Hand-pulled noodles with a side of baby grand piano in Monterey Park

At Chopin Noodle House in Monterey Park's Atlantic Times Square, the dining room is small. But there's still room for a baby grand piano.

If you’re lucky, you might catch owner Zi Yang playing for customers as they work through bowls of Lanzhou beef noodle soup. A few feet away, cooks pull a fresh batch of noodles by hand, made to each diner’s preferred thickness.

The traditional beef noodle soup at Chopin Noodle House in Monterey Park comes with clear broth, chili oil, sliced beef, leeks, and cilantro.

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Gab Chabrán

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LAist

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Noodles are pulled by hand to order at Chopin Noodle House.

(

Gab Chabrán

/

LAist

)

Pianists turned chefs 

Yang and his wife, Mimi Song, are both former piano teachers who met through music.

After moving from China to the U.S., they hoped to make a living teaching piano, but it didn’t pay the bills. So they turned to another love: noodles.

Co-founders Mimi Song (left) and Zi Yang, both former piano teachers, have grown Chopin Noodle House to five locations.

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Courtesy Chopin Noodle House

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The couple opened the first Chopin Noodle House in Catonsville, Maryland, in 2023. They later expanded to Southern California, starting in Chino, and opened in Monterey Park in March. The chain now has five locations in Maryland, Virginia and Southern California.

When I visited, Yang stepped out from behind the counter, sat down at the baby grand and played Frédéric Chopin’s Waltz in C-sharp minor, its soft, rolling melody filling the small dining room. A group of diners in the corner looked up from their bowls of noodles, watched and cheered when he finished.

The restaurant name comes from the Polish composer. “We both love Chopin,” Yang said.

The Lanzhou connection

Yang is from Lanzhou, the capital of Gansu province in northwest China, and the birthplace of the signature beef noodle soup.

“I was born in Lanzhou, a city along China’s ancient Silk Road,” he writes on the restaurant’s website. “Every morning, the streets fill with the scent of beef broth and the rhythm of pulled noodles slapping the counter.”

“Maybe 80% of the people eat it for breakfast or lunch,” he told me.

Before opening the restaurant, he returned to China for a crash course in its creation.

“I went back to learn how to pull the noodles and how to make the very delicious beef noodle soup,” he said.

The piano started as a practical idea.

“We saw that restaurant life would be so boring, so we decided to put a piano in our restaurant. So sometimes if there’s no customer, we can practice the piano,” Yang said.

What’s in the bowl

The most popular order is the traditional beef noodle soup ($14.99). It's made from beef bones and beef shank.

Diners choose from eight noodle styles, from extra-thin to extra-wide, plus knife-sliced and gluten-free rice noodles. The bowl follows what the restaurant calls Lanzhou’s five signature elements: clear beef broth, white radish, red chili oil, green cilantro and leek, as well as golden hand-pulled noodles topped with thinly sliced beef.

For sipping alongside the noodles, order the eight treasures tea, known in Lanzhou as san pao tai. It’s served in a lidded bowl called a gaiwan and brewed with green tea, dried red dates, goji berries, longan, raisins, rose petals, chrysanthemum and rock sugar. You use the lid to keep the fruit and leaves in place as you drink. It’s naturally sweet, a nice counterpoint to the chili oil.

An open bench

Anyone who visits is welcome to play the piano. Yang said they’ve had everyone from kids learning to play to professional musicians, including members of the San Gabriel Valley Symphony.

Some of the players are so good that Yang admits he’s now a little shy about taking his turn.

“I’m afraid to play because they are so good,” he said.