"Do you mind if I smoke here?" Peter asked as he pulled a cigarette from the pack."Before the pandemic, our restaurant strictly prohibited smoking indoors," Peter said, lighting up the cigarette before waving the lighter backward to show how empty the restaurant was. "But now, look here, who cares?"Peter, who comes from Southwest China's Sichuan province, has been working in the restaurant industry for more than 20 years. He is the manager of one of the most popular Szechuan restaurants in Manhattan — Lan Sheng on West 36th Street. It was awarded a Michelin star from 2012 to 2014. "Manhattan was like a paradise for us," Peter said.An internet search on the restaurant's Chinese name, Cao Tang, will yield a few pages of entries by travelers raving about their dining experience there. Some people call it "the No.1 Szechuan restaurant in New York" or "the restaurant that you can ne
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