Chinese Tuxedo — Restaurant in New York

I was at the Chinese Tuxedo in Chinatown NY last night with my girlfriend who is over in NY visiting me on a holiday.

We were highly recommended to go to the Chinese Tuxedo from many people but unfortunately our experience was extremely unsatisfactory.

Our waitress, Emily, was friendly at the beginning but we felt she was rushing us with our order. We ordered a bottle of wine which was kept at the waitresses section of the restaurant for us but this resulted in us asking for our wine to be filled multiple times. Although we were told that are food would come separately when it was ready, we were unsatisfied with the fact that the rice came at least 20 minutes before our main course which was chicken and prawns. This resulted in us eating the rice prior and then having a very plain, not filling main course.

I ordered the ‘crispy skin chicken with ginger and scallion relish’ which turned out to be dry chicken breast on the bone with side dishes of soy sauce and cut of scallions, not worth the 28 dollars which it was priced at.

After the food, we waited nearly 20 minutes for our waitress to come back to our table to ask us if we were having dessert. She did not present us with a menu with the options but told us the desserts on offer. We chose the custard tart and 5 minutes later she came back to our table to tell us that this dessert was not available. This is absolutely appalling that she would tell us what is on offer without even knowing herself if the dessert was still available. We then decided to not get a dessert because of this. She said to us then that we would just have to return if we wanted to try this dessert.

The restaurant has a bar attached, throughout our meal we could see other guests being brought down to the bar with the host. We asked the waitress if we could be brought down for a drink after our dinner and she said “I’ll have to see if it’s over capacity”. Two minutes later she returns and tells us that we cannot go down, as we watched multiple people leave the downstairs bar.

She then came over and gave us the cheque without us even asking for it - again rushing us. Her leaving remark to us was that we would just have to come back if we wanted to try the dessert of our choice and enter the exclusive bar downstairs.

Outraged, on our exit we approached the host and told him about our awful experience and he laughed and just said sorry and walked away. Outside the restaurant, we decided to try the bar next door which we were granted entry to straight away. Once downstairs we realised it was the ‘exclusive’ ‘full capacity’ bar that the waitress denied us entry to.

I would absolutely never return to this restaurant after paying for awful service and an...

Chinese Tuxedo has good food and a cool ambiance that references Chinatown's past. But there are layers to this.

When we went to Tuxedo, there was hardly any Asian clientele, which is strange given that we're in Chinatown and there were loads of Asians among the many people hanging out in the neighborhood.

There are a few reasons, partly about the food, but also about that "cool" ambiance.

The prices at Tuxedo, while a bit high, would not scare away Asians, as there are increasingly wealthy Asians in the city. And restaurants like Blue Willow or Cafe China are pretty similarly priced, have a very cool retro vibe, and are popular with Asians.

The difference is that if you're going to charge $32 for steamed fish with ginger and scallion, an incredibly simple standard Chinese dish on Tuxedo's menu, you have to do something special if you want to also appeal to an audience that's very familiar with Chinese food.

This of course isn't the only kind of thing on Tuxedo's menu. We had duck and radish fried dumplings ($16), which were yummy, and lobster noodles with black pepper sauce (MP $88), which had a bit of twist on the traditional presentation.

But then there's that hip vibe -- that I found off-putting. The restaurant is located in an old theatre that was the site for a legendary fight between Chinese gangs. This happened during a time of Chinese exclusion, when Asians could not become citizens, had almost no rights, and families could not be together...there's a lot to unpack.

In an irreverent wink to that past, the restaurant has drinks called "Bloody Angle" and "Five Points Pegasus" and tries to evoke some of that illicit history. Despite the fact that the owners must know that their clientele is not Chinese, the restaurant entrance is only in Chinese so you might not be sure if you're in the right place, and they give you a menu with one side entirely in Chinese.

They clearly don't expect most people to rely on the Chinese - it's more part of the "ambiance."

It seemed fitting then that when you get the bill, the restaurant gives you a postcard with an old photo of the original Chinese Tuxedo featuring a table of customers. None of...

I've had this restaurant on my list for a while, and it's truly a hidden gem. Tucked away in what is essentially an alley in Chinatown, this spot is easy to miss but worth the search. Let me start with the staff—upon entering, you're warmly greeted, setting a welcoming tone from the beginning. The restaurant has a dark, moody ambiance typical of many high-end Asian establishments in New York City, with minimal lighting that adds to the overall atmosphere and works beautifully here. Once we were seated, we started with sparkling water and some alcoholic beverages. I ordered a drink called the Golden Ratio, which was quite strong but still enjoyable. I noticed many other diners also had it, so it seems to be a popular choice. For dim sum, we tried the shrimp & scallop toast and the crispy pork & chive dumplings, both of which were delightful. From the rice and noodles section, we selected the vegetarian XO fried rice, which was a unanimous favorite at our table. The fried rice was incredibly flavorful, with distinct notes of ginger and scallion that really stood out. In the seafood and meat section, we ordered the stir-fried Snake River beef sirloin and the Cantonese-style half roast duck. As a frequent duck eater, I was particularly interested in trying the duck, while it was my friend's first time. The duck was delicious, though I found it to be quite fatty—perhaps due to its preparation in the Cantonese style, whereas I’m more accustomed to Peking duck. If you’re not a fan of fatty duck, I’d suggest opting for something else on the menu. Unfortunately, I can’t recall the names of the desserts we ordered, but we enjoyed both. However, there was one significant downside to our dining experience—the restaurant didn’t serve all of our main dishes at the same time. Our stir-fried Snake River beef sirloin arrived well before the duck and fried rice, so by the time we received the other dishes, the beef was cold. This was quite disappointing. Overall, I would still recommend this restaurant. It was impeccably clean, the food was delicious, and the service was excellent, despite the issue with the timing...