5 Happiness in.NOLA

Yes. We went and the food was absolutely horrible. The beef was hard as a rock and too much salt. My wife got egg rolls and they had no stuffing inside, just fried dough. Never went back.

Friend,

Why would you takeout from New Orleans' best Chinese restaurant (or should we say Taiwanese)? As Tom Fitzmorris, the greatest food critic in America, says, "Getting take-out reduces the goodness of the food by fifty percent."

People now rave about Dian Xin, saying it's New Orleans' best Chinese but I still prefer Five Happiness. Perhaps it is because Five Happiness was my first experience with Chinese food, or was it Trey Yuen? It was Sam Sifton of the NYT who said something to the effect of the first pizza you have as a child is the pizza against which you will judge all future pizzas. Some call it the pizza cognition theory, but it applies to almost anything in life. The theory has its basis in a Platonic notion of Ideals, tying it to childhood psychology.

And no matter how many great Chinese restaurants I try, from Sun Wah in Chicago to Buddakan in Manhattan to Peking Gourmet Inn outside DC to Harbor City in Seattle, when I think of the perfect Chinese dish, I think Five Happiness sesame chicken. Some will accuse me of parosmia or ageusia, but the power of childhood taste is greater than that of the refined palate of a seasoned epicure.

Mother and I recently ate at Five Happiness on a trip to the now closed Neutral Grounds. We had actually had dinner earlier, but as we crossed under I-10 on Carrollton, I begged Mother to stop for a quick bite. We had not been to Five Happiness in half a year, so it was the perfect place that night.

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What was most surprising that Thursday evening was the lack of cars in the front lot and the lack of a security guard. In bygone days, parking was difficult and always a bit daunting when the only spots were in the back lot. The off-duty NOPD officer helped to assuage that disquietude. We entered the unmanned front doors and found only two other tables taken, a far cry from a decade ago when it was common to wait. Two decades ago, it was even more crowded.

Grandfather told me he used to buy crabs here when he was a boy from Kogos Bros. Seafood, which opened on this site in 1942. The Kogos Brothers arrived in New Orleans in the early 1900s from Tripoli, Greece. The brothers opened a hat store and fruit stand on the corner of Camp St and Commercial Place, an alley between St. Charles and Camp St that opened in 1851. Their fruit stand was where Trenasse restaurant sits today. Back in the early 20s, when the glorious Volstead Act was law, the Kogos Brothers store was known to host a speakeasy. Apparently, they made a lot of money and bought the building in 1926 before expanding to South Carrollton in 1942. It was on Carrollton that they sold "some of the cleanest picked blue crab I have ever had," according to Grandfather. They also continued their hat store there. At the corner of the building, they rented space to McKenzies bakery.


Photo from LINK

The South Carrollton location, as most of you know, has been a Chinese restaurant since 1961, when Harry Lee's brother-in-law's parents opened How Toy. Johnny Ngai Sr. was its proprietor. He arrived in NY in '38 to help in his father's laundry. He served in the WWII in the European theater, returning to Houston and then arriving in New Orleans in 1947.

Paggy Lee of Taiwan, not Peggy due to a immigration office mistake, just as Phil Leotardo's ancestor experienced, bought the restaurant from the Ngais in 1978 and changed its name to Five Happiness. It was a hit and expansion came quickly, first by buying the entire building.

In the early 90s, Five Happiness expanded across the street with its Imperial Room, a banquet hall. One of my Jewish friends had his bar mitzvah here, the only time I ever ate there. It was a smashing good time, and the sesame chicken tray, with my body never leaving a twenty foot radius of it, was constantly filled. My friend was mocked mercilessly for the event being there rather than a tony locale, and it was the last bar mitzvah I ever heard hosted there.

The banquet hall closed in 2018 and a disgusting IHOP replaced it the following year. Ms. Paggy sold the restaurant to Xikai Yao, owner of Sake Cafe, in 2020 bringing an end to what some have called the golden age of Five Happiness. If only Chinese banquet halls were kosher to the New Orleans Jewish community for rites of passage celebrations.

Entering Five Happiness is like stepping back in time to 2006, when the restaurant was fully remodeled after it was destroyed in the floods of Hurricane Katrina. Some people call the floods "the failure of the federally built levee system," but I find such parochial labeling petty and vindictive. It was Hurricane Katrina that flooded the city. Yes, the levees were in poor condition, but the levee failure that flooded Five Happiness was a result of an unprecedented storm surge. If we want to play the blame game, let us remember it was locals who, decades ago, did not want a pump station at the mouth of the 17th St Canal, thus, bringing the waters of the Gulf via Pontchartrain into the heart of the city. Local levee districts, one speculates, could have done a better job raising alarm bells that a poorly constructed berm with an I-beam wall could not hold back an ocean of water pressure. I digress, but only a little. As in 2006, the same dress hangs on the restaurant's north wall. I am no expert on Taiwanese garb, but I believe it is hanfu. If anyone knows the story behind the dress, please share it.



One of the fun parts about dining in Five Happiness is the complimentary wontons brought to the table with a spicy mustard sauce and a sweet fish sauce for dipping. Like asking for Italian roll refills at Impastato's, I always have to have no fewer than five of these sample trays. I prefer the sweet sauce, but after five dips in the sweet sauce, I get wild with a dip in the mustard sauce.



Mother did not have to ask what I wanted. She actually ordered for us without even needing to look at the menu. She knows I will always order the chef's special sesame chicken. She is a fan of the Moo Shu. Our waiter was fabulous and our food was out in less than ten minutes. It was superb! As good as any sesame chicken I have ever had.





Mother only ate a few bites of her dish. She said she was full, so I finished it. Sadly, she refused when I asked if I could get a second order of the fabulous sesame chicken. And so I departed with only a partially satiated stomach on the way to our last visit to the Neutral Ground, site of some of my first literary readings. So, no, I did not have the same experience. I had a memorably great meal from Five Happiness within the last six weeks.

Yours,
TulaneLSU

Hong Minh, it ain't fancy but it some of the best Chinese I've ever had.

Tried to order Royal China last week and the phone number was not in service. I hope they aren't closed. Hot Wok is not as good.

Used to be own/ran by Ms Peggy-Sue but she sold out or retired 5 or so years ago. Hasn’t been the same since

Friend,

It was Ms. Paggy, not Peggy, who made Five Happiness into what it is. She sold it in 2020 to Xikai Yao, owner of Sake Cafe. One of Uncle's business associates tells me that Ms. Paggy moved to Singapore and is alive and well there.

Yours,
TulaneLSU

I used to love Five Happiness but around 2022 it went downhill. Green Tea wasn't bad last time I was there.

I think Trey Yuen still has it. 5 Happiness, not so much.

Well, when mother and uncle keep
Him locked in the hot attic until “feeding” time he really has nothing better to do. ;)