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It has been four years since Chinese expatriates craving familiar flavors and New Yorkers looking to expand their culinary tastes have been able to indulge in Taiwanese sponge cakes, dumplings and Sichuan skewers at Golden Mall in Flushing, Queens.
The destination, which opened in 1990 and is considered by many to be the pioneer of the modern food hall, closed for four years to carry forward a $2 million renovation project. Not only did the space officially reopen in July last year, but the owners are gearing up to launch a second Golden Mall, this one in Manhattan’s Financial District sometime this summer.
According to the New York Times, “out of a seven-floor, 32,000-square-foot space, a mix of full-service restaurants and food court stands will offer pan-Asian dishes.”
The Cheng family, who has owned Golden Mall since the year 2000, is clearly banking on the popularity of Asian dishes throughout the city and, if the original iteration of the food hall is of any indication, New Yorkers should prepare to meet and obsess over a slew of novel characters that will likely come to define the local gastronomic scene: KungFu Kitchen, Xi'an Famous Foods and Lanzhou Handmade Noodles, now major culinary players in New York, all started off at the original Golden Mall.
"Gone is the no-frills environment of the early 2000s," reports CBS when describing the renovated Queens space, which now features a ton of seating and "neon-lighted accents."
Although it might look slightly different, Golden Mall will offer the same sort of cuisine that has drawn important figures on-site throughout the years, including chef Eric Ripert and the late Anthony Bourdain—from Taiwanese bakery Original Cake, which serves Castella cakes, and Laoma Malatang, a purveyor of mala dry pot dishes.
Suddenly, it feels like the early '90s in New York—and we're all for it.