Some historians say that Marco Polo introduced spaghetti to Italy when he returned from his far-flung travels with noodles from China. Today, on a quiet Brooklyn side street in a historically Italian-American neighborhood, 29-year-old Eton Chan is reintroducing the ancient noodles of his ancestors. But he may be disproving Marco Polo's legacy — Chan's hand-pulled noodles don't travel well.

"They've got to be made fresh — they can't sit in a hot water bath or they start to look like brains," Chan says. The difficulty of making hand-pulled noodles and their lack of portability might explain why they're not as popular as Japanese ramen: "Making these noodles is a dying art that I'm trying to bring back. Nobody teaches how to make them in the U.S. so I'd just watch at restaurants and think, 'Jesus, how do they do it?' Before you know how make them, it doesn't make any sense at all. But I started practicing at home and after about four to six months, I cracked it."

Half a year is a long time to spend harnessing a cooking technique, but when you consider that these noodles have been served for centuries, a few months doesn't seem so bad. At Chan's eponymous shop, Eton, these noodles are hand-pulled-to-order — without the help of any tools or machinery — and plunked into paper containers with broth for immediate consumption. There's a busy take-out business, but unless you live steps from the storefront, you're better off snagging a seat in the shop for the fresh eats, colorful atmosphere, and all-night noodle show.

Chan greets customers over the din of his open kitchen. Behind him, Dan Schonberger beats the noodle dough, pounding it loudly against the table. He rolls it into a long log, adding flour and water as necessary. Once it's ready, the noodle-making process is like a dance. He picks up one end of the log in each hand and lets the middle droop, stretching it into a U-shape. He reaches out and up, and then brings his hands back together, just higher than eye-level, swinging the dough into a loop. The loop slowly twists into a rope, like in a magic trick. A customer in a puffy black coat leans on the counter to watch, and a little boy perched on a stool at the front window cranes his neck to gaze at the mesmerizing motions of the dough.

Schonberger repeats this process until the dough hits the right consistency. Pull. Swing. Loop. Twist. Then he picks up the rhythm. He stretches the twisted loop into noodles, doubling them over themselves again and again. He draws the delicate dough into thinner and thinner strands, like a deft and graceful game of Cat's Cradle. With his fingers carefully threaded through either end, he shakes this mass of flour filaments, wiggling them apart from each other. Finally, he sets the mass on the table and cuts off the ends, leaving a human mark — an imperfect edge — on each individual noodle. "The noodles aren't uniform, sort of like the ends of a pizza crust," Chan says. "That's the beauty of it."

Dan Schonberger twisting noodles.

Tonight, the noodles will be dunked into a thick and sweet beef broth with meltingly tender short ribs. While the noodles themselves were inspired by many trips to Chinatown, the daily specials are influenced by the staff's training at the French Culinary Institute. Traditional Chinese noodle soups tend to be hoisin or bean sauce-based, but Chan's fusion soups make sense: To him, noodle soup is comfort food, and by pairing it with short ribs, pork belly, or braised chicken, he gives each bowl a homey Western spin that appeals to his customers. For a more traditional Chinese soup, the shop's handmade dumplings are always available to toss in. And since the noodle dough is made from flour, water, salt, and baking soda — and is egg-free — a bowl of noodle soup in their house-made vegetable stock can even please a vegan.

Chan grew up in Chicago, where his parents own a Chinese restaurant, but opening his own eatery wasn't his plan when he left home to pursue an economics degree from Rutgers. For four years after college, he worked as a stockbroker by day but became obsessed with making hand-pulled noodles by night. When he realized how much he looked forward to coming home and cooking every evening, he decided to quit his job and enroll in culinary school.

He started cooking professional in the kitchens of New York's Cafe Gray, Asiate at the Mandarin-Oriental Hotel, and Southgate at Jumeirah Essex House. But it was the staff meals that inspired him to open his own restaurant. When his fellow chefs got excited about the dumplings he made for them in the restaurant kitchens, he realized he was onto something.

Chan opened Eton over the summer, serving dumplings and shave ice — a treat similar to a snow cone that he and his wife discovered while honeymooning in Hawaii. Noodles were introduced to the dinner menu this fall. In order to prepare the noodle dough, Chan kneads it every morning for about 30 to 45 minutes, in order to get the gluten in the flour to start to break down. After that, he and Schonberger knead and pound it throughout the day.

Chan lived across the street from his current storefront for five years before he opened up his shop, and he greets many of his customers by name, regarding them as neighbors and friends. A visitor with a thick Brooklyn accent worked up an appetite playing his first-ever round of golf. Chan smiles widely as he listens to the hole-by-hole details. Another customer, wearing a thick fleece and a thicker mustache, laments how much TV he's been watching since his retirement as he waits for his dumplings. And when a guy in clogs and a sweatshirt stuffs a few bills in the tip jar on his way out of the shop and says, "See you later," Chan responds, "Yeah, see you tomorrow!" The guy smiles sheepishly, silently acknowledging his noodle addiction.

In the kitchen beside Schonberger, an intern from the French Culinary Institute named Amanda Quijano is learning the ropes. She, too, has been pulling the dough all afternoon, but her noodles aren't making it into anyone's soup just yet. "Amanda probably has another month," Eton says. In other words, she has another month of kneading, pounding, and pulling without a single bowl of soup to show for it. Chan seems proud of her progress — not at all aggravated by the time she is taking to develop her technique. After all, with every person who takes the time to master this method, there's a better chance that these ancient noodles will survive for centuries to come.

Kara Zuaro is a Brooklyn-based freelance writer and the author of I Like Food, Food Tastes Good: In the kitchen with your favorite bands.

Photographs by Kara Zuaro, "The Scoop" photograph © Chris Gillard, "Plate" photograph from FoodCollection/Getty Images.