Auntie Guan’s Kitchen 108

Chinese cooking from the northeast hinterlands of Dongbei is old hat by now in Flushing, Queens. But news of its arrival on West 14th Street in 2016 was a pretty big deal. The owners (who also run Flushing’s Golden Palace and a takeout Auntie Guan’s on 23rd Street) have larded the menu with a hodgepodge of multi­regional dishes, anticipating wimpy Manhattan palates. But we recommend you stick with the Dongbei classics: the ho-hum-sounding-yet-transcendent sautéed potato, green pepper, and eggplant; the pork-and-cabbage cake, like a cross between an Indian paratha and a Hot Pocket; Chinese leek turnovers shaped like little calzones; the hearty sautéed pickle cabbage with vermicelli and pork, a robust assemblage that eats like something that might have originated in Northern Italy’s Alto Adige region; and the ever-impressive lamb chop with cumin, a braised, battered, and deep-fried slab of chewy, fatty ribs festooned in what we call the Dongbei everything-bagel style (cumin seeds, dried chiles, black and white sesame seeds, and whatnot). Among the Dongbei cognoscenti, it’s as venerated as a Keens mutton chop.