Well, I would like to know how Chinese food is like in the West from people that live there. I would like to learn about their POVs. Cause I've heard alot how people hate chinese food, its soggy, deep fried with lots of oil, and well generally lousy. And the names that the chefs gives the good is ridiculous! Like chop something.
This is a story for example. I read it in reader's digest or some other magazine. The reporter went to a chinese restaurant. The chef said his dish was traditional and famous back in a province of China, dating back to the Qing Dynasty. ( For all those that do not know about the Qing Dynasty, it was the last dynasty to rule China, from 1600+ till 1911.)Anyway, when the reporter went to China to check it out, the officials and people there did not know anything about the dish! It was a fake.
Well so just to repeat, what are your feelings about Chinese food, do you like it? Real Chinese food isn't the fried noodly takeaway stuff I usually see portrayed in American culture.
Nichodemus ( I'm from Singapore btw, a Singaporean Chinese.)
I should probably refrain from this conversation given my ethnic background (Malaysian/Singaporean Chinese) because I happen to be familiar with "actually Chinese (and South-East Asian)" cuisine. The whole "chop suey", "blackbean beef" and "sweet and sour" sauces are popular (among the gu-, I mean Westerners) in Chinese takeaway at your average mall food-court because it's strong tasting and easy to do cheaply. So yes, it's generally soggy, laced with a ton of MSG (ajinomoto), oily, tenderised with bicarbonate until it's like sponge etc. etc.
However all is not lost for the Singaporean/Malaysian immigrant who yearns for some hawker style food. In Australia (Sydney and Melbourne at least), if you know where to look it's not hard to get your hands on a good curry laksa or char hor fun or mee goreng or nasi lemak etc. etc., among other decent-quality international fare. Furthermore ingredient quality in Australia is generally very high so sometimes you might find the international food here even better than where it locally came from. Though you would probably not find certain specialties e.g. if you want a good oh chien (egg-fried oysters), you'd still have to go to Pinang.
Funny thing though, I went through that region not two months ago and Singapore doesn't really have the whole hawker scene going on anymore- over the past 10 years it's become increasingly dominated by shopping malls and has become very cosmopolitan, in my opinion. Even in Malaysia it's hard to find a Chinese hawker stall actually run by a Chinese person because they've all consolidated their capital, bought out another stall in another restoran somewhere and hired the nearest Indian to do the cooking at their original stall.
And thus capitalism infiltrated the East, but you guys already knew that was happening.
Yeah...us Aussies have the best Chinese food...maybe even better than China itself.....
I think the best aisian food I have ever had is the Indian Curry my dad makes...but his curry is a bit westernised because he is Anglo-Indian...but I don't really know...
Although...the lamb korma from a place in Adelaide is Awesome!
eh Aussies having better chinese food than the Chinese from China? I can assure you that the food from Singapore ( not sure about china, the food is sometimes... unhygenic to put it in a nice way. Think communal stemaboat sharing by the road!) In case you don't believe me, I've been to Australia and the chinese food there, although I believe is better than most other Western Countries, is still quite off from Asian countries. Anyway, indian curry is not chinese food, it's asain and this thread is aimed mainly at Chinese food.
Of course in China they just call it food, but yeah I actually like ti a lot. There's a pretty big Chinese community in London and as a result there are some great restaurants. I think the Chinese you're reffering to are the crappy takeaways. Most people I know like Chinese food a lot.
yeah those takeaways, in ugly white cartons. Boy what an insult to chinese culture. Have you eaten anything like that? even maggi mee ( instant noodles) is better! Are you chinese fire?
Aha! Food discussion! I know lots about foood. It's my real life outside of AG. ^_^
Note: I will be assuming West means America for this discussion.
Oriental food in the West came along with the flow of immigrants during the early 1900s(I believe). Just like everyothet culture making the trip to the American lands, one of the few things they were able to take with them was knowledge and techniques for preparing local cuisine. Like most immigrants did, the Oriental parts of cities began to be filled with several authentic cultural restuarants. These were mainly for fellow immigrants to relax at and bask in the comfort of homemade food. Yet locals were not the only people to stop by. Often, construction workers would be in that part of the city and decide to stop by during their lunch break. Nearly all of the authentic Oriental cuisine was beyond the pallets of Americans. It was often too spicy or too bland, and not containing as much meat as Americans were used to. Thus, in order to please the tasteless Americans, cooks started to change the food and how it was prepared. More food in the middle of the spicy/bland scale appeared along with a myriad of meat dishes. In fact, nearly all the food in a local Oriental restuarant is not tradtional at all, and was merely made to appease Americans.
Overall, I hate that the food was changed because of the weak American pallet. But, meh, it tastes ok I suppose.
well, i AM chinese, but i don't know what its like in the west since im in Australia. But i think that chinese dishes are awsome, but some are also crap
chinese food, it always creeped me out, i heard they somtimes use DOG in their recipes, but that only in asia, and low rate canadian chinese resteraunts.
wow, i still gag at the smell of the meat they kook there.....
