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[Haly]

The Struggles of Writing About Chinese Food as a Chinese Person, Clarissa Wei

Growing up, I was the weird kid who adored boiled pig intestines and fermented tofu. So imagine my surprise when the 2000s hit and the food of my people was suddenly cool.

I like pig intestines but I can understand why people give it the side eye.

In 2006, travel shows began highlighting China, showing viewers firsthand what cuisine in the Far East is actually like. That same year, Los Angeles writer Jonathan Gold became the first food critic in the world to win a Pulitzer Prize. Among his highlighted works: a tribute to the fleshy, cold salted duck at Nanjing Kitchen in Los Angeles.

I was baffled. I grew up eating salted duck. Hell, in Taiwan we have a salted cold goose, which I find much more spectacular and refined than Nanjing's version.

In a weird turn of events, people were making money and becoming famous for eating the things I had grown up with and had been bullied for.

Yeah this is par for the course, I think every minority deals with this in America.

When Taiwanese-American Cathy Erway, the author of Food in Taiwan, made the first round of pitches for her book, all the initial publishers declined.

"They didn't get the 'why' of this book," she says. "In a couple meetings it was fairly apparent that most people had no concept of where, what, and who was Taiwan. I fell in the awkward position of giving a geography as well as history lesson just to broach the topic of this book. It seems that publishers are shy of taking on a book that really has no precedent with which to make a reasonable estimate of sales figures."

In fairness I only know where Taiwan is because I need to conquer it as China/Japan in EU4.

In China, I learned that the secret to the elasticity of hand-pulled noodles is an obscure desert plant.

Imagine if a hipster white chef started making pasta and enhanced it with salt bushes in the Mojave desert. He'd receive a roaring, standing applause and a string of awards. Chinese people have been doing the equivalent of that for centuries.

Absolutely true. Maybe Sichuan noodle chefs should start calling their hand pulled noodles "artisanal", or "herb-infused".

In California, when Chinese farmers first arrived to the swampy shores of the Sacramento Valley in the 1850s, the story is that they looked at the land and cried. Eventually, with the help of the Japanese, they were able to convert the area to a productive piece of land.

Land prices increased four-fold. Property values soared, and soon bankers and land companies rushed in. Rice became one of the most profitable agricultural industries of the state—the new gold.

But a backlash arose as more established Americans began to vilify the Asian settlers who had created this industry and, in their opinions, could steal jobs that were rightfully theirs. By 1913, this ongoing discrimination caused California's Alien Land Law to be passed, barring most Asian immigrants from starting their own farms by prohibiting non-citizens from owning property. Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Indian tenant farmers were forced to lease land from white landowners, yet still produced most of the rice at that time.

This is a topic that's important to me as someone who feels exasperation at seeing my favorite culinary traditions get lumped together under the umbrella of "Chinese", usually with the prefix "cheap", as if you could describe Spanish, Italian and French cuisine as "European" (never mind differentiating between north and south Italy, etc). While the article is Vice as all hell it raises a lot of good points on the tendency of American society to cut PoCs out of their own culture in the drive for commercialization and commodification, and the barriers they place when those same PoCs try to break into these new industries. This article also ties into the recent GITS debacle, actually, as part and parcel of "cultural appropriation", and the pigeonholing of PoCs, specifically Asians in this case, into the cultural equivalent of a museum exhibit.

I had some other thoughts about the state of Chinese cuisine in America relative to Japanese and Korean but I'm too lazy to write it out. Anyway, go out and look for stinky tofu and Sichuan restaurants.

Additional reading and viewing, brought to you by non-threatening white people:
The Search for General Tso
Land of Plenty: A Treasury of Authentic Sichuan Cooking
The Food Ranger

 

[Chojin]

This is why I'm glad that Filipino food failed to be a thing in spite of Food TV chefs trying for the past 10 years.

 

[Secret Character]

Thank you for this, I'll be reading it this evening.

It kills me that "Chinese" food is little more than Panda Express and $1.25/scoop cheap places here. The good, genuine stuff is out of this world and would probably scare off a lot of epicures that don't venture out of their comfort zone. I haven't been to China proper, but I have been to San Francisco and Honolulu's Chinatowns and have eaten at a bunch of restaurants there. Here in Colorado, there is nothing even close to resembling it.

 

[Makonero]

Best authentic Chinese food I've ever had: Sichaun Chili in Cincinnati.

I'm a convert. Give me all your delicious authenticity! I WILL EAT IT ALL

 

[Firemind]

Anyway, go out and look for stinky tofu and Sichuan restaurants.

I'm Chinese and even I think stink tofu is disgusting. Sichuan cuisine is overrated by the way. I prefer Hunan spices.

 

[.JayZii]

White People: Taking credit for your culture since, well, forever.

 

[hydrophilic attack]

I want to go on a trip through all the different regions of China and eat ALL THE FOOD

 

[nampad]

I am happy that more people enjoy "weird" food even if it is a hipster thing. Western nations used to eat a lot of "weird" stuff too until some decades ago and it sucks that many of those dishes are getting lost.

This is why I'm glad that Filipino food failed to be a thing in spite of Food TV chefs trying for the past 10 years.

In my experience, Filipino food isn't very tasty compared to other Asian cuisine. Admittedly, I might have only eaten in tourist traps o the Philippines

 

[HoodWinked]

ya i really like food ranger i found his videos by accident. also he knows some chinese/mandarin which is nice to see and he tries everything even the very unsavory stuff. like a rabbit head or coagulated cow blood.

 

[fallengorn]

Cool, I'll read this on my commute home.

This is a topic that's important to me as someone who feels exasperation at seeing my favorite culinary traditions get lumped together under the umbrella of "Chinese", usually with the prefix "cheap", as if you could describe Spanish, Italian and French cuisine as "European" (never mind differentiating between north and south Italy, etc).

Reminds of something I overheard on-line at a ramen festival this past weekend. This girl basically said, "I was in Brooklyn last night and had some Asian food. This is going to be such an Asian weekend." In some alternative universe I probably would've turned it into a Curb episode.

 

[Chojin]

In my experience, Filipino food isn't very tasty compared to other Asian cuisine. Admittedly, I might have only eaten in tourist traps o the Philippines

Subjective of course. There's quality in all food. Shit is shit. Tasty is tasty.

Interestingly enough Filipino fast food is total cultural appropriation of American fast food changed to the Filipino palate. Which makes for fun "struggle food" threads on GAF.

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

Hold up

Chinese people eat chitlins?!

 

[Haly]

I'm Chinese and even I think stink tofu is disgusting. Sichuan cuisine is overrated by the way. I prefer Hunan spices.

You're awful but I knew this already. Sichuan > Hunan, but I do agree Sichuan is now a meme.

It's all about that Xinjiang for me now.

Hold up

Chinese people eat chitlins?!

There's few parts of a pig/cow that isn't eaten somewhere in China.

 

[Lois_Lane]

Best authentic Chinese food I've ever had: Sichaun Chili in Cincinnati.

I'm a convert. Give me all your delicious authenticity! I WILL EAT IT ALL

Eeeeee, finally a food place I can go to!

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

You're awful but I knew this already. Sichuan > Hunan, but I do agree Sichuan is now a meme.

It's all about that Xinjiang for me now.

There's few parts of a pig/cow that isn't eaten somewhere in China.

Damn, that looks a lot better than what I'm
used to seeing

 

[nampad]

Subjective of course. There's quality in all food. Shit is shit. Tasty is tasty.

Interestingly enough Filipino fast food is total cultural appropriation of American fast food changed to the Filipino palate. Which makes for fun "struggle food" threads on GAF.

Sure but I think there is a reason Filipino food hasn't been as hyped like other cuisines.
Halo Halo is awesome though.

Hold up

Chinese people eat chitlins?!

Asian people eat EVERYTHING that is tasty. Funnily, what is the difference between chitlins and (natural) sausage casing?
Some people act all high and mighty about weird food like chitlins when they chow down something where poop literally went through while eating a sausage.

 

[.JayZii]

Subjective of course. There's quality in all food. Shit is shit. Tasty is tasty.

Interestingly enough Filipino fast food is total cultural appropriation of American fast food changed to the Filipino palate. Which makes for fun "struggle food" threads on GAF.

Filipino food has a sort of "struggle food" feeling to me. Hot dogs with marshmallows, ice cream in hamburger buns, and sweet spaghetti sauce with sliced hot dogs and velveeta cheese doesn't represent the entirety of Filipino food, but that's what I think of.

 

[Rokal]

Author of the article seems to wish, both as a kid and now as an adult, that other people would appreciate the food that she was passionate about and stop treating it as a weird thing. Now that people actually have, she's mad about it. She references histpers mockingly several times in the article but if "I liked a thing before it was cool" complaints don't make you a hipster, I don't know what does.

Seconding the recommendation for Land of Plenty from the OP btw, excellent cook book.Though, it was written by a white author, so I guess it's just another awful example of cultural appropriation rather than a celebration of Sichuan recipes. Whoops.

 

[shira]

Eh. I'm not so good with the offal stuff or fermented stuff.

I prefer to just eat food with little or no flavor added.

 

[Haly]

Seconding the recommendation for Land of Plenty from the OP btw, excellent cook book.Though, it was written by a white author, so I guess it's just another awful example of cultural appropriation rather than a celebration of Sichuan recipes. Whoops.

I like Dunlop because she does the footwork and isn't just a food tourist writing food tourism blogs for would-be food tourists. Same for FoodRanger. If you go to China and eat the food and talk to the cooks in actual Chinese you get a pass from me.

Agreed about the author but that's just Vice all over.

 

[Polari]

People also tend to lump Chinese cuisine into one large category, unaware of the vast regional differences.

Italian food to most people is pizza and pasta. Italy wasn't even a unified state until 1861. China is far from unique in that sense.

 

[ColdPizza]

White People: Taking credit for your culture since, well, forever.

Yeah!

"How dare you mix and match culture to make something new. Where do you think you are? Some kind of melting pot?”

Spoiler

appropriating Bill Maher

 

[RyougaSaotome]

Thank you for posting this. As someone of mixed descent, I find these kinds of articles and stories fascinating and relatable.

I'll def give this a read when I'm home.

 

[.JayZii]

Yeah!

"How dare you mix and match culture to make something new. Where do you think you are? Some kind of melting pot?"

Spoiler

appropriating Bill Maher

Obviously people are free to do it, and the results can be awesome, but does that refute what I said in any way?

 

[Septimus Prime]

Damn, that looks a lot better than what I'm
used to seeing

I think the challenge is for Chinese cuisine to shake off the stigma that it's cheap, oily, take out food that comes in those paper boxes.

 

[ColdPizza]

Obviously people are free to do it, and the results can be awesome, but does that refute what I said in any way?

I don't know, maybe if you make such a statement you should provide some examples?

 

[Massive Duck. C.M.]

I think the challenge is for Chinese cuisine to shake off the stigma that it's cheap, oily, take out food that comes in those paper boxes.

Ah, I was talking about chitlins, not Chinese food lol. I've had some bomb Chinese food made fresh and yeah, it's a very different experience

 

[Apathy]

at least here in toronto you can go down to chinatown (or up to northern scarborough/markham border) and get actual mainland chinese food, not the americanized style, although i like both. I would imagine its similar in many big cities.

 

[Cagey]

Italian food to most people is pizza and pasta. Italy wasn't even a unified state until 1861. China is far from unique in that sense.

And chicken parm.

But not seafood. Ask the average American, hell ask the average Italian-American, and you'd have no idea that Italian cuisine features seafood beyond calamari (fried obv).

 

[Chojin]

Filipino food has a sort of "struggle food" feeling to me. Hot dogs with marshmallows, ice cream in hamburger buns, and sweet spaghetti sauce with sliced hot dogs and velveeta cheese doesn't represent the entirety of Filipino food, but that's what I think of.

It doesn't really represent Filipino food at all. Those things are usually eaten at parties.


Granted theres things that might not catch on like balut (duck embryos) or dinuguan (pig blood stew). But the staple Filipino diet is fish and rice. There are tons of fish dishes available and eaten there. Again theres all kinds of food in every culture. Talking filipinos eating sweet spaghetti and having that represent the culture as a whole is akin to saying middle class food in the states is nothing but mallowmars and mcdonalds.


There's more than 20 "tribes" living in the Philippines and each have their own culinary styles. To pigeonhole a country by having Jollibee represent it is disingenuous. Again, McDonalds doesn't speak for the US alone. We also got Taco Bell

 

[ColdPizza]

I think the challenge is for Chinese cuisine to shake off the stigma that it's cheap, oily, take out food that comes in those paper boxes.

I was spoiled with a great Chinese restaurant growing up as a kid. It was a big deal for us to get dressed up, and sit down for a nice dinner at their restaurant with white table cloth and nice tableware. The presentations were beautiful.

I live in a different city now and it's just littered with cubby style Chinese takeout places with boilerplate paper menus or pictures of dishes above the counter. I long for those meals with my family as a child, and we became good friends with the owners who have since then sold their restaurant and moved back to the west coast.

 

[Derwind]

Cultural appropriation exists, I agree. However, I'm a little hesitant to say that the new found culinary appreciation of cuisine outside of North America is a bad thing.

 

[StarCreator]

There's few parts of a pig/cow that isn't eaten somewhere in China.

That looks so ridiculously good I was trying to go light on dinner tonight welp

I live in an area where there is, oddly, a very large Taiwanese population. I've never been anywhere else with a larger concentration of Taiwanese restaurants, and I love it. Even if I can't always convince friends from out of town to eat pig ear.

 

[.JayZii]

I don't know, maybe if you make such a statement you should provide some examples?

I was referencing the examples given in the article about a food critic "discovering" asian foods and then getting awarded for it and "hipster" chefs making asian food and using asian techniques and getting the credit for it.

I assumed people replying to the thread and reading my comment would have read the article in the OP and wouldn't need me to reiterate what was in it. Apologies.

 

[.JayZii]

It doesn't really represent Filipino food at all. Those things are usually eaten at parties.


Granted theres things that might not catch on like balut (duck embryos) or dinuguan (pig blood stew). But the staple Filipino diet is fish and rice. There are tons of fish dishes available and eaten there. Again theres all kinds of food in every culture. Talking filipinos eating sweet spaghetti and having that represent the culture as a whole is akin to saying middle class food in the states is nothing but mallowmars and mcdonalds.


There's more than 20 "tribes" living in the Philippines and each have their own culinary styles. To pigeonhole a country by having Jollibee represent it is disingenuous. Again, McDonalds doesn't speak for the US alone. We also got Taco Bell

That's why I said the foods I mentioned don't represent the entirety of Filipino food, but that's what I think of, and they have a "struggle food" feel to them. I'm not sure what's disingenuous or pigeonholing about that.

 

[andythinkpad]

So this is the thread posters try to "out Chinese" each other?

I don't mean to be an asshole but if you are not discussing Chinese food in 8 separate cuisines (at a minimum) or randomly putting Sichuan and Hunan food in the same sentence you are not discussing the Chinese cuisines properly.

 

[ReAxion]

I wonder what exactly she found objectionable in Gold's piece.

 

[Slayven]

White People: Taking credit for your culture since, well, forever.

Pretty much. Don't let them fuse it, they will lose their minds

Hold up

Chinese people eat chitlins?!

Don't eat nobody's chitlins until you seen how they keep their house. Sage wisdom i learned as a young lad

 

[ColdPizza]

I was referencing the examples given in the article about a food critic "discovering" asian foods and then getting awarded for it and "hipster" chefs making asian food and using asian techniques and getting the credit for it.

I assumed people replying to the thread and reading my comment would have read the article in the OP and wouldn't need me to reiterate what was in it. Apologies.

But did the critic actually say they "discovered" it? I just don't understand this silly notion of ownership over cuisines and the like. How is being inspired about a cuisine someone has discovered for themselves suddenly stealing for profit? They're just taking an idea and presenting it in, dare I say, a more palletable or consumable way for their target audience. Unless they're taking full credit for something without paying respects to its cultural origins I have zero problems with this sort of stuff.

Imagine the world now if everyone respected these imaginary borders and ownership over food and music. Our world culture as we know it wouldn't exist.

 

[ezrarh]

I find it funny that white people have suddenly "discovered" bone broth and now it's a thing when it's been part of most old cultures forever. There's a lot of traditional stuff that people are discovering again which I'm happy for but just like discovering civilizations, it only counts as a discovery if white people discovered it.

 

[SuperStiltzkin]

That's why I said the foods I mentioned don't represent the entirety of Filipino food, but that's what I think of, and they have a "struggle food" feel to them. I'm not sure what's disingenuous or pigeonholing about that.

In my case, it's hard to call you disingenuous because my Filipiino boyfriend hypes up those exact kind of foods to me lol. First Jollibee opened up here in Illinois and he insisted we go and was convinced that I'd give up Popeyes for chickenjoy. I didn't. Outside of Jollibee, him and his friends have taken me to traditional Filipino restaurants and eaten stuff like sisig. And I've been to tons of get-togethers where there's trays of food like pancit and diniguan. I like it, but I can see why it hasn't caught on like with Chinese and Vietnamese food. Personally I find some of it to be tough to eat for my taste palate. Lumpia is always great though.

 

[ColdPizza]

I find it funny that white people have suddenly "discovered" bone broth and now it's a thing when it's been part of most old cultures forever. There's a lot of traditional stuff that people are discovering again which I'm happy for but just like discovering civilizations, it only counts as a discovery if white people discovered it.

Most people don't give much thought about the origins of the food they are consuming. Old flavors becoming mainstream shouldn't be met with contempt. It's just a sign that the world is becoming more homogenous as cultural barriers are removed.

 

[IggyChooChoo]

Best authentic Chinese food I've ever had: Sichaun Chili in Cincinnati.

I'm a convert. Give me all your delicious authenticity! I WILL EAT IT ALL

Hey, I've been there! That place is great.

 

[Muppet of a Man]

When a white hipster "discovers" a particular type of ethnic cuisine which had previously flown under the radar in the States, all of a sudden it gets the white stamp of approval and is validated for other white people to eat.

 

[luchadork]

Author of the article seems to wish, both as a kid and now as an adult, that other people would appreciate the food that she was passionate about and stop treating it as a weird thing. Now that people actually have, she's mad about it. She references histpers mockingly several times in the article but if "I liked a thing before it was cool" complaints don't make you a hipster, I don't know what does.

I have a lot of chinese family members. They take a lot of pride in being chinese which is awesome but sometimes i dont think they realise how it comes across as a weird mix of victim mentality crossed with a pseudo racist superiority complex. "why doesnt anyone like true authentic chinese culture?? also. noone will ever understand how good true authentic chinese culture is!!"

I feel like this article epitomises that mentality.

 

[ReAxion]

But did the critic actually say they "discovered" it? I just don't understand this silly notion of ownership over cuisines and the like. How is being inspired about a cuisine someone has discovered for themselves suddenly stealing for profit? They're just taking an idea and presenting it in, dare I say, a more palletable or consumable way for their target audience. Unless they're taking full credit for something without paying respects to its cultural origins I have zero problems with this sort of stuff.

Imagine the world now if everyone respected these imaginary borders and ownership over food and music. Our world culture as we know it wouldn't exist.

http://www.laweekly.com/restaurants/the-great-white-duck-2142379

this is the piece she's complaining about.

 

[Firemind]

When a white hipster "discovers" a particular type of ethnic cuisine which had previously flown under the radar in the States, all of a sudden it gets the white stamp of approval and is validated for other white people to eat.

Who can resist crispy Peking duck in pancakes tho?

 

[.JayZii]

But did the critic actually say they "discovered" it? I just don't understand this silly notion of ownership over cuisines and the like. How is being inspired about a cuisine someone has discovered for themselves suddenly stealing for profit? They're just taking an idea and presenting it in, dare I say, a more palletable or consumable way for their target audience. Unless they're taking full credit for something without paying respects to its cultural origins I have zero problems with this sort of stuff.

Imagine the world now if everyone respected these imaginary borders and ownership over food and music. Our world culture as we know it wouldn't exist.

That's kind of the implication when you get awarded for something. Doing it first or best. I can understand someone from a culture whose food is being represented and popularized by someone else (usually a white guy), and thereby getting a kind of credit or ownership over it, being annoyed. Muppet of a Man said it better than me:

When a white hipster "discovers" a particular type of ethnic cuisine which had previously flown under the radar in the States, all of a sudden it gets the white stamp of approval and is validated for other white people to eat.

I also said people are free to take from other cultures and that the results of that can be awesome in my first response to you, so I don't really see the point in you telling me there should be no borders in food or music when we already agree.

 

[UnemployedVillain]

Thank you for this, I'll be reading it this evening.

It kills me that "Chinese" food is little more than Panda Express and $1.25/scoop cheap places here. The good, genuine stuff is out of this world and would probably scare off a lot of epicures that don't venture out of their comfort zone. I haven't been to China proper, but I have been to San Francisco and Honolulu's Chinatowns and have eaten at a bunch of restaurants there. Here in Colorado, there is nothing even close to resembling it.

But let's be honest, the authentic stuff is probably be just as cheap (in China, not in the US were there's 1000+% markup on anything ethnic)

 

[massoluk]

When I watched a chef on Top Chef rolling out Tom Kha Gai, a sour and spicy Chicken soup, a common as dirt Thai soup, to the judges' roaring review, I was like... WUT?