Thy Tran is a food writer and Mutual Friend of Torrez who lives in San Francisco. On her blog, she has this post which informs anyone in the Bay Area who might be interested that the Chinese Cultural Center of San Francisco is hosting a symposium on “The Future of Chinese Cuisine”, wherein the panelists will consider why Chinese take-out food in the U.S. is so uniformly terrible compared to authentic restaurant cuisine in China and Taiwan. No less than Martin Yan himself will be on the panel.
In that blog post, Thy links to this NY Times piece by Tim and Nina Zagat from last summer, which also considers this question. The Zagats believe that the early Chinese immigrants found themselves having to adapt their traditional recipes not only to a different Western palate, but also to ingredients that were very different than what they were used to in China. These days, they say, the main issue is immigration policy which makes it difficult for top Chinese chefs to come to America.
I think that second point is probably more germane than the first. Chefs, after all, are generally pretty adept at making the most out of whatever they have to cook with. But many immigrants, not just Chinese but all nationalities and ethnicities, arrive with limited economic opportunities, and ethnic restaurants are a low-barrier point-of-entry into the American economy. Novelty often outweighs authenticity among the consuming public, so a new Chinese take-out where there was none before automatically draws customers. In my hometown in Maine, for example, there was only one Chinese restaurant in town when I was growing up, but now there are many. Standardization of supplies from large-scale food wholesalers means that even the lowliest take-out joint can buy the same frozen egg rolls, crab rangoons, sweet and sour sauce, and so on that everybody else has. And, as I keep pointing out, that commoditization process debases the value of whatever it touches. In other words, the cheaper the eggroll, the cheaper the eggroll, if you get me.
Large cities with thriving Chinese communities do eventually produce some restaurants where the cuisine is authentic. San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles all feature high-end Chinese cuisine. Here in the Boston area, there aren’t many high-profile Chinese restaurants that you could classify as “fine dining”; I don’t know if I consider Ming Tsai’s Blue Ginger a “Chinese” restaurant so much as a “celebrity” restaurant these days and you sure as hell can’t order Egg Foo Yung there. And the big places in Boston’s Chinatown aren’t especially “high-end” (as the Boston health inspector will attest). But there are some low-profile places with outstanding authentic food prepared by real chefs. We are lucky to live near one called Sichaun Gourmet. It’s also close enough to my office that my cow-orkers and I get lunch from there quite a lot. They have standard take-out style “luncheon specials” for the crowd who want sweet-and-sour pork or kung pao chicken, but the bulk of their menu is authentic Sichuan specialties. The food is insanely spicy and incredibly good.
As the Zagats mention, in the last 20 years or so, Americans have been exposed to and have become fans of other Asian cuisines — Thai, Vietnamese (remind me to tell you about my obsession with pho someday), Indian — and you can see these also going through the same commoditization process right now. Used to be you had to search for Pad Thai, but now there are a million Thai places, all selling the same dish and buying the same spring rolls and chicken satay from a wholesaler. But, then again, we prefer McDonalds to real food anyway, so I guess its our fault.
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