Midtown restaurant closed in 2023 after 28 years. Here’s what’s taking over the space
After Genghis Khan Mongolian Grill announced it had closed in August, the online response from customers online was so appreciative of the Volker restaurant’s 28 years in business that owner Ling Chang reopened for one final Saturday.
“We’d like an opportunity to serve you one last time and to say goodbye,” Chang said at the time.
Genghis Khan has been closed ever since. But the response from customers stuck with several members of the Biswa family, Nepalese refugees who held a variety of positions at Genghis Khan. They weren’t ready to say goodbye.
They’ve since leased the same building at 3906 Bell St., purchased all the furnishings and equipment from Chang and will soon reopen a restaurant in the space called … Genghis Khan Mongolian Grill.
“Everything will be the same,” said owner Gobar Biswa. “Same food, same hours, same quality, and most of the same employees.”
Biswa said he worked at Genghis Khan for about a decade before leaving in 2018 to pursue different business interests.
“It was my first job in America,” he said. “I was a busboy, then cook, server, manager. But my brother, aunt and sisters all worked there until it closed. We’re a family, and we’ll be operating it together.”
He said he hopes to have Genghis 2.0 open “within a month.”
Next door, the owners of The Fresh Mediterranean Co. have said they plan to open this year in the former d’Bronx Authentic Deli and Pizzeria space at 3904 Bell St.
The Jamestown Square apartments — a 200-unit, $66 million project that’s under construction behind the restaurant — are not yet completed, but the parking garage in the structure opened a few weeks ago, said Justin Kaufman with Cadence, the commercial real estate firm handling the site. It amounts to 125 new parking spots for restaurants, shops and patrons in the area.
“(Genghis Khan) has been a fixture of this community and part of the 39th St. vibe we are striving to maintain and build upon,” Kaufman said in an email. “It’s been a couple of chaotic years but it’s finally starting to come together.”
