Jim Myers

jtmyers@tennessean.com

Forget the manna. The heavens have parted and dumplings will fall.

Finally, Nashville might have the Chinese restaurant we have long prayed for.

Maneet Chauhan has pulled another coup to partner with well-respected chef Chris Cheung to create the menu for her new Chinese restaurant concept called Tánsuŏ, which is the Cantonese verb "to explore."

The proof will be in the execution when the restaurant opens in September or October, but all the elements for great, authentic and thoughtful Chinese food will be in place. Yes, it's being called Asian-inspired, but it will be truly Chinese at its very core. Here's why:

Cheung has both the pedigree and the skills to realize this dream. He grew up in Chinatown in New York, learning wok technique at his uncle's small shop that served simple food to working-class Chinese people.

"Great Chinese food is peasant food, but it's been perfected for thousands of years. You take the humblest of ingredients and make them taste really good," said Cheung, in town to prepare a media preview dinner Tuesday evening.

After growing up steeped in the Cantonese culinary tradition, Cheung's professional training began at the side of Jean-Georges Vongerichten at Vong, an upscale Thai concept in New York. He was then part of the opening team at Morimoto Masaharu's Nobu before cooking alongside Wylie Dufresne and Didier Virot at Jean-Georges.

Rising along the way, he became chef de cuisine at Celadon and then executive chef at Ruby Foo’s, learning Hong Kong-style dim sum from Chef Lam. New York critics began to take note of his skills when he opened Tiger Blossom and then earned accolades at the helm of Monkey Bar.

Wanting to go deeper still, Cheung traveled with his wife to the small village where she grew up near Shanghai, working his way up to be the town banquet cook.

"They didn't trust me at first and wouldn't let me near the wok," he says of the rustic experience. "There was limited electricity, so we started dinner at 10 a.m. when it was light out. These weren't woks over high BTU gas jets, either. We cooked over lower heat from bamboo fires.

"There was no refrigeration, everything was harvested that day," he adds, saying they pulled creatures from the sea that he still hasn't figured out what they were. It also gave him a deep appreciation for scale and breadth of Chinese cuisine, the thousands of uses for rice and how much can be done with so little.

Cheung is excited about this new opportunity. He's a self-professed Johnny Cash fan who calls "Live at Folsom Prison" one of the best albums ever made. He also likens the Nashville culinary renaissance to what he saw happen in Brooklyn over the past decade.

While Cheung will not be moving here, he plans to run up his frequent-flier account and travel here every week. He is also installing his most successful protege, chef Alex Sidorov, who arrived from Siberia eight years ago and showed early promise, giving Cheung the chance to develop an ambitious chef in the way he learned from others.

Sidorov, who grew up in the country, says he prefers a city Nashville's size to New York and jumped at the chance when offered.

Cheung will continue to operate his small, 16-seat restaurant in Brooklyn, East Wind Snack Shop, where he continues to cook and turn out almost 1,000 dumplings each day.

This will be the third leg of Chauhan's Morph Hospitality group, along with Chauhan Ale & Masala House and the new Mockingbird Diner, all adjacent properties in the Gulch at 121-123 12th Ave. N.

Reach Jim Myers at 615-259-8367 on Instagram@culinarityand on Twitter@ReadJimMyers.

To learn more

Tansuo

121-B 12th Ave. N

www.tansuonashville.com