Celebrate LUNAR NEW YEAR in style
CHINA LIVE HAS BECOME A CULINARY CAPITAL IN SAN FRANCISCO’S CHINATOWN
Until now, veteran San Francisco restaurateurs George Chen and his wife, Cindy Wong-Chen, were best known for Betelnut and Shanghai 1930. But their latest and most ambitious project, China Live, may well be the couple’s legacy. The 20,000-square-foot epicurean destination has brought renewed energy and style to Chinatown since it opened last March. Comparisons have been made to New York’s Eataly, and it’s easy to see why.
On the street level, there’s Market Restaurant and Central Bar, a bustling fine-dining restaurant with four exhibition kitchens and eight specialized stations; the casual, tea-centric Oolong Cafe; and two retail areas brimming with condiments, kitchen tools and high-end jewelry.
Upstairs, you’ll find the luxuriously hip scotch bar Cold Drinks and the high-concept Eight Tables by George Chen, a private, dinner-only (tasting menu $225) experience made to look and feel like you’re dining in the chic midcentury home of a second generation Chinese-American family.
In celebration of Lunar New Year, Market Restaurant, Cold Drinks and Eight Tables are offering supplemental menu items through the end of February. Here’s our guide to eating and sipping your way through China Live, whether you visit for new year celebrations or any day of the year.
Oolong Cafe
When you enter China Live, you’re essentially standing in Oolong Cafe, a casual, 25-seat counter-service cafe featuring a rotating selection of high-quality and rare Chinese teas, as well as coffee, grab-and-go bites and reinvented Chinese baked goods and pastries, such as the black tea tiramisu and sesame cheesecake ($7 each).
The spotlight is a Ming dynasty mural with Bay Area landmarks — Transamerica Pyramid, Golden Gate Bridge — hand-painted onto blue and white tiles. People come here for the artisanal teas, which are sourced directly from farmers in Taiwan and greater China, including the woody Dong Ding “Frozen Peak” High Mountain oolong tea and the earthy Dragon Well green tea. Teas are served in custom-designed glassware and teapots ($3.50-$6 glass; $10$15 pot) with suggestions for the exact brew temperature and steeping time.
The Dragon Well green tea was a lovely accompaniment to our banana milk chocolate cream puff ($7), which was served
cold but came to life and revealed its sweet banana flavor when we waited and let it to come to room temperature.
Keep in mind that Oolong Cafe gets very crowded, especially on weekends, because the hostess stand for Market Restaurant & Bar is situated there, with plenty of diners waiting to be seated. (By the way, you can order from the Market Restaurant menu while seated in the cafe.)
DETAILS » Open at 11 a.m. weekdays, 10:30 a.m. weekends at China Live, 644 Broadway St., San Francisco; chinalivesf.com.
Market Restaurant & Bar
This 120-seat, marketdriven restaurant is the heart of China Live. The focus is on elevated traditional, regional cuisine using organic and micro-seasonal ingredients, and the menu is divided into small ($6-$24) and large plates ($16-$60), which are great for sharing. In the dining room, trendy concrete floors have an unmistakable sheen. Tables and chairs are made from reclaimed northern Chinese elm wood and the ceiling is stenciled with Chinese characters.
Ask for a seat at the bar overlooking the dumpling and dim sum station, so you can watch master dim sum chefs craft the restaurant’s most popular dish, sheng jian bao (four for $9), pan-fried pork dumplings in the biggest castiron pans you’ve ever seen. These morsels are hot and juicy on the inside and toothsome on the outside. They’re in such demand, you’ll want to put in your order the minute you meet your server, otherwise you’ll be waiting a while.
Peking duck is another home run. The stone-oven roasted duck comes with a sweet kumquat glaze and sesame-studded, pita-like pockets (three for $14 or five for $19) for stuffing.
Round out your light meal with a small cold plate, like the utterly delicious black tree ears and soya beans ($8): Thin, snappy black mushrooms tossed with soybeans and plump gingko nuts are served in a hot mustard sauce. Cold mushroom salads have been a staple in Chinese cooking since the sixth century. Under Chen’s masterful vision, we get to taste them and so much more in a modern and exciting environment.
DETAILS » Open at 11 a.m. weekdays and 10:30 a.m. weekends. A limited number of tables are available by reservation; the rest are walk-in only.
Cold Drinks
Exit the front doors of China Live, head up the stairs, following the black bats stenciled on the wall, and you’ll hit the gold door to Cold Drinks, a dark, swanky, hush-hush spot recalling Old World Shanghai glamour and overlooking Broadway.
Inside, chrome and gold accents bounce off tufted, mocha- and mink-hued chairs. It’s definitely a luxurious bar — the bartenders wear locally made custom suits and tuxedos — so don’t show up in shorts and Nikes. This is your chance to dress up and explore one of the country’s largest selections of scotch. You’ll pay for it, too: Most of the drinks are in the $16-$22 range, or you can go really big with the Royal Salute Rob Roy, which will run you $52. It’s made with Royal Salute 21-yearold scotch, Glenlivet 12, Barbera Chinato, Lustau vermouth and Angostura bitters.
If that’s your entire dinner budget, stick to the signature Sometimes Old Fashioned ($16) instead, made with duck fat-infused Speyburn 10, Rittenhouse Rye, black pepper syrup and three kinds of bitters: Angostura, black lemon and candy cap mushroom. It’s beautifully complex and gets better the longer you linger and swirl.
DETAILS » Open at 5 p.m. daily. You’ll find 12 special Lunar New Year cocktails, each inspired by zodiac animals, on the menu through Feb. 28.