When I was a young kid my father used to work in Manhattan and I’d occasionally get to go to dinner with him and a friend of his at Wah Kee, a tiny long gone restaurant on Doyer St. in Chinatown. Maybe 15 years ago I Googled and found a discussion about the place, but the guy who ran the blog has since moved on and the discussion is gone.
Some recent Googling has turned up a few more recent references to the place but, perhaps due to fading memories, some folks remember it was WO Kee or confuse it with a better known place in the same area called Nom Wah Tea Parlor
I’m posting a pic I found of the menu coffee and am just taking a flyer that someone else here is familiar with this place that lives in my memory
Yes but I misremembered it as the “Wo Ki”. My boyhood best friend’s father worked in the city & introduced me & my sister to them with a combined family outing. (their house & ours were 4 feet apart, 4 kids in ea house-- comparable ages-- if you didn’t know us you couldn’t tell which set of kids belonged to which house. It was there I learned of the glory of chicken fried rice! Also egg rolls, good Moo Goo Gai Pan ( it can be insipid ) Moo Shu Pork. I always remembered the address as 17 Doyers St though the menu shows as 16 & 1/2b. Beginning about '66 me & my friend would go there at least once a month for 10 years.
Food & Restaurant critic Richard Gehman mentions it in his book The Haphazard Gourmet 1966. Great Book, the kind of food writing that keeps one opening the fridge. Not available as an e-book.
I do remember it but not in any meaningful way. I think I only went there once. Wo Hop or Hong Ying (both on Mott) were where we went in the late '60s/early '70s.
I am processing an archive of a NYC resident from the 1960’s and in the correspondence a friend mentions this restaurant as Wo-Kee’s - I assume it’s the same but her words were “The only things I miss about New York is you and China town. I’ve been out for Chinese already but no place is like Wo-kee’s”
I was so delighted to see this… I remember Wah Kee so well. My family would go every Friday night and then to Ferraras for ices… I had my second grade birthday party at Wah Kee and it was most probably the first time most of the attendees had been in Chinatown,(All the parents wanted to come ) most had never experienced Chinese food… this was 1957… when I saw the picture it just brought all those memories back… and I believe one of the gentlemen in the picture was named Wing… we had so much fun there … thanks for posting and the food was delicious…
Driving in from NJ with my parents and going to eat at the tiny Wah Kee down the stairs as a little kid in the early 1970s is just at the edge of my earliest memories. There were two waiters: Fat Louie and Skinny Louie. My dad’s favorite story from Wah Kee–which he always said was the only restaurant he went to with his family when growing up in the 1940s–was when an uncle of his grew impatient with the slow service one particular visit, and leaned over to my grandfather to express his displeasure in Yiddish. As the waiters were evidently well-accustomed to Jewish clientele, one of them snapped back with a reply in Yiddish without missing a beat.
Heh, Welcome Everymann! I just wrote the below last week to my buddy who was complaining about FR here in Portland, ME. We’d been discussing the FR from China Express in South Portland.
“Ah but this fried rice was most definitely fried. Felt like it was anytime 'tween 1966 & 1975 & I was at the Wah Kee restaurant on Doyers St in China Town.”
I certainly remember Wah Kee. A couple of my classmates took me there a few times in the early 1960s and I took my wife there on our first date. The food was superb and the portions huge. We especially like their “special soup” and I remember my wife had crab in garlic sauce. Chewing on those crab shells made her mouth sore so I had to forego kissing her goodnight. We’ll be celebrating our 59th anniversary in a couple of months and I have Wah Kee to thank for a great, if kissless, first date.
I remember this place well. We used to go there regularly with my grandparents. It was in the basement, correct? I was born 1968 and I started venturing to Chinatown by the age of 7 years old, if that helps you place the memory. –
Just saw the thread. This place ROCKED. The crab with black bean sauce was also my favorite. I’m not sure how much crab meat the dish contained, but the sauce was phenomenal and the rice made for a fantastic accompaniment. Left NYC at 18yo and never returned; now in San Diego. I’ve eaten in many Chinese food places all across the USA, but none holds a candle to Wah Kee’s.
