Chinese food
This is topical because I just watched Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations episode about China. He admits that a survey of China's food culture would take at least a lifetime, but he tried to hit some interesting street markets and what not in Shanghai and also investigate some traditional fishing methods (trained birds, for example) on the coast.
He also did a whole seperate show on Hong Kong.
Apparently there are at least eight different distinct culinary cultures in China among the 56 ethnic groups.
Everyone who can claim to know anything about China is aware that American Chinese food is not like the typical food in China, but watching that show I was therefore surprised at how familiar a lot of the stuff Bourdain was eating seemed. Not all of it, of course - there were some sea creatures I didn't recognize and some stuff like moldy tofu and various bits of eel and congealed this and that which looked downright revolting. But a lot of it did sort of resemble what we get in Chinese take-outs here - fried crispy spicy chicken of various sorts, dumplings, various shrimp dishes, rice noodles, soy sauce, sweet and sour things, etc.
I don't have much time for complaints that American "ethnic" food is "inauthentic." I don't care if what they eat in Italy (if the Italians don't live lots of cheese than that's just their loss) or China or Mexico is different from our version of Italian, Chinese or Mexican.
All that matters is if they're any good and if the price is right. Italian-American, Chinese-American and Mexican-American (not to mention, all of the other -American subcultures) are their own thing and have developed apart from their ancestral homeland.
I've tried to explain to people that pizza as we know it here isn't really Italian, but nobody will listen.
This is topical because I just watched Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations episode about China. He admits that a survey of China's food culture would take at least a lifetime, but he tried to hit some interesting street markets and what not in Shanghai and also investigate some traditional fishing methods (trained birds, for example) on the coast.
He also did a whole seperate show on Hong Kong.
Apparently there are at least eight different distinct culinary cultures in China among the 56 ethnic groups.
Everyone who can claim to know anything about China is aware that American Chinese food is not like the typical food in China, but watching that show I was therefore surprised at how familiar a lot of the stuff Bourdain was eating seemed. Not all of it, of course - there were some sea creatures I didn't recognize and some stuff like moldy tofu and various bits of eel and congealed this and that which looked downright revolting. But a lot of it did sort of resemble what we get in Chinese take-outs here - fried crispy spicy chicken of various sorts, dumplings, various shrimp dishes, rice noodles, soy sauce, sweet and sour things, etc.
I don't have much time for complaints that American "ethnic" food is "inauthentic." I don't care if what they eat in Italy (if the Italians don't live lots of cheese than that's just their loss) or China or Mexico is different from our version of Italian, Chinese or Mexican.
All that matters is if they're any good and if the price is right. Italian-American, Chinese-American and Mexican-American (not to mention, all of the other -American subcultures) are their own thing and have developed apart from their ancestral homeland.
I've tried to explain to people that pizza as we know it here isn't really Italian, but nobody will listen.
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