I saw this comment before watching the video. I was like nah, it can't be that good. After watching the video: I was like ok buddy relax, no need to flex your multi-lingual, we get it
Agree. Also, in LA, my friends & I have been seeing quite a few non-ethnic-Chinese holding chopsticks to eat Chinese food in Chinese restaurants in San Gabriel Valley in Los Angeles County better than many Chinese themselves. Not surprisingly, when the non-ethnic-Chinese learn the Chinese language or to hold chopsticks, they learn it from scratch correctly in a formal way -- conversely, some Chinese have a better command of the English language and hold chopsticks worse than their non-ethnic-Chinese counterparts.
Chili Literally not what cultural appropriation is. The only people that would say that kind of shit are people that don’t believe it’s real, in their case as a joke, and “fake woke” people that think that they know social issues really well but don’t at all. I know that you’re possibly joking but seriously someone could probably be thinking the same but unironically.
I'm happy for this! All I want is some real ass chinese food! with szechuan peppercorns and hot chili oil galore, bubbling hot pots and meaty, brothy noodle dishes seasoned with all the best chinese spices!
@@myes344 considering I eat chicken feet and tripe and pork blood with my Vietnamese gfs family, I wouldn't consider myself a picky eater when it comes to asian food.
@@Rum0r Lol, spoken like a true hipster Just because you previously were ignorant about Szechuan/Chinese food does not mean you have now discovered "real" Chinese food A plate of Cantonese stir fry is as authentic as any Szechuan hotpot The Szechuan peppercorn you mentioned, as implied by its name, is mainly used in Szechuan cuisine; it is unheard of in Cantonese or Hokkien cooking for example - next time you meet someone from Guangzhou or Fujian, go tell them their food isn't authentic because they dint use Szechuan peppercorn or hot oil, won't you
i'm all for americans realizing true real authentic chinese food but i dont want all that fancy decor to justify the restaurants jacking up prices 10 fold for simple comfort food - that is absurd
Having diversity in price range is fine, I for one wouldn't mind if it changes the stereotype that Chinese food has to be cheap and in terrible shape restaurant with questionable hygiene. If Chinese food does not have to be dirt cheap then restaurant can actually do more sophisticated and advanced Chinese food than just comfort food or street food. The history behind the whole Chinatown aesthetic is a tragic one, it will be a happy progress if America can live out of it.
If you listen carefully his English has a slight accent but his Chinese does not. I'd bet he was raised at least partially in China and returned to the States later in life.
I’m learning that Chinese cuisine is so diverse from region to region (and China has so many people in it!) that I’ve come to feel that the phrase “Chinese cuisine” should be thought of as being more on par with saying something like “European cuisine,” as opposed to saying something like “Italian cuisine” or “German cuisine.” In the world of gastronomy, a province of China is probably comparable to a country in Europe. Good food will spread wherever people go, so of course there are similarities from place to place, but the various regions still seem to have truly distinct culinary subcultures/traditions. Pretty interesting. And delicious. Hahaha.
Yep. Most Americans should feel right at home with Dongbei/Northeastern Chinese food, since it bears a lot of similarities to other cold climate cuisines like German or Russian food. And nowhere else in China will you find food quite like that. Usually this is an eye-opener, since Americans are used to the spicier cuisines or Cantonese food.
Exactly. Chinese people don't talk about "Chinese cuisine" as a single style - and there's been a lot written about Chinese food by the Chinese over the millenia, which one would expect in a very large bureaucracy where government officials had to move around a lot and often missed the food they got in their home province.
@@thegrynne Well not quite. We do talk about "Chinese cuisine" (zhong can) but this only applies to overseas Chinese from the previous wave. I don't see younger Chinese immigrants using the phrase as often, often just saying what the regional cuisine is.
I can attest to this, I went to a Guangzhou, Sichuan, and a Beijing restaurant while I was in Beijing and they had almost nothing in common except rice.
5:28 "The fact that Chinese restaurants don't cook down, don't pander to Americans, suggests to me a real growing openness of American culture and American society." No, that tells me more about China's rising economic strength. Even in this video you see wealthy young Chinese patrons occupying the majority of the restaurants shown. With patrons who appreciate authentic Chinese flavors, these restaurants can stay open without compromising authenticity. This phenomenon has little to do with American openness.
Also felt weird when she mentioned that. Now that you said it, its absolutely true that. Similarly seeing many Chinese students driving sports cars in Berkley, people start saying all the Chinese are rich, its a super weird assumption. There are many poor Chinese students as well, but just not getting the spotlight, so people just skipping them.
That was a bit of a strange quote to me as well. To claim the whole country is more culturally open is a stretch, given our politics at the moment. Though in New York the point might stand.
Americans don't care what your preferences are, and the racists that do always make it on the news. Gotta realize America is the 3rd most populous nation, can put all Americans in one basket.
The headlines is still wrong about Chinese food. Chinese food is complex and goes way thousand of years, so there is no real Chinese food. For eg, American Chinese food in the 1960's - to 2000's is southern Chinese food because most restaurant owners are from Hongkong and Canton, thus the food is more of a southern like, but after it goes to America, it becomes Americanized southern Chinese food. It is acclimatized. Now, China opened up and more emigrants to America comes from all over China, so all kinds of northern style, Sichuan style or whatever, sprang up in America. It is different from Southern style , but it is still Chinese food.
Tristan Lau the truth is the AUTHENTIC Sichuan food is not always spicy. It's spiciness was reinforced as an identity by Sichuan migrants in China. For example, 清水白菜 is a very famous Sichuan cuisine, and all it has is just baby Chinese cabbage and the well cooked soup. Extremely simple and completely not spicy.
@@jamesyang420 Thanks for the info. I went to Sichuan once and I thought that is just a plain dish of veggies, nothing special. P.S.: The Sichuan meal gave me a bad time in the toilet and my lips swelled up like a blow up doll lol.
they show off all these trendy restaurants in the good parts of new york but what of the chinese restauraunts in china town that have been serving authentic food from their provinces for a very long time? because they do not present it with flare and sell it for a high price where the upper middle class will go, they are ignored.
is it possible that these "trendy" restaurants are being shown because these restaurants in particular are the ones that are bringing their cultural food to a wider audience, rather than putting the restaurant in a secluded corner of the Chinese district? remember, the loudest talker gets the attention. the most outgoing man gets the friends the guy that sits in his little corner with his niche group only gets noticed by said niche group. these guys (the owners of said restaurants) brought proper Chinese cuisine to the public eye, they took the risk and made their restaurant in a popular area, rather than taking the safe bet of putting Chinese food in china town, and as such, they are being recognized for it.
@@Thejigholeman yep! As a Chinese person myself, I know enough Westerners who are super vanilla when it comes to food, some of those people would not go in to a hole in the wall, slightly grimy-looking "ethnic" place, but they might go into a well-decorated, nicely-lit middle-class-looking restaurant. Also, maybe because I grew up in a Western city with a smaller Asian population, but most of the restaurants then were from Southern China: Cantonese, Fujianese, and Szechuanese, who were the majority of Chinese immigrants at the time, and few restaurants had Northern food, like Xi'an mutton skewers or hearty Dongbei food, where I'm from. This all changed in recent years, of course, with the wave of new mainland immigrants, thank goodness. There's so much more to Chinese food than greasy bastardized Cantonese food!
Back home in the Middle East, I thought Chinese food was bad noodles with lots of soya sauce and broccoli. When coming to my current university I met these high end Chinese people who taught me about this incredible food which is literally nothing like Chinese food I knew. And yet when trying dishes there I found a lamb dish that tasted almost exactly like a dish we had back home. Real Chinese food doesn’t use huge amounts of soya sauce and many (if not most) don’t even use it.
Was it from a Xi'an restaurant? Xi'an because of its historical terminus on the Silk Road has a large population of Muslims directly descended from Arab traders. Among many things they influenced was the city and province's lamb heavy cuisine.
chinese food does use a LOT of soy sauce! from someone who's family is chinese and still cooks chinese food regularly, the soy sauce many different chinese foods use is good soy sauce. The soy sauce we prefer to use is strongly flavored, complex, and very rich. it is usually more healthy than the soy sauce you usually get at the table.
"Real Chinese cuisine doesn't use huge amount of soy sauce" LOL, spoken like a true self-important hipster who thinks he knows better than everyone else There are Chinese dishes that are literally simmered in a broth of soya sauce Fact of the matter is that Chinese cuisine is incredibly diverse And to be a snob about brocolli in Chinese food is just stupid Salmon as an ingredient was only popularized in Japanese cuisine since the 1980's, and has since been embraced as an integral part of Japanese cuisine, both internationally and by the Japanese themselves Saying that a Chinese dish isn't authentic for using brocolli is just asinine
FYI, most original settlers in the US and in other countries came from southern China, where seafood is much more popular and lamb is almost nonexistent. Therefore remember that not all Chinese (including myself) think alike in terms of food. I personally do not have any liking towards most northern Chinese food because it tastes crude to me (my ancestors were from the south).
He spoke one line in Chinese. You dont happen to be a taxi driver from the mainland are you? Once any of us speak one line in Chinese their first words are "wow, 你中文那么66666666“ 哈哈哈
Sorry, but authentic Chinese regional cuisine has been around for a long time in major American cities, including New York - all one had to do was travel a bit, say to Flushing in Queens, which can take about 50+ minutes on the subway. Opening up “authentic” chinese food in Manhattan - which is still less authentic and twice as expensive as one can find in Chinese immigrant communities in Queens and lower Brooklyn - doesn’t mean American foodies have discovered or embraced real Chinese cooking, it means said foodies were hitherto too lazy to make the trip until a restaurant opened up a quick subway or uber ride away where they can queue up with other yuppies and take instagram photos
Hiyuke La Vie “Foodie” seems to be a term for white people who like to eat fairly overpriced food in the heart of a major city and then feel very cultured and progressive for it
hardly, existing "authentic" Chinese food are still a bit dated comparing to restaurants back home both taste-wise and aesthetic-wise , we Chinese only goes to Flushing because there is no better choice. Canadian Chinese food is far better and actually start to taste a bit like home.
almost made me cry. I'm from Changsha, capital city of Hunan province. I never imagine anyone would open a restaurant serving real hunan rice noodle in America, I‘d love to go there and 嗦粉（slurping noodles).
Nice video. I am a NYC native who grew up in Chinatown. I'm glad that chinese food is now getting popular and in some places can even be seen as "upscale". The unfortunate side effect of this is the gentrification of Chinatown and the new traffic at my favorite childhood hole-in-the-walls causing all my favorite places to upcharge to meet the rent and demand.
This is a bit insulting. Major Chinatown has always had authentic Chinese food available, it's just that they only served Chinese food from one specific region and that is Guangzhou. What we have here is different regional (e.g. Sichuan, Hunan, Xian) cuisine being introduced to the western pallet.
As a Singaporean-Canton Chinese who travels a lot, I honestly find it more even more insulting that you'd call the typical Westernised Chinese food "authentic". It might have had Cantonese influences, but it is no longer the same nor authentic. I'd even found naan bread and sushi being served in a Chinese restaurant when I was in the UK a few years back.
@@watwatwatwat I won't argue against that. It is as you said, American Chinese food. Authentic food such as Cantonese roast duck and bbq pork is a Cantonese staple in Hong Kong and Guangzhou and they were readily available in Chinatowns across the US. There were many restaurants that catered to Chinese customers and they all served authentic Cantonese cuisine. Dim Sum is authentic Chinese food and it has been available in the US for decades. What we are seeing now in the US and other western country is not real Chinese food, but different regional cuisine that was not readily available to the public.
@@lilpeanutish I would never call Westernized Chinese food as authentic. I was trying to say that there were authentic Chinese food, primarily Cantonese cuisine, in major US Chinatowns (Manhattan and San Francisco) for a very long time.
There is nothing special about any human being being able to speak any language fluently given enough practice and dedication. A sufficiently powerful nation in the world will have millions of foreign students who are required to master its language. The fact that the Chinese are impressed by non-Chinese who can speak Chinese fluently or even at all is a sign that Chinese culture is considered somehow unimportant or unworthy, either by the world at large or by the Chinese themselves. The day Chinese people stop being surprised by random white men's ability to speak Chinese perfectly would be the day that anti-Chinese racism and prejudice have largely ended.
What's with the implication that upscale = Authentic™ Chinese food? Many of NYC's afforable Chinatown restaurants have always served Chinese food: dim sum, baozi, hot pot, spring rolls, scallion pancakes, mooncakes, egg tarts, etc. There's plenty of variety. And it's very affordable. This acts like the only offerings are beef & chicken, General Tso's chicken.
I came to the US in 2009, loved the American Chinese food for a little while then discovered authentic Chinese cuisine in 2011 and never went back to the American version ever since, and never will!
This hits so close to home because I remember vividly how chinese food was ALWAYS represented as broccoli and beef with some weird sauce in takeout boxes throughout my childhood. I'm so glad that times are changing and people can taste real good chinese food
one comment, many of the new chinese food are mainly from 3 to 4 areas hunan, lanzhou, sichuan, and xinjiang. This is good to hear about, but there are many different foods in other areas in china.
Glad to see New York is finally getting some good Chinese food. Coming from Los Angeles, I’ve always thought the Chinese food scene in NYC was always a bit mediocre.
Funny how all the shops featured are within 3 blocks of each other in East Village. Weakens the argument that this is happening across the US or even NY.
"Chinese food" like General Tso's Chicken are never invented in China, but invented by American. If you're in China or Southeast Asia, just ask "General Tso's Chicken" and people won't even understand.
Chinese food becoming more authentic has nothing to do with the openness of American culture - it is quite simply that these restaurants can survive and thrive due to the increased spending power of overseas Chinese people seeking a taste of home. When it comes to food, Chinese are perhaps among the most open-minded eaters that don't rigidly associate food with social status - there is good food and bad food, no such things as "poor man's food" solely based on origins. That might be changing though but at least for now you can still see people getting out of their Bentleys to eat a good bowl of rice noodle soup while sitting on a tiny stool in front of a tiny food stall.
Authentic Chinese food not the Americanized version is much more tasty in my opinion. The American version is good too, but it can’t compete with the authentic stuff.
so you're saying other Chinese food is fake because you don't realize that many Chinese don't know other Chinese cuisine? sweet sour chicken and kungpao chicken are accurate, and my typical Chinese buffet line I visit in Taiwan serve something similar to general tso...without the broccoli.
Walter S. Chill, I said Americanized. It’s not fake, it’s Americanized. Like pizza in the US vs Italy. They are both pizza but taste different based on the country that makes it. Authentic as in mainland China with flavors and textures you wouldn’t see on a regular basis like Szechuan beef, thousand year old eggs, Jian Bing, Boazi, Dim Sum, Peking Duck, Stir Fried Lotus Root, Black Pepper Beef, And Fermented Cabbage, Braised Pork, Stir Fried Liver, Congee. I understand that the popular Chinese food in the US is from a specific region, not the whole country, but like I said, it’s Americanized. Meaning it’s sweeter, limited in variety, and lacking in nutrients that the Chinese get on a daily basis like bone broth, fermented foods, animal fats, and organ meats just to name a few.
@@NewBlueTrue Kung pao chicken, orange chicken, and sweet and sour chicken are the same, kid. Lemon Chicken? 100% the same. Trust me. If you traveled around China and tried out the local delicacy, not much different; some love it very sweet, some don't like sweets. General Tso, tasting very like Hunan cuisine, was supposedly invented by the Hunan Chinese chef who moved to Taiwan and served a "General Tso" to the American military stationed in Taiwan...eventually who moved to NYC and died a year or two ago. There may be a few Americanized food but crab wontons, but pretty much everything is a stir-fry to a Chinese chef and myself.
Walter S. I’ve tried local delicacies within China in various provinces. Based on what you are saying, I prefer Chinese food from a specific region, not the super sweet stuff. The sweet stuff is still good though. Your comment is fair. But like I said the Chinese food served in the US lacks variety, flavors, and nutrients. How many Chinese restaurants in the US are you going to get skewered heart? Unless you live in or near a major city, or know where to look, you’re not going to get that from a Chinese restaurant in the US. Of the many Chinese restaurants where I live. They all basically serve the same thing. Chow mein, orange chicken, fried rice, beef and broccoli, Kung pao chicken etc. There’s nothing wrong with these things, but why are these the only things being served? Did all the Chinese people opening restaurants come from the same region? I don’t think so. So why are their menus limited to this small range of cuisines compared to what is available in China?
@@NewBlueTrue Hey, I love my "American" Chinese food too. The cooking is no different generally from where I've been traveling. Anyway, my thoughts on what you said: To offer different Chinese food, we need owners who are familiar with how to cook that style of Chinese cooking but that's not going to happen for Chinese restaurants managed by older folks or immigrants who never learned to cook until buying the restaurants out (lots of northern Chinese and Fuzhounese since the 90's were starting to buy restaurants along the east coast with no cooking skill whatsoever). Moreover, we don't want to risk losing money experimenting with food customers may not like or rarely buy because margins are very tight. Running a Chinese restaurant sucks unless we can increase the price which customers don't want to pay for. Anyway, I'm about to get my sweet-and-sour chicken in Asia in an hour. Peace out, bro.
I mean, I'm in Philadelphia and I live close to Chinatown. I already get authentic Chinese food. It's been around for at least a decade. Like, it's not as foreign as people think, at least when it comes to cities.
Authentic Chinese food has existed all my life here in California, I've eaten it all my life. I think the point of the video is, it's becoming more mainstream and trendy, and eventually will be more widespread than just the areas of America where so many immigrants have concentrated throughout the years, brought up their families, and found success. The diaspora is changing.
Not just Chinese, but more Asian cuisines are influencing, such as pho, Vietnamese noodle soup, also helped Americans to get use to authentic Asian noodle soup.
I live about an hour from Houston,Tx which has a very high Asian population & has some really good authentic Asian restaurants I have been blessed enough to eat at Korean,Japanese,Vietnamese & Chinese restaurants I like to try everything it gets my wife out of her comfort zone as well real authentic Asian food is some of the best cuisine in the world! If y’all get a chance to go to Houston you will be surprised at all the food choices there!
I eat Chinese food all the time even I am not in China. What I missing these day is Chinese vegetable dish. Most of the Chinese menu now is fancy meat like duck, pork, fish. Basic dish is hard to find.
Completely understand, the stoves here are under powered to cook vegetables properly. Even some restaurants can't even do it. I guess it take some real investment in professional kitchen gear or just get used to saggy vegetables... Crispy cooked cooked leafy green are quite the luxury here.
I live in Hawaii and very easy experience authentic Chinese culture and enjoy authentic Chinese food. Also Chinese New Year’s is one the most important holidays on the islands.
Authentic Chinese food has been in NYC for decades. Just bc they weren't upscale doesn't mean they didn't exist. Apparently lower-end restaurants aren't worth the coverage.
I think this thesis is interesting: Chinese food in US has been seen as cheap and lower class food similar to Mexican food, however as the economy of China rises, the phenomenon that poor Chinese immigrants open their restaurant for living has kinda disappear, newer middle and upper class Chinese immigrants are changing the stereotype impressions about Chinese food in the eyes of Americans.
Terry Cai there’s actually a lot of stories where the poor and lower income families from ghettos can feed their whole entire family for cheap because of the low prices of Chinese food.
@@lavat5186 Cheap Chinese food is a lifesaver though, you're right. I got through a lot of tough times surviving on that stuff and the portions are huge too. People don't know what's amazing until it's gone. The old generation Chinese are retiring/dying too.
The best Chinese food I ever had was in San Francisco. It was called "rice porridge with assorted pig guts". The "guts" were pieces of heart, liver, kidney, etc and the "porridge" was a soupy boiled rice. Yummy!!!
Chinese food isn’t changing. The food is just becoming more authentic in America than before. Chinese don’t eat General Tsao or teriyaki chicken in China.
yo one of my fave places is yuan yuan (i think its that). i like the really cheap rundown restraunts because frankly, it reminds me of ones in china. hand pulled noodles with "beef" are amazing in china even if there really isnt much beef. i mean its cheap :D
Thank you so much for this episode. Growing up in the restaurant environment, the idea of "fall apart" meat served in a posh space was pushed as the pinnacle in dining experience. I always kept my voice to myself, instead shaking my head that they'll someday understand that there are more flavors than "bbq sauce covered" and "drenched salads". Too bad my family no longer owns a restaurant.
This should be happening with Mexican Food! We have a rich culture and have a diversity of different types of food rather than just burritos and "hard shell tacos" that aren't even authentic. I hope to see this one day!
So, this should actually be called "New York foodies are finally embracing real Chinese food," because bro here doesn't even mention anything outside of the five boroughs.
As long as there is a lower/middle class, the classic hole-in-wall Chinese restaurants will never go out of business. The reason for its popularity is cheap price you can pay for enormous amount of food.
I cannot stress enough the impact Chinese American food has had for Chinese immigrants! It's part of such a unique cultural identity that fulfills a very specific niche of American culture, I hate to see other Asian Americans bash on it (cough cough, Buzzfeed Panda Express video). I really love traditional cantonese food, it's so comforting, but I also think that American Chinese food, like Jewish & Italian delicatessens, are an institution in America.
My first thought is: how far will it take to spread? For example, since I grew up online more and some people I followed were Chinese or Chinese American/Canadian, I always saw more real Chinese food as more... normal I guess lol? But harder to make as some ingredients can only be found at the Asian market. And while my Dad will see the difference between these foods too, my mom wont, like many Americans. So how long will it take for people like her, who still hold Chinese food and China in general the way they do, to accept this?
I just had real chinese food for the first time, those tsin tsin peppers are SO GOOD. OMG. And the way they velvet their meat!!! And all the chunks of garlic and ginger!!!
People also don't realize that Chinese food is changing because the regions that they emigrate from is different. 30 years ago it was from Hong Kong and Southern China, and now they're from other regions of China.
This video came up at the most perfect time. I am Cantonese, and recently I've been looking into other parts of China and their cuisine. I'm not from NY, but its close enough for me to take a trip there and eat for an entire day. Some people don't get to enjoy that, and it makes me wonder. If myself, a first gen Chinese American, took 2 decades of my life to discover and try other regional cuisines of China; how can I expect a normal American to develop a taste for Northern Chinese dishes, when they have not been introduced to it yet until now? Not to add that there are other taste from provinces not familiar to even Chinese themselves yet, like the west and the south.
I like both. I think English and German food is amazing. But I do agree that Asian food makes me feel better in the long run, especially if it tastes homemade.
@Zicheng Zhang Attentions yes, not necessarily good ones, I don't see press like CNN or Fox say any good about China nor do they introduce our culture to the west
I grew up chinese american, and seeing people "discover" food that's existed in my neighborhoods for ages is pretty weird. The upscaling is also very weird though, since I have admittedly been eating food cooked by people who left China some 20-30 years ago and both the store design and the food cooked reflects the tastes of my parents' time. It's super traditional and they offer large spreads that are meant for families and big occasions. It's only been in maybe the past 6-8 years that I've seen that smaller shops targeting young adults and their social groups appearing. The influx of young mainland chinese immigrants has left me in a weird in between place. Never feeling fully american, and yet distinctly not chinese.
i was chocked by that man's Madarin in 1:14. his accent is far better than the woman, lol. the woman's madarin is somehow with Guangdong or some near provinces accent
@@jamesyang420 you got the point~~i lived in Guangzhou(Canton) for 5 yrs, so i just guess its like the accent there. i replayed that clip again, the woman just pronounced "Rou jia mo" as "Lou jia mo", she should come from Min-ese speaking areas~~but i just lack the Min language expirence, so not so sure if it is Fuzhou
Pipi I don't know any Min language either, but I guessed so because it's in NY and there're a lot Fuzhou people there. And I also know a celebrity from Fuzhou who has the same kind of accent "rou jia mo" --> "lou jia mo"
@@themmmeanone well, thanks for correcting me. actually i come from Guangzhou(Canton), a city with hybridity culture. Totally agree with you! i should have given an explain "(compared to the official Putonghua language)". but you cant deny that when we talk abt the accent, there are many power elements exist. they are related to different group of pp's social backgrounds. like in this video, the man's education is better than the woman's. (but i dont mean who is better, by judging)
really well-done video, I have been saying that Chinese in America got to stop degrading their food to fit the taste of what American wanted, be yourself and let them taste what real Chinese food is like.
I am very happy that restaurants are becoming more authentic. We travel for sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and the overall experience. I wish this trend was started long ago. At least it's happening now. : )
Having 2 generation of family in restaurant business, it’s really hard. My mom used to tell me how they open the restaurant in America w limited English. Working in restaurant isn’t pretty and having work in one for 5yrs I don’t even want to work in one anymore
I want to say American Chinese food is an adaptation of authentic chinese food interpreted to the palates of Americans. In other words, the chinese lives in the 5th dimension when it comes to food senses, and us American have been living in two dimensions. Which is why, American chinese food usually tastes similar, and are either sweet, salty and sour. Us American have been missing out on other dimensions of senses.
TrendThis American Chinese food is Guangdong Cantonese dishes from the southeast region of China. Foods like chop suey, chicken chow mein, egg foo yung, are all Cantonese foods to fit the American palates and its American as apple pie cause they don’t even eat this in China like the fortune cookie.
TrendThis the Cantonese set up the standard, and the Fuzhou people work for that standard. Cantonese food is also considered as high-end food in China, but now more local foods are introduced to other places just like the trend in the US.
Hongyu Wang Yee when I went there last year I was terribly disappointed as all the Chinese restaurants I went to are stereotypical canto spots that opened in the 90s. I'm from the north and simply can't deal.
Thing is even restaurant food is different from home-cooked Chinese food. Most home-cooked meals take a god-awful lot of time to complete (at least an hour), whereas restaurant food is finished in 10-15 minutes. Sometimes restaurants do have dishes that require reservations; I once had rice-filled duck that required 24 hours advance booking (apparently it was a 10-hour dish)
A Chinese acquitance I had while studying abroad in Germany taught me how to eat spicy food. The Korean place I went to for cheap lunches there made me enjoy the spice. Now I miss all of it and can't wait for authentic Chinese, Korean or Thai food to make its way to my country.
Two things First of all, all that is happening is that they're just seeing an infusion of Chinese cuisine from Szechuan/Hunan that they have not seen before; just because you are discovering Szechuan/Hunan cuisine does not mean you have discovered "authentic" Chinese food Secondly, about "Americanized" Chinese food items like General Tso's Chicken; just because a dish is relatively new in Chinese cuisine does not automatically mean it is not authentic; salmon as an ingredient for example was only popularized in Japanese cuisine in the 1980's, and has since been embraced by consumers of Japanese cuisine both the Japanese themselves inside Japan and also all over the world; does this disqualify any Japanese dish containing salmon from being called Japanese cuisine? All these hipsters declaring Szechuan hotpot as the "real" Chinese cuisine while trying to discredit newer dishes like General Tso's Chicken are precisely that: self-important hipsters who think they know better than everyone else
It’s not “newer”to Chinese cuisine. It is not Chinese to begin with. Nobody in China eats General Tso’s Chicken or whatever else you think China eats. In China, they say that Chinese people eat anything with two legs and two arms (basically anything other than tables and chairs) but they do not eat Americanized Chinese food. It was never Chinese food to begin with.
@@emily-bg8cb Strangely, General Tso's Chicken is a very popular and widely available dish in Taiwan So when you say nobody in China eats General Tso's Chicken, are you indirectly saying Taiwan is not part of China?
@@hiyukelavie2396 Looking through the comments, I have come to the realization that you are trying to create a political argument, @Emily Li did not mention Taiwan or anything related to Taiwan in their statement. While people can argue about Taiwan being part of China or not, General Tso's Chicken may be a very popular and widely available dish in Taiwan and in the Northern Part of China, it is Americanized Chinese dish.
Has anyone noticed that the featured noodle shop owner speaks with a southern Chinese accent (I believe she's from Fujian or possibly Guangdong), YET her shop serves Xinjiang and Shanxi cuisine (not really meant to be roped into the same cuisine/category)? The rise of popularity of Da Pan Ji (big plate chicken) and Rou Jia Mo (meat stuffed pita) in China metropolis has happened only in the past 5 years or so. These were regional dishes that were unbeknown to most Chinese people before then, though they do share the characteristics of being closer to Western Cuisine - high meat content, wheat/flour-based, saucy but not soupy. These items have been popularized over the years in PRC by regionally themed restaurant chains that have taken hold in metropolitan areas of China - Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, etc. I do agree that Western societies are more keen to explore Chinese food nowadays AS China becomes a bigger economical power in the world, but I do think the popularized items are still very much based on cuisine akin to Western food, otherwise that shop lady would be serving Fujianese fishballs or "Buddha Jumps over the Wall"!!! Not a complete picture or story there. But yea, the interviewer speaks great Mandarin!
