Chinese dry pot spot MáLà Project opens in Greenpoint 

By Scott Lynch

The MáLà Project in the East Village has been a consistently tough table, especially during prime times, ever since Amelie Kang opened the doors in 2015. And it’s easy to understand why: The place specializes in build-your-own Chinese dry pot, stir-fried with chilis and peppercorns, for which you and your crew choose from among 60 or so different ingredients. It’s a dish that’s fun to order and share. It’s also good drinking food.

Kang followed the success of her original MáLà Project with two spots in Midtown Manhattan (one east, one west), and last week, finally, she opened an outpost in Brooklyn, right on Manhattan Avenue near the Williamsburg border.

MáLà Project (Scott Lynch)

It’s her largest, coolest-looking restaurant yet — the design studio LOVEISENOUGH, which also worked on Rule of Thirds and Le Crocodile, partnered with the team — with a lovely back dining room featuring skylights and a jacuzzi-sized “water feature” and a bustling bar area up front, complete with photo booth.

“We’ve had a lot of requests for a Brooklyn location over the years,” Christian Castillo, MáLà Project’s creative director, tells Brooklyn Magazine. “It seems like a good vibe for us here. We looked at Williamsburg, we had Prospect Heights in mind, and Clinton Hill, but we couldn’t really find a space that felt right. Then we saw this space in Greenpoint, which used to be Sikorski Meat Market, a Polish butcher shop, and both really loved it. It felt right.”

The heart of MáLà Project is, of course, those killer dry pots. True, they require a lot of decision-making on your part, but you can’t really go wrong, so just trust your cravings. There are many meats on the menu, ranging in price from $5 to $22 and including crowd-pleasers like chicken thigh, pork belly and sirloin steak as well as funkier cuts such as beef tendon and pig intestine.

The fish section runs a similar gamut, and your veggie options include green things (bok choy, broccoli), fungi (king oysters, shiitake) and starches (sweet potato, taro). Various noodles and types of tofu round out the offerings.

Cold noodles, $14 (Scott Lynch)

Our dry pot combo last Friday was a flavor party: beef tongue, fish cakes, tofu skin, asparagus and glass noodles. The “spicy” setting I requested for the seasoning was a lot less potent than what I’ve come to expect from MáLà. I hope that was an aberration and not a new policy.

Dry pot with beef tongue ($10), fish cake ($6), enoki mushroom ($5), asparagus ($6), and tofu skin ($5) (Photo by Scott Lynch)

There’s plenty of other stuff going on here too. To celebrate her successful expansion in Brooklyn, Kang introduced several new dishes to the already-stacked not-dry-pot pages of the MáLà Project menu. That Sichuan stalwart mapo tofu is available for the first time, for example, as is a hearty new “crispy duck salad” and silky egg custard with minced pork.

Crispy duck salad, $26 (Scott Lynch)

Alcohol has always been a key part of the MáLà Project experience, and at the Greenpoint location, cocktails like “BenBen’s Wild Days” with tequila, mango and bird’s  eye chili, and “10,000 Years of Love” (sounds nice!) with baiju, vodka, sesame and pineapple, will set you back $16 each. A few beers and wine are available as well.

Mapo tofu, $18 (Scott Lynch)

MáLà Project in Brooklyn is located at 603 Manhattan Avenue, between Driggs and Nassau Avenues, and is currently open on weekdays from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., and on weekends from 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. (718-500-3881)