A copper pot of hot pork broth and light noodles. Pork belly and shiitake mushrooms and garlic nestle into
the spaces between the noodles. You lean in and waft.
The word “mmmmmmmm” comes to mind.
This image brought to you by Little Tong Noodle Shop, a—yes—noodle shop that wants you sitting down to
Chinese noodles prepared by a former wd~50 operative. It opens tomorrow.
It takes a bit of moxie to open up a noodle shop in this neck of the woods, what with Momofuku, Han Dynasty
and Ippudo all pretty close by. So you can imagine the confidence that the woman behind this has. To be
fair, these noodles are different from any of those. They’re mixian, a light rice noodle out of the Yunnan
province. So they’ve already got that going for them.
If you’re in the neighborhood—for this is a
neighborhood-type establishment—you’ll want to know what from the menu to focus on. For our money, start with a plate of beef tartare with Sichuan butter
before moving on to the main event, which is any of the six types of noodle dishes on offer. That one we
described at the beginning is real and is called Little Pot Mixian. There’s another with shrimp in a
smoked tomato-shellfish broth with coconut milk, lemongrass, pickled green chili, fresh herbs and lime,
which you ought to lean on a friend to get.
