new eats
Yuan, a new Chinese restaurant, has opened in the Newport neighborhood of Jersey City. The restaurant is inspired by the owners’ childhood growing up in China. Located at 537 Washington Boulevard, the new eatery will be open daily for lunch and dinner, and will be bringing fresh and authentic Chinese food to locals and visitors alike. Read on to learn more about Yuan opening in Jersey City, New Jersey.
Coming to Jersey City
The team behind Yuan consists of a group of entrepreneurs who have been proudly serving Jersey City since 2019 at their other Chinese restaurants. Yuan, however, is completely different from past places the team opened, especially with the overall dining experience, interior renovation, and the food, according to one of the owners who spoke to The Hoboken Girl.
From the moment you spot Yuan on Washington Boulevard, residents will immediately see the dozen or so plants that are lined outside, sparking interest from those who pass by. Once inside, there are more plants by the front of the restaurant that give a relaxing feel. Throughout the eatery, some details make it “more of a modernized Chinese restaurant,” the owner said.
The tables themselves are “very good quality” and made out of Maplewood. In addition, there are fixtures on the walls that are from old buildings in China that hold “about 200 years of history.” The owners credit the design inspo from Raaz, an Indian restaurant that was the previous tenant of the space.
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“Raaz literally means ‘secret’ in Urdu. The Raaz team wanted to provide authentic and the best Indian food, so I was really inspired by them and they were serving here for 17 years,” the owner shared with HG. “We want to do a long-time business here.”
Photo Credit: @yuanjerseycity
The owner shared more about what drew his team to opening in Jersey City: “It’s a good market and it’s a very good Chinese community. People working in the city, working in Jersey City, and also students. I know what they want — a very good Chinese space, very good Chinese restaurant.”
About The Menu
What attracted the young restaurateurs to Jersey City is that the community, they felt, “is more stable than other places.” One of the owners explained, “People order food three to five times a week, so we try to make the food you can eat daily, not like if you do [eat out] one time a week and then you get bored.”
According to the website, “We dug into those flavors and memories from our childhood and all the flavors from the journey that brought us here. We hope our menu will remind you of home, or maybe even introduce you to new favorites that feel right at home in Jersey City.”
The food, which has a Szechuan feel (but not everything is spicy), is all reasonably priced and fresh, especially the fish (customers can choose from sea bass or largemouth bass). The menu is broken up into appetizers, dumplings and noodles, main course, vegetables, soup, and desserts.
Some of the specialty items, according to the owner, are steamed fish in foil, braised fish in Szechuan bean sauce, stir-fried chicken with peppers, and stir-fried beef tendon with peppers. He notes that these dishes are made with green peppers called Aconcagua, which are imported from China and are not commonly found in the US.
Other menu items include jellyfish with vinegar, pig ear in Szechuan chili sauce, lion’s mane mushroom lo mein, beef and dried bamboo shoots noodles, kung pao shrimp, organic cauliflower in casserole, and seaweed egg drop soup, among other platters. Homemade desserts include caramel pudding, lemon tart, brown sugar rice cake, and sticky rice balls in sweet rice wine soup.
Check Out Yuan
Yuan opened to the public on August 14th, 2024, and was in its soft opening stage for about a week. The soft opening allowed the owner to work out any issues and learn about ways they could improve. Despite having been open for a few days, Yuan is still a work in progress. Soon enough there will be a patio built outside along with a little garden, as well as additional interior details that will turn Yuan into an even more whimsical escape.
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“Little garden,” after all, is how the restaurant’s name came about. The owner told HG, “I was born in communities – you can think of it as a village. They are all coworkers, they’re living together. All the kids after school, they just say, ‘Okay, let’s play.’ There are trees, there are artificial small mountains and artificial rivers in the little garden and they hang out and play.”
He continued, “So it’s the memory from childhood and being with your best friends, your family, people you love. We want people to come here, have the same experience with their families, with their friends or coworkers. They can enjoy the food, the environment and have a very good time here. That’s what we want.”
Yuan is open daily from 11:30AM to 9:30PM for walk-ins and pick up only. The restaurant will soon be available for delivery on Uber Eats, and the lunch menu will be available soon.
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