![]() ![]() “I had more staff there than customers that day,” he says. The restaurant’s size was partially to credit for its citywide reputation, according to Lam, along with its downfall during the pandemic.Ī month before coronavirus had been detected in New York state, Lam recalls walking upstairs and counting 36 customers in Jing Fong’s 794-person dining room. When the sprawling room wasn’t filled with diners seated at round tables sharing dumplings and roast duck, the space was often used to host large weddings and events. Jing Fong, which opened in 1978 and moved to its former, two-story home on Elizabeth Street in 1992, was largely recognized as Manhattan Chinatown’s largest dim sum hall. ![]() The restaurant’s red carpet, paneling, and wallpaper are meant to evoke “the vibe of Jing Fong,” Truman Lam says. The restaurant’s team of dim sum carts may return to the floor in a limited way - “maybe three or four of them,” he says - and possibly on weekends only. “We want to do carts in some way,” Lam says, “but given the size of the space, we’re not sure if it makes sense yet.” Indoor dining could follow as early as next week, Lam says, though don’t expect dim sum carts at the start. Jing Fong will open for takeout and delivery to start, as its kitchen staff - almost all of whom worked at the previous location of the restaurant - settles into the new space. “Did people come to Jing Fong for the food, or because the vibe is so awesome?” He’s about to find out. What used to be a multi-sensory, possibly hours-long dining experience - arriving early, or otherwise waiting in lines of Disney proportion riding an escalator upstairs keeping one eye on the room’s roaming dim sum carts - is now mostly about the food. There’s just not a lot of foot traffic down there.At around 100 seats, the new restaurant isn’t small, but it’s a far cry from its former 800-seat home on Elizabeth Street. Now, there’s no tourists, businesses are told to work from home, and the local community tend to prefer to eat at home. There’s not much residential around here. “We’re in a part of town that’s more tourist dependent. ![]() It’s not just rent, it’s just not neighborhood, it’s not just utilities. And even once restaurants were allowed to partially reopen, the 25 percent occupancy limit has proved difficult to navigate because the restaurant loses its volume and bustle, Lam noted to Gary He on Eater NY, According to a statement posted to the restaurant’s Instagram, Lam will seek to reopen Jing Fong elsewhere, and says in a statement they are “actively and quickly searching.” Jing Fong shut down on March 12 following Governor Andrew Cuomo’s order prohibiting large gatherings of 500 or more people. “Our type of restaurant, that does dim sum lunches and banquet hall stuff, everybody is struggling and just kind of trying to survive one day at a time.”Īt 800 seats, the restaurant’s size has presented issues since the start of the pandemic. “We are basically running the smallest part of our business, which is delivery, for a year,” he explains. Today, he says sales are down 85 percent, in part because the restaurant’s events business - once half of all sales - has completely evaporated. Last February, Lam said sales were down 25 to 50 percent, depending on the day, “The writing’s on the wall that it’s basically going to be down, we just don’t know how much,” he said at the time. Restaurants in Chinatowns were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic earlier than most because of a precipitous drop in tourism, growing concerns in the community over the coronavirus, and Sinophobia that also led to an alarming spike in hate crimes against Asian Americans. “At the end of the day, we’ve been dealing with this pandemic now, for us, over a year,” says Truman Lam, whose grandfather opened the restaurant. In 2017 the owners expanded with a second location on the Upper West Side, which will also remain open. Open since 1978, Jing Fong is Manhattan’s largest Chinese restaurant and one of the neighborhood’s more famous spots. The business will continue to operate its takeout and delivery business, as well as offer service on its outdoor, second-floor patio. Chinatown’s dim sum palace Jing Fong will close its sprawling indoor dining room, the owners announced today. ![]()
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