Kam Hing Pandan Sponge Cake: Kam Hing offers ~half a dozen flavors of sponge cakes, and after working out of NYC for a couple weeks, I've sampled a good number of them including pandan, original, brown sugar tea, ube, coconut, and black sesame (to be fair, I also brought back a bunch of them to share with my parents at home). The first one I purchased was pandan, a spiky tropical fruit that looks like a cross between a pineapple and durian but has a milder flavor that belies its spiky exterior. Overall, it has a pleas... (read more) 3.5/5.0
recommended chinatown nyc kamhing pandan sponge cake 3.5
Kam Hing Jujube Tea: Kam Hing is a cash-only shop on Baxter in Chinatown that is known mostly for their $1 sponge cakes that come in a variety of flavors. To accompany my sponge cake (review forthcoming), I purchased an iced jujube tea, made to order with chopped up dried jujube dates on the bottom (a popular Chinese snack). The drink instantly brought me back to Taiwan, where I spent some summers in my childhood – the beverage tasted like sweetened honey water, and the beverage softened & hydrated the diced j... (read more) 4.0/5.0
recommended drinks chinatown nyc kamhing jujube tea 4.0
Manna House Bakery Scallion and Ham Roll: I was on my way to Golden Steamer when I passed Manna House Bakery ~2 doors down on Mott St that had a small queue of older Asian customers. Locals don't normally wait in line, especially in places as impatient as Chinatown, so I decided to stop in and check out their selection. The cash-only bakery is very narrow, yet has an impressive selection of traditional Chinese pastries like pineapple bun, sponge cake, egg tarts, and more, all thankfully labeled both in Chinese and English. I left ... (read more) 3.5/5.0
recommended chinatown nyc mannahousebakery scallion ham roll 3.5
Chung Chun Rice Dog Sweet Potato Corn Dog: The first time I came across Korean corn dogs was in Shin Okubo, the Korean district of Tokyo. I had wandered into the neighborhood at sunset and was surrounded by neon signs and endless stalls of street food, all labelled in languages I couldn't translate but could generally tell what region of the world they represented. That's how I learned that fried cheese on a stick, and hot dogs covered with deep fried diced potatoes resembling an ear of corn from Willy Wonka, was a popular Korean j... (read more) 3.0/5.0
chinatown seattle korean corndog chungchunricedog sweet potato corn dog 3.0
Yomie's Rice Yogurt Haw Purple Rice Yogurt: This shop features a drink menu dominantly in Chinese, with a sprinkling of English just so you know how to order. They make yogurt drinks that verge on porridge territory, with a thick consistency that you can just manage to consume from a straw. Their most popular drink is purple rice yogurt, but I opted for the haw flavor, a popular berry used in Asian desserts. Made to order, it took about 10 minutes to arrive in a boba-tea-like plastic packaging with a sealed off top you puncture wit... (read more) 2.5/5.0
drinks chinatown seattle chinese yomiesriceyogurt haw purple rice yogurt 2.5
Cheng Kang Rare Soybean Drink: I'm not sure what makes it rare, but I recently discovered that Asian grocery stores stock several brands of "rare soybean" soymilk. This one is from Taiwan, and I purchased it at Hong Kong Supermarket in Chinatown. I thought the bean flavor of the drink was very familiar and overall ok, but it was heavily sweetened, so I wouldn't get it again. 2.5/5.0
drinks chinatown hongkongsupermarket chengkang rare soybean drink 2.5