It’s the top duck in a city full of bland birds that fly lower.
The Hong Kong-style roasted fowl at the new Cha Cha Tang is one of the best Chinese duck dishes in the city.
The restaurant is a winning collaboration between owner John McDonald and partner Wilson Tang. Tang was famously the guiding force behind the revival of famed-but-tired Nom Wah Tea Parlor on Doyers Street in 2010.
Cha Cha Tang isn’t a dim sum place like Nom Wah, though. It’s a full-on Cantonese-inspired place rooted in tradition with only a few modern touches.
It puts the dazzle back in the block where Sixth Avenue meets West Houston Street, which lost most of its juice when Da Silvano closed seven years ago.
The comfy-if-noisy, 80-seat location with windows facing the street was previously McDonald’s Hancock Street, a good American place but “not a home run,” he chuckled.
Tang is “a New York-born Chinatown kid,” McDonald said of his longtime friend. “We had talked for years about doing a Chinese restaurant.”
McDonald also owns ever-popular Lure Fish Bar, Bowery Meat Co. and Mexican Bar Tulix. He once owned Chinatown Brasserie on Lafayette Street. It ran out of steam in 2013, and he’s been itching to open a new Chinese spot ever since.
In August, he and Tang turned Hancock Street into a twice-a-week pop-up called Cha Cha Tang. It was such a hit, they decided to transform the place all week long.
They made some tweaks to the dining room, adding red and pink tablecloths, some new upholstery and wall coverings and vintage Chinese photos. But the changes are subtle.
“We didn’t want it to be overly themed in an aggressive manner,” McDonald said.
Cha Cha Tang offers some familiar dim sum fare, such as plump crystal shrimp dumplings sparked with chili oil, but the similarity to Nom Wah ends there.
Large-portion “chef’s specials” are the menu’s heart. Chef Doron Wong, a veteran of several New York Chinese places, runs a tight kitchen ship. Everything I had arrived freshly made and skillfully executed.
The Cantonese roasted duck ($110 and enough for three or four depending on appetites, also available in half size for $55) is the must-order dish.
Like Peking duck, it’s served with thin wheat pancakes, scallions and Hoisin sauce.
But Wong said that where the Peking style emphasizes crackling skin achieved through hanging birds upside down to air-dry, the Cantonese style amps up the flavor by marinating the fowl overnight in Chinese five-spice, licorice root and ginger. After cooking, it’s glazed with red vinegar.
The meat is slightly fattier and considerably thicker cut than Peking duck usually is. The result is a deep, intense gamy flavor.
It’s so good that my party-of-four gobbled some of it off the plate without waiting to roll it into the pancakes.
They usually have eighteen ducks on hand daily and often sell out.
“But people can call to ask us to reserve one in advance,” McDonald said.
Other menu highlights include wonderfully tactile XO jasmine fried rice with scallops, shrimps, lobster and crispy garlic. I also loved smoky, creamy Macao-style chicken curry made with coconut milk. “Original” egg roll was the best I’ve had in decades, grease-free inside a crisp egg crepe.
Brunch is coming this weekend — “a big part of our concept,” McDonald said. It will include the dessert that’s also on the dinner menu: griddled Hong Kong French Toast with condensed milk and sweet cream butter.
A “bloody Mary cocktail cart will move through the room,” he said. But for me the French toast, sweet, creamy and crunchy, is intoxicating enough — though not as much as the duck.
