's shaped like hotpots, but it's generally like a noodle place from Yunnan. That's how people usually eat their noodles. They have the size of ingredients for you to choice to put it in. Sometimes people just choose whatever they like in the size, just put it in and they enjoy their noodles as well. David, imagine it's 2.30 a.m. right now. It's actually not, but it could be because they're open that late. Are you putting the noodles inside of the soup or are you pouring the soup onto your bed of noodles? Yeah, I put the noodles in the soup, bro. Just like it's hotpot, guys. Essentially, you can treat it like a hotpot. It's not technically a hotpot, but it kind of operates like one. Look at that. You have the pork, the lettuce, you got the mogu, which is the mushroom. I'm trying to speak more Chinese. Fish cake, little lap cheong, Chinese sausage. Let's get it. It's great for sharing, too. That's what I love, man. You can come here, you can have some drinks with your buddies. Maybe you're a little tipsy, whatever, a little woozy, but you get a nice big pot of hot mushroom broth in your face and you just feel better about life or maybe striking out at the club. I have to admit, I do think it's pretty hilarious that of all things, became this drunk food of people at like 3 a.m., where people are literally stumbling through those doors and just be like, hey, man, we're getting some noodles. And I wonder if in their head, they're like, I'm getting some Yunshan noodles, or you're just like, yo, I'm just getting noodles. I don't care if it's Wonton noodles or Yunshan Mishan. Hey, man, shout out to this spot, man, for holding it down through COVID. It was open for takeout, but since they reopened dining, it's been crazy. All in this bite, I have different types of mushrooms. I got pork, I got lettuce. And if you know anything about Yunnan, it is in the Southwest region of China. It also has a lot of different types of mushrooms. That's kind of what it's known for. Mm. Late night Chinatown food in the past was usually dominated by Cantonese food, right? Wonton mien, you have roast ducks, chashu, kind of chicken wings. There used to be a spot called 69 Bayard way back in the day. But here, you can get garlic crawfish. You can get hou shui ji, which is like a Sichuan dish. You can even get takoyaki. You can get a few skewers on here. You can get some tu dou si, shredded potatoes. And honestly, man, it's just cool to add this type of cuisine to the late night Chinatown menu. It's just another side of things, man. And I know that when you can't get full late night, you can always get this. Trust me, I don't know if you guys understand how interesting it is to see so many non-Asians come into this spot and eat Yunnan guo chao mien. It's not really a dish that maybe these people would even try otherwise, because there's not that many of these spots. But this one happens to be open late, so shout out. All right, guys, you know this is late night Chinatown, but it's not just about food. You can also get a massage here at Ocean One Spa. They're open till about 11 o'clock. So that's not super, super late, but they have pretty good prices here. Look, 20 minutes for $25. Oh, and by the way, it's legit, guys. Don't come in here with those bad thoughts, man. Don't do that, man. When you're thinking Chinatown late eats, you're probably thinking about wontons, something based in the Cantonese cuisine. But actually, we're at Famous Sichuan, and it's open till 2 a.m. every day. The Mandarin name is Chuan Wai Chuan. Check it out. You know how, like, most of the food late night is Cantonese food, but you have different dishes, like Sichuan. We only serve Sichuan spicy food, not only Cantonese. But if you want it not spicy, I can make it not spicy for you, just a little spice in there. But how can you make the Sichuan food not spicy? Oh. How do you do it? Oh, we just, some people ask, I can't take it too spicy, but I know a little bit how shop, and can not put my spicy food on that. And they go like that. All right. Good job, man. Listen, guys. That's how you know this spot is legit, because they have the soda wall. I mean, I got brisk lemon iced tea, Heineken's Qingdao, what you need? What you need? When it comes to the journey of Sichuan food in America, guys, we're talking about two different waves, two different generations. I would say that Famous Sichuan sort of represents something in between. But this came in like the 90s and early 2000s. And right now there's a whole new generation from 2020. This is from the previous one. It's been a little bit New York, guys, but it does not mean it is not good. You are looking at Chongqing Lazi Ji. This is Chongqing fried chicken bits. Twenty two bucks. This is Zhiyuan Yang Rou. That's just basically cumin stir fried lamb. Twenty three bucks. Let's check it out. For me, as somebody who enjoys both generations of Sichuan food, I don't really think one is better than the other. Of course, I would more lean towards the modern one. It's being directly ported over from Chengdu and Chongqing. This New York style, man, it still has its own charm. And I could see, you know, especially Americans even preferring it. All right. Our next two dishes are the big entrees here. We got the Zhang Cha Ye, which is fried tea duck. And then we got the Gan Guo. This dry hot pot is about thirty five dollars. This one's twenty eight. I know this isn't the cheapest eat that you can get in Chinatown, but it is open late. Hmm. So this does taste kind of similar to the Cantonese roast duck, aka the Siu Ap. But the skin is even extra crisp because I think it's fried. It's a little less juicy because they cut it up to fry it. And it has a little bit more tea flavor. I got to tell you, though, that this is probably fairly authentic because the chef is from Chengdu. Hear this crunch. All right. So here we got the Gan Guo. It does kind of look pretty similar to the modern day dry hot pots that you're going to get that are opened up, you know, mostly serving the international students. Now, here's the funny thing about famous Sichuan, man. It's open late. It's actually very delicious, but I don't come here that often. This is a Gan Guo or Gan Huo Guo, aka dry hot pot. It's supposed to kind of mimic and have a lot of the same flavors. As you would have from a hot boiling cauldron of Sichuan hot pot right in front of you. But it's a lot easier to eat. The sauce is already on it. Everything's already cooked. So you just eat out of it. Hmm. So I got to say this has a lot of flavor and I'm really enjoying it, but it might not exactly have that crazy mala-ness that you would get if you got this at the bottom floor of the New World Mall in Flushing, Queens. Also, maybe it does have a little bit less of the mala than like a mala tang or like a maotai, you know, these very popular Chengdu dishes that are getting really big in America right now. But overall, man, I like this spot. Late night Sichuan. I don't even think there's another Sichuan spot even open this late in the entire city, you know, until you get to Queens. Hmm. You know, eating all the Sichuan food at 1 a.m., I kind of realized why everybody loves particularly New York style Chinese food. Now, New York style Chinese food was always a little bit different than the Midwest style Chinese food or the super, super authentic international student Chinese food. It's kind of in between. And that's what I like. You know, it's a little bit more authentic than the Americanized stuff, but it's not too authentic to turn people off. So I guess it's in a nice middle point. Shout out. I'm sorry, guys. I got to admit that even though famous Sichuan to be open this late with this quality is a solid spot. I'm not going to lie. It's not really a cheapie. All right, guys. Our dim sum has arrived here. It's 1030 p.m. So you can get dim sum late at night in Chinatown, right here in the heart of it, Pell Street. It's really cool to see this spot filled up with old Chinese people during the daytime and then at night time filled up with a lot of older white people or Jewish families, guys. So it's really cool that House of Joy was able to bring dim sum at a pretty decent level, clean space in the heart of Chinatown. Guys, here we have our favorite dishes. Classics. They're still steaming. You got ha gow, you got feng jiao, chicken feet. You got the Hakka stuffed eggplant. I love this dish. Xin zhe gyun. We ate one. This is a fried tofu roll. Here you got the pai guet. You got siu mai. And then you have this egg cake roll. Ma la gou, right here. All steaming fresh. Let's try it out, man. Mmm. All right, guys. Of course, you got the classic feng jiao. This is chicken feet. But feng jiao actually, in Cantonese, translates directly to phoenix claw. The more casual term would be like gai gou, which is literally chicken feet, but that's not as poetic of a term. And this dish totally deserves a poetic term, for sure. For $10.30 at night, pretty damn good. Here we have the ha gow. And a lot of people say that you can tell the skill of a dim sum chef by the shrimp dumpling. Now, all these dishes are anywhere from about $6 to $6.50 each. And trust me, I know that's a little bit more than you're used to, but honestly, the days of sitting down at a restaurant, eating $3 dim sum, it's over, man. You can get those at the stall, but if you're sitting down at a nice spot in the middle of Chinatown, you're gonna pay six bucks. Ma la gou, it's kind of like an egg cake roll with sweet salted egg yolk in the middle. So, it's kind of like a dessert. Eggy and lemony. Listen, walking around Chinatown, man, you can tell people grow up eating Chinese food. They love it here. Even the non-Asians, whether they're white, black, Hispanic, or Jewish, or whatever color they are, guys. So, I'm telling you right now, if you're thinking about opening up a Chinese restaurant right now, just know that people like the food, but if you build it well and you don't take any shortcuts, they will come. Nori is a fun, divy local spot on Grand Street in Forsyth. It's one of those places that once you've had a drink there, you kind of feel like you fit in. Sally and Herman work the bar, Randy and Chad are the owners, and they used to sell mostly Thai food, and now they flipped into a full-fledged bar. But the bites are still good. Calamari, wings, spam fries, and no joke, the hot dogs are solid. If you're looking for a spot that gives you some cheers-type vibes, check it out. Open late every day but Monday. All right, here we have the chicken chow mein, and I gotta say it like that because I feel like that's how you're supposed to order it, the chicken chow mein, right? But it's nicely seared on these big egg noodles. Now, I'll tell you this, guys. New York Chinese food is very famous for a couple of reasons. One, because Chinese have been in New York for so many decades, and also, I feel like by the time the Chinese were building up a lot of the restaurants seen out here, the recipes were already maybe one notch more advanced than they were when they started on the West Coast, so I'm excited. But hey, New York Chinese food, man, it hasn't really changed that much. Mm. They don't even give you chili oil. They give you red devil trapeze. You know who the sponsor is. Mm. And here we have the undefeated walnut shrimp, guys. This is a dish that you can find at any other Chinese restaurant, especially, obviously, Cantonese restaurants. Let's see how it compares. Nicely fried, kind of tempura battering. The mayonnaise is very white. No, that's pretty good. That's definitely comparable to all other restaurants, honestly. The shrimp are huge. Other spots might do it a little bit more sweet, but I could rock with this one a lot. Let's try the fried walnuts. This one's good. Listen, at the end of the day, when people ask, oh, is Warhop authentic Chinese food? Yeah, it definitely is, and it was authentic at a time. Now, maybe times have changed, but, you know, considering this is New York and these are cooked by a lot of Chinese immigrants, yes, in a way, it really was. I would say my favorite is the walnut shrimp right here, but, guys, again, if you want to eat Chinese food that is from, like, 40 years ago, I think this is the best spot. It gives you that interesting vibe. You got police badges up there. They're clearly part of the community, clearly part of the city, so shout out to Warhop, a staple in the late-night Chinatown. Welcome to HK Wonton Garden. It's open till 11 p.m. every night right now. It used to be open till 2 a.m. Maybe they're working their way back to that time, but for now, guys, let's check it out. Oh, my gosh, guys, HK Wonton Garden, I'm telling you, this is a deal. It's only 10 bucks a month. This is a lo mein, but with chow mein. Chow mein is the wide noodle. You've got the wontons here. Of course, we got the char siu right here. I'm telling you, guys, this is probably one of the most underrated dishes in Chinatown. You don't always need the soup, you know? It's almost like a sukeh man, you know? What'd you order? Oh, okay, the char siu. Late night, guys, Cantonese roast pork buns. We got the roast pork right here, the char siu. Can't go wrong with it. You know how much you spend? How much were they? 375. Easy. Yeah, easy. As you can see here, they will steam up some ha gow, some shrimp dumplings for you fresh late at night. I mean, I'm telling you guys, these old-school spots, they deserve your support, and it's not like you're supporting them just for no reason. The food is good, too. If you truly a Canto, you know you love yourself some wonton. That is a comfort food. It just feels good, especially as it gets colder in New York City. New York City, please go easy. Oh, that's hot. All right, you guys, Pizza Town is a brand new pizza spot that opened on the outskirts of Chinatown. It's open till 12 a.m. Let's check it out. All right, you guys, we are at Pizza Town. I've got the buffalo slice. I've got the margarita. Let's check it out. Ah, it's hot. Oh, oh, what is that? Dude, hey, listen, guys, unconventional, but, you know, we're at a Bengali-owned pizza spot in Chinatown right next to the subway station. Unconventional. Oh, my God. Does not begin to describe what we're doing. This ain't- This is too much. This ain't a typical Italiano slice, okay? Bro. Whoa. All right, you guys, it's late night in Chinatown. There's only one McDonald's. Technically, the Delancey one is kind of near a McDonald's, but that's really Lit Donald's. This is the only Maidang Lao. Even in China, it's been rebranded as Jing Gong Men, but, you know, it is a Chinatown late night eat. We gotta check out the Maidang Lao. All right, you guys, we had a 50% off code here at McDonald's, so we're actually gonna go ahead and get the shareables. Maybe we'll give them out to some people on the street that, you know, obviously are having a tough time, feeling like the combo pack is a good play. We're gonna eat well tonight in Chinatown. Eat well. I like it, I like it. Hey, you heard it. You heard it. All right, you guys, we're at Manero's. This spot is open till midnight every night. We're like half a block away from Chinatown. What I'm looking at right here is a prosciutto white slice. This is $5 per slice. Over here, I've got a soppressata pinwheel. You know, not everybody where even carries pinwheels and they, you know, chop it up for you. Check that out. See the layers? It's like an ant farm. And then over here, I've got a hipster Brooklyn's Best peach half and half. $4, guys. This is still like right outside of Chinatown. Got the Mike's Hot Honey. I'm gonna drizzle on there. Manero's Pizza, it is one of my favorite slice spots in the Lower East Side, hands down. I know $5 is just a little pricey per slice. You get what you pay for. Oh my goodness. Look at this soppressata pinwheel, guys. You got so many different layers. You know, you got meat, cheese, bread, meat, cheese, bread, meat, cheese, bread. I would kind of compare this to a denser version of like a pepperoni croissant. It's got the burnt cheese on top. It's got the soft melty mozzarella in the middle. I know the owner of Manero's is from Brooklyn. So he's kind of bringing some of that Brooklyn Italian vibe to Little Italy. Like we said, guys, it's open till midnight every night. This is the best pizza you can get late night in LES Chinatown. We are at Sweet House. I always, always, always order delivery from here, but you can get takeout until 11 p.m. at night. I'm gonna get a sago dessert. This sago, sango, with the fruit. And I'm going to get this mixed mango drink. Mango. She just told us that after Cardi B tried Tahoe, which is the Filipino version of tofu pho with boba. People have been coming in, non-Asians have been coming in and ordering this all the time. That's the power of media. So you got a layer of coconut slush, mango slush, and then aloe jelly. And the aloe jelly is plant-based. I feel like I returned to Hong Kong. Okay, you got a strawberry sago, sago in the bottom. And then you got all kinds of fruit. There's melons, mango, kiwi, strawberry. What is sago? Sago is tiny tapioca. They're clear and they're from Thailand. We are at Tiem Yuen, which is the Cantonese name of Sweet House. I feel like I'm in Tsim Sha Tsui TST right now. Oh man, I never even got the strawberry sago. I usually get a watermelon. Ooh, ooh, ooh, they got the whole mango. Dude, I'm telling you, these are fresh strawberries right here. Guys, it is clear that rumors of Chinatown's late night death have been exaggerated. Is it true that a lot of spots are not fully back to their old school schedule from a few years ago? Definitely, that's true. But as you can see, you still got a lot of options up to 11 p.m. Yeah, come out and support it. You know, don't just order on the apps, come in person because I'm telling you, it tastes better when you get it fresh. I know that Chinatown used to be the premier spot at one point in New York City for late night. And you know, it's taking a big dip, but it's gonna come out of that dip. It's gonna bounce, it's like a stock. Hopefully, you know, like the market will in a couple of years. For the past two years, Chinatown has been in a battle to bring itself back through the COVID shutdown and the new jail controversy. As always, the community has stayed relentless and there's definitely a nice new energy going on. Many of the spots are open and some good ones are really open late. So let us know what's good in your Chinatown or if you wanna visit New York's Chinatown. Hit that like button, click subscribe, turn on your notifications and until next time, we out.