The senior crew going on weekly pilgrimages to Queens restaurants

A group of a dozen diners took up two large round tables at Little Pepper — a beloved Sichuanese restaurant in Queens' College Point neighborhood — on a recent Wednesday.

Some guests had traveled for two hours to be there. Others came from Manhattan. Nearly all were in their 70s. No one took pictures of the food, and no one was on social media.

Instead, they discussed topics ranging from Indonesia travel tips to the New York City parking app and the Jeffrey Epstein files.

When it came to restaurant talk, they could easily discuss some of Queens' most beloved local gems and tick off various locations of restaurants that had moved — even though none of them live in the borough.

And that’s part of the point.

They’re part of the Wednesday Lunch Group, a crew of retired seniors, mostly of European heritage and mostly from Westchester County, who make weekly lunch pilgrimages to Asian restaurants in Queens.

Why Queens?

They find a breadth and depth of Asian cuisine not found to this degree in other parts of New York City, and certainly not in Westchester County. Asian Americans account for 26% of Queens' population — the highest concentration found in all New York City's boroughs. Plus, most Queens restaurants operate all day (instead of opening at 5 p.m.).

And why Asian food?

“It’s easily shareable,” said Paul Miller, who started the group in 2010 as a way to eat with friends.

He also just loves Asian food: “It’s the variety, the use of vegetables and all kinds of proteins.”

And so they commute into the city every Wednesday, with the aim of trying regional cuisines of different Asian countries.

The group started in 2010 with just three people, including Miller. It has since grown to an email list with 54 members, including a retired metals and minerals trader, a teacher, a caterer, and a marathon swimmer.

They come to Queens each week to try a new restaurant and Miller caps the group size at 14. In 2024, the group visited 51 restaurants through rain and snow, missing only one week.

Many are friends, having lived and raised their families in Armonk in Westchester County before moving to other parts of New York. A few attended high school together in Great Neck.

“I've also made some dear friends that I didn't know before” as friends of friends were invited, Miller said.

Miller, 77, grew up partly in New York City and has always loved food. He inherited that passion from his parents, who took him to explore different cuisines, particularly Chinese.

“I'm sure it was mostly American Chinese [food] at the time in the '50s and '60s,” he said. As he got older, attended Columbia University and took on the family business of manufacturing of licensed nightgowns (i.e. Mickey Mouse prints) in Midtown, he dug deeper into the cuisine, learning about Sichuanese and Hunanese dishes.

After he retired in 2000, he took up bookkeeping for one day of the week, and filled the rest of his days with his cravings for Asian food.

In 2010, Miller read a New York Times article on regional cuisine from China's northeastern Dongbei region, and decided to head to M&T in Flushing to sample its lauded Northern Chinese food. He called his two friends (he said food is not his wife’s passion) and they met there.

“It was really different and really new to us, and so it really started from there,” he said.

While many New Yorkers are turning to TikTok for restaurant recommendations, Miller still finds his spots via newspapers, blogs and word of mouth.

Over the years, the group has gravitated away from buzzy new places and toward restaurants beloved for their cooking skills: Golden Wonton King and Szechuan Opera in Flushing, Yuk Jun Gui (a Korean spot in Queens’ Murray Hill), Asian Bowl (a Burmese restaurant in Forest Hills), Angel (an Indian place in Jackson Heights) and Hug Esan (a Thai spot in Elmhurst).

Back at Little Pepper, the group was feasting on dishes of garlicky cucumbers, tea-smoked duck, and dumplings glistening with chile oil. Group members rattled off their favorite dishes over the years.

“The crispy eggplant at Legends of Taste.”

“The cabbage at M&T.”

“The Muslim ribs at Fu Run.”

“I've been looking for people to eat with me for about 10 years, because I've been to Asia between 80 and 100 times, and I fell in love with the food there,” said Mo Siegel, 73, a celebrated marathon swimmer who also manufactured air conditioning equipment in China for 20 years.

Delicious food aside, most diners said they craved community.

Even during the pandemic, Miller arranged weekly Zoom meetups so that everybody kept in touch.

Nancy Holson, a recently retired theater producer (she’s behind the political satire "Me the People: The Trump America Musical") looks forward to these hangouts every week.

“I think we all feel like we're really supporting people we want to support, by eating at their restaurants,” she said. Most of the restaurants are small businesses run by immigrant families and she noted that some have closed over the years.

Miller keeps in touch with many of the owners, following them to new locations through New York and New Jersey.

Dave Cook, a food writer and group member, laments one thing about the group.

Offal’s on the “blacklist,” he said, gesturing as if cutting his throat. “Paul doesn’t like it.”

“I’m a control freak,” Miller admits. “So they let me order, and they don't have to think about it. They’re just going to get a whole bunch of choices put in front of them and then we divide up the bill at the end.”

It’s not a problem because one requirement for initiation is that you have to eat almost everything. Friendliness is another.

David Air, 79, retired from commercial real estate in New York, joined the group after he met one of the founding members, Marty Marmor, on a taco tour in Mexico City in 2018.

“I've been pretty loyal ever since,” said Air. “Where do you find people just so enthusiastic and knowledgeable, very sophisticated?”