Yao's restaurant taking Chinese food to new heights

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/printstory.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/rox/3043849

Feb. 17, 2005, 12:29AM

Yao's restaurant taking Chinese food to new heights
Rockets center's parents will run a stylish eatery and sports bar on Westheimer
By DAI HUYNH

The seven-figure salary. The high-powered agents. The commercial endorsement deals.

Houston Rockets center Yao Ming has all of the above. But one fashionable hallmark of the superstar-athlete lifestyle is missing: the eponymous restaurant or sports bar.

Michael Jordan has The Steak House N.Y.C. in Manhattan. Former Rocket Clyde Drexler has Drexler's World Famous BBQ & Grill near the Toyota Center. And don't forget Mike Ditka's Restaurant, operated by the Chicago Bears' former coach in that city's Tremont Hotel.

Come Monday, the doors will open at Yao Restaurant and Bar, a $1.5 million Chinese eatery and sports bar at 9755 Westheimer.

The owners are Yao's parents, father Yao Zhiyuan and mother Fang Fengdi, who own a home near Katy.

But the son's mark is evident. The chairs in the VIP room fit his 7-foot-6-inch frame.

The doorways are about 10 feet tall, so he or other NBA players won't need to duck.

The walls are plastered with photos of Yao in action.

The menu will feature Yao's favorite home-cooked dishes, as well as contemporary Chinese creations from co-owner/chef George Phou, founder of Houston's Fu's Garden.

"The Yaos love to cook. Peking duck is a real favorite of theirs," Phou said. "Their son loves it, too, so we've hired a chef who will do nothing but Peking duck.

"Once the restaurant opens, Mr. and Mrs. Yao will be here every day to greet guests and help them make their selections."

Yao has a penchant for his mother's soups, including the featured slow-simmered chicken soup with shiitake mushrooms, and pork and shrimp wonton soup.

"There will be other dishes from Shanghai, where the Yao family is from, like sautéed baby shrimp with snow pea leaves," operations manager Wendy Ju said.

Yao's restaurant is on a commercial stretch of Westheimer, just west of South Gessner.

The area is peppered with such established restaurants as Amazon Grill, Churrascos, Kasra Persian Grill and Benihana Japanese. The eateries draw from an eclectic mix of neighborhoods, from upscale homes along Memorial Drive to more modest dwellings near Beltway 8.

Houston's booming Chinatown is about three miles away.

The restaurant will seat 440, with private dining rooms and the super-sized VIP room.

Yao's folks should feel at home in the elite lounge with private bathroom. Both are former basketball players.

His mother, once captain of the Chinese national team and considered one of the premier centers in the world, is 6 feet 3 inches tall. His father, also a prominent player, is 6 feet 7 inches tall.

"The custom-designed chairs from Beijing are about two sizes bigger than the rest of the furniture," Phou said. "I'm 5-11 and when I sit in a Yao Ming chair, my feet are dangling in the air."

Adjacent to the restaurant is a sleek chrome-and-silver bar with red-and-black accents and three 70-inch televisions for Rockets game viewing.

"We're anticipating large groups on game nights," Ju said.

Opening a restaurant is notoriously risky, as more than one athlete has discovered.

A successful example is Jordan's The Steak House N.Y.C., an upscale eatery overseen by celebrity chef David Walzog. With an enviable location in Grand Central Station, its future seems bright.

Yet the restaurant actually is owned and managed by Manhattan's Glazier Group, which also operates Houston's buzz-generating Strip House.

Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis discovered that fans do not necessarily follow the athlete to the eatery. Lewis and his two partners opened Cafe Noir, an American fusion restaurant, on Fannin in February 1999 — and closed it 15 months later.

And Shaquille O'Neal's plans for a restaurant, called Shaq's Place, in Orlando's Universal City fell through after his trade from Orlando to Los Angeles in 1996.

Drexler's barbecue eatery, a modest, family-run business on Dowling since the 1960s, relocated recently to a renovated warehouse near the Toyota Center. Jumping from 60 seats to 220, the bustling establishment draws downtown workers and Rockets fans with a more varied menu that includes gumbo, fish and steaks.

dai.huynh@chron.com

 

Which one? they got 4 of them, about to be 5