Shun Lee to do Nixon’s actual 1972 dinner to mark Met Opera’s “Nixon in China” in February

        Shun Lee owner Michael Tong is digging out old menus preparing to recreate President Richard Nixon’s famous 1972 banquet in Beijing to celebrate the Metropolitan Opera’s “Nixon in China” come February at Opera chief Peter Gelb’s request. Gelb has been coming to Shun Lee with his mother and father since he was a boy. Dad of course is the New York Times larger-than-life onetime managing editor Arthur Gelb, a city room legend.

         Tong, a restaurant host in the old Sirio Maccioni mold, says he is pleased to restage the banquet in a joint promotion with Gelb but he has a few doubts about the menu itself. “We did the dinner in 1972 and a few of the dishes were not that good for most New Yorkers.” That might have been shark’s fin and bird’s nest culture shock.

        Ever clever Tong got the ABC reporter with Nixon in China on the historic visit to send him the menu so he could do the dinner the next day. It was a public relations coup for Shun Lee. Tong himself appeared on the local news that night with Bill Beutel and Roger Grimsby demonstrating Peking duck.

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