Che Li

Behind a glowing door on a particularly Asian-influenced block of the East Village, a wonderful Shanghaise restaurant exists in the same building that once played host to Andy Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable, which in 1966 hosted a little band called the Velvet Underground. Today, the interior seems lifted from a period C-drama and the food sings. Fresh ingredients dress up a seafood-forward menu from chef Qiling Wang, with thoughtfully-timed splashes and sprinkles of soy sauce and sugar, rice wines and their vinegars. Steamed dumplings come out of the kitchen as colorful and luminescent as a tray of jewels and the xiao long bao (soup dumplings) are a slurp above the rest. Don’t skip desserts like red dates with peach resin stew by Wang’s pastry chef wife, Fang Fang.