Pekin Noodle Parlor

A small upstairs restaurant on the second floor of a survivor building on Main Street — climb a steep staircase past faded photographs of the original 1911 dining room. The menu has barely changed in a century: chow mein, chop suey, noodles, fried rice, sweet and sour pork, served in private red-curtained booths.

Open evenings only. Cash and cards. The chow mein is the dish to order; the historical experience is the meal.

eating out restaurant
A story
Pekin opened in 1911 and is the oldest continuously operating Chinese restaurant in the United States. The original wooden booths, the dumbwaiter from the kitchen, and the Burmese teak doors are all still in use. The Tam family, now in its fifth generation, has run it the whole time.