Baijiu, Crab Lo Mein, and Mahjong Collide at D.C.’s New Lucky Danger

The peking duck comes coated with compressed plum and is meant to be wrapped up in butter lettuce bites with cured cucumber.

Chinese American restaurant Lucky Danger is moving in “the reverse direction of Panda Express,” acclaimed chef and restaurateur Tim Ma jokes. The Mount Vernon Triangle ghost kitchen that first served delivery staples like fried rice and pork wontons during the pandemic and set up long-term takeout digs in Pentagon City Mall is returning to D.C. in an almost-unrecognizable new form (709 D Street NW).

Opening on Wednesday, May 21, the full-service restaurant with three distinct bars will feature what Ma calls “updated Chinese food,” drinks inspired by Chinese herbal medicine, and even mahjong lessons that turn the restaurant into “a Chinese community center.” Opening hours are 4 to 11 p.m. Wednesday through Saturday, with lunch (and possibly even weekend dim sum) coming soon.

The Penn Quarter spot will serve dishes, like allium pancakes with whipped tofu and caviar; blue crab lo mein with leek fondue; and duck fried chaufa (Peruvian fried rice) with fish sauce caramel, that transform classic Chinese dishes with flavors and techniques from France, Peru, Thailand, and the rest of the world. Ma says the menu’s eclectic palate is “just a reflection of how people eat these days,” and is influenced by D.C. kitchen staffs being made up of many different nationalities.

A D.C. native, executive chef Robbie Reyes returns to the capital to run Lucky Danger’s kitchen after stints at the David Burke-led Breckenridge Distillery Restaurant in Colorado, David Chang’s Momofuku in New York and D.C., and even a short time in Peru. He’s been running operations for the classic Chinese American menu in Pentagon City for a year now and developed the new Penn Quarter menu with Ma through nostalgic research trips to New York’s Chinatown.

The new restaurant itself straddles the line between fine and casual dining, with the brick walls of the Partisan’s former space dressed up with the playful Lucky Danger icon and red-and-green wallpaper depicting flowers, pottery, and dragons that take cues from ancient Chinese art.

There are four distinct spaces throughout the multifaceted flagship. First there’s a bright entryway bar serving classic cocktails infused with Asian-influenced flavors, like a take on a margarita with Sichuan peppercorn and a tomato-salt rim, leading into a cozy dining room where diners can settle into soft leather booths to chow down on family-style servings of Chinese prime rib, Beijing duck, or wild boar char sui balanced with a napa cabbage slaw.

At the back of the dining room, Chinese characters on the wall spell out a saying that was written on Ma’s uncle’s restaurant, the Shandong Inn, which loosely translates to “let the cocktails and champagne fly, let the good times roll.”

That freehearted phrase leads to the moody and red lantern-illuminated “Lucky Club.” Bar director Sunny Vanavichai’s flowing cocktails are a little more complicated in this den, like an umami bitters and sesame-infused whiskey drink served with a Pei Pa Kao candy that’s reminiscent of molasses-like traditional Chinese cough medicine. A Chinese grain spirit called baijiu is paired with brie, pear cordial, and a bitter apertif to marry the complex fermented flavors. There’s also a hidden theme in the name of each cocktail (hint: Ma loves Jackie Chan), with the Twisting Tiger Punch mellowing out smoky mezcal with Oolong tea, mango lassi, ginger, and five spice.

The groundbreaking restaurateur pays homage to one of his favorite movies by the iconic actor and martial arts star in his hidden mahjong parlor at the very back of Lucky Danger. In Rush Hour 2, Chan kicks down the door of Don Cheadle’s character’s illegal mahjong bar in the back of a Crenshaw Chinese restaurant. “This is our mahjong bar in the back of the Chinese restaurant,” Ma explains. “I am Don Cheadle.”

Automatic mahjong tables can be rented for $45 an hour here, and Ma plans to host weekly lessons with the four tables that can set up a game within seconds. His dad helped teach mahjong at Scott Chung’s (now-closed) Sparrow Room for two years and the classes garnered a cult following, easily booking up twice a week. Now, Ma himself, his dad, and other family friends will teach mahjong at Lucky Danger. Over-proof whiskeys and whiskey cocktails will be served at this hidden bar, and while the entire food menu is available throughout the rest of the building, this shrine to the tile-based game will be drinks-only.

A quick scan of the food menu may seem familiar to devoted Ma fans. The iconic crab Rangoon from the original takeout spot are dusted with Old Bay, spicy mapo tofu is beefed up with rice cakes and shiitake mushrooms, and a few dishes that have frequented Any Day Now’s constantly evolving dinner menu are back too, like whole crispy flounder balanced by a fresh papaya salad. The Navy Yard spot became a sort of test kitchen for Ma, where they served “versions of the dishes from here last year, some of the upcoming concepts have been tested there.”

Those upcoming eateries include the recently opened Kata, an Asian fusion supper club in Chinatown; Sushi Sato, an all-you-can-eat sushi spot coming to H Street in the next month; and Taco Cat, a playful, all-day taco spot in Western Market. Beyond debuting three completely new restaurants and a more refined version of Lucky Danger, Ma plans to open another location of Any Day Now in the Chinatown area and two more casual takeout versions of Lucky Danger in Baltimore and Virginia.

While all these openings sound overwhelming, Ma is taking a back seat to young new chefs that “are closer to modern cuisine” in his kitchens and is ready to focus on rolling out a small restaurant empire with new takes on Asian-American food “for the culture.”

“Nobody’s going to Sushi Sato to see me. They’re going for sushi. And I think that’s the way it should be,” he says. “That’s the new evolution.”