Tindo

1 Eldridge Street, New York City, NY
(212) 966-5684

Jim Leff says "Love Me Tindo" is among the offbeat undiscovered hyperdelicious eating places he likes to frequent be it at 11:30 am when they open or 3:00 am when they close. He advises that:

When we think of quests requiring copious time and effort, ordeals such as finding an apartment, a job, or a mate come to mind. All these monumental pursuits are dwarfed, however, by the herculean strivings involved in finding a default Chinatown restaurant.

I'm not talking about places like Kam Chueh, or places very good for a dish or two but merely OK for the rest, like Excellent Dumpling. Not banquet places either such as The Nice that are too shmancy for a mere bite, but not charming/unsubtle hole-in-walls like Tin Yick, either. I love Joe's Shanghai, but soup dumplings are a special occasion thing, and my Joe's peak only monthly. The hot new places (Mandarin Court is one, at the moment), like the hot new movies, invariably leave me cold.

There's treasure in Flushing, yes, but having to make a special trip isn't the same as feeling mighty angsty in Manhattan realizing that your favorite place awaits you downtown, ready to revitalize your flagging spirits.

I believe that there's a tremendous difference between knowing certain joints for certain dishes and having Your Place. For years, my heart belonged to Shing Kee at 42 Bowery south of Canal. It was reliably wonderful and I knew the menu by memory--so utterly hooked into the kitchen that I could detect even minute variations in the black bean sauce (Did the chef hurt his wrist? The sauce seems a bit thin, as if something was obstructing him from shaking in his usual dose of rice flour). The waiters knew me (not as a writer, of course), and while service is not my primary concern, having guys tell me whether the squid's fresh is a serious plus.

In time, Shing Kee went the way of so many restaurants. First they became inconsistent, then they opened a separate establishment next door--for a while it was a game of "who's got the chef?" There followed a long and painful decline, hitting rock bottom after Sam, the manager, got ill and passed away. Names and menus were changed. Their legacy, Kam Chueh remains at 40 Bowery (one door down from the original location) and is now abysmal. It isn't the Shing, but one can extrapolate.

After that, I suffered five years of confusion and aimlessness. I ate in Chinatown, sometimes quite well, but never found an all-purpose hang that I could call my own. But then bassist Mark Dresser called to hip me to Tindo on Eldridge Street and that advice was stellar. I ate meals the likes of which I had scarcely fressed before. Nearly each dish set a new standard. Best of all, it was co-owned by the chef--a rare guarantee of kitchen continuity in the erratic world of Chinatown restaurants.

I feared for their future; clientele consisted of a small group of almost entirely Chinese foodies, but business didn't seem robust. Then one Black Wednesday I stopped by at 9 pm and found the gates down. The next day, I tried calling but found that the phone had been disconnected.

Friends tried to cheer me up, but I was inconsolable. I wore black the entire next day and sighed a lot. It would be years before a replacement could be found, if indeed those scrambled Eggs with Shrimp and Scallions (served on a toothsome bed of velvety rice noodles) could EVER be replaced.

Out of business. The phrase shudders with finality, evoking the morose helplessness with which one presses one's pining nose against locked gates and boarded windows. If only I had gone more often--if only I had sent more people. But such speculation is useless when doors have shut and the people that brought a favorite place to life have scattered to the four winds.

But sometimes--VERY rarely--reprieves are granted by the restaurant gods. Tindo has. It turned out, they had a policy of closing every Wednesday. And, they simply had been having trouble with their phone line. Like Warren Beatty in Heaven Can Wait, I was given another chance; LOTS of chances--three meals a day for ever and ever (or at least until they blow it, ala Shing Kee).

The moral of this story, O vicarious armchair chowhounds, is: use it or lose it. Put down this article RIGHT NOW and high yourself to Tindo. Eat too much and pay too much, and scarf with passion and gratefulness. Because it is not closed. You can go to eat there; you can give them money, and not much, at that, and they'll cook you food--great food. Eat, then you'll shut your eyes and moan with pleasure. The universe is in a state of perpetual flux and we mustn't attach, but we CAN gorge on Salt-and-pepper Squid in a state of rarefied gourmand grace.

Tindo's Salt-and-pepper Squid is my favorite fried calamari, regardless of nationality; it never fails to elicit gasps of pleasure. There are some other must-eats, but first a word about the restaurant itself. This is a bright beacon in the drab area north of the Manhattan Bridge near East Broadway. The main room occupies a warm ultra-narrow triangular space, and there's a larger upstairs auxiliary dining room--accessible through an unmarked entrance around the corner, but it's flourescently lit, boxy and considerably less charming--though it does sport a picturesque view of subways ascending the bridge.

Their style is home-style Cantonese including some rare Hong Kong grandma dishes like off-menu Salted Thousand Year Egg with Dried Octopus, Chopped Water Chestnuts, and Minced Pork. It's a dead ringer for corned beef hash with fried egg; scoop chunks into your rice bowl. This snack is ubiquitous in Hong Kong, eaten several times per week. The egg's saltier than usual, but still the flavor is unbelievable; so soothing, so smoothly porcine.

But their real specialty is Hot Pot cookery, both tradition stewy stuff and more thrown-in-last-minute fare. Three don't-miss highlights: Baby Beef and Black Pepper, Baby Eggplant with Squid, and Ground Pork and Clams in Thailand Sauce. Other good stuff: Chives with Salt Fish, Steamed Oyster in Shell in cognac sauce, Fried Prawns topped with homemade mayonnaise and honey walnuts (even better than the classic version at The Nice, but this is a dish that for me had at least one off-night soooo, if you don't flip over it, do try again another time). Don't forget the above mentioned Scrambled Egg and Shrimp.

Some dishes (especially noodles and soups) on the regular menu are merely very good; stick with the specials menu or ask the owner (remember, she's a bespectacled woman, and she hangs downstairs) for advice. But beware of tips from the upstairs waiters. They may try to coax you into the more expensive dishes--though nothing's THAT expensive. Just GO, GO, GO--go often and enjoy.