On Monday, February 10, 2014 2:14:37 PM UTC-8, sf wrote:

> There is Chinese food and then there is Americanized Chinese food.
> Both can be delicious, but it's always good to know the difference
> between the two.
>
> http://dc.eater.com/archives/2011/10...e-dont-eat.php
>
>
>
> 1) Crab Wontons: These deep-fried dumplings filled with crabmeat and
> cream cheese are popular..

On the East Coast, maybe.


>
> 2) General Tso's Chicken: Come on, this guy was too busy warding off
> rebellions to be cooking. This recipe is strictly American—chunks of
> chicken battered, fried and sweetened for Western tastes. No one in
> Hunan had even heard of this before 1970.
>

This raises the question: Can a Chinese chef create an authentic Chinese
dish once he emigrates from China? If not, can a Chinese chef create
an authentic dish even if he never leaves China?

>
> 3) Chop Suey: Ah yes, the garbage disposal of the omelet world.
> Refrigerator scraps stir-fried and topped with an egg. It is said that
> some Chinese cook working during the Gold Rush served it as a personal
> "**** you" to some drunk American miners.

Three problems: This dish was created before refrigeration existed; it never
had an egg (is the author thinking of Egg Foo Yung?) and it ALWAYS had
bean sprouts.

Bean sprouts being the only authentic vegetable that could be grown anywhere
any time. Chop suey was a Chinese style dish made with ingredients available
to us barbarians.

A recently defunct SF restaurant, Kam's near the Balboa Theater, was the
only SF Chinese restaurant I knew of to have Chop Suey on the menu.


> 4) Pu Pu Platter: Everything about this appetizer is an affront to
> poor people. It's nothing but fried, greasy egg rolls, spare ribs,
> chicken wings and beef teriyaki— which isn't even Chinese!

Right, what Chinese person could even imagine combining sugar and soy
sauce?

The pupu platter was essentially invented by Trader Vic's, as he combined
island and Asian cuisine for us Americans.


>
> 5) Sweet 'n' Sour Pork: Chunks of pork, battered, deep-fried and
> slimed in a thick orange sauce. There are obvious Southern barbecue
> influences here.

The local SF equivalent is Lemon Chicken, which can be delicious.

> 7) Salad: We cook our food. When dysentery is a concern, you would
> too.

Yes, where vegetables are fertilized with "night soil," raw vegetables
are not advised. But another classic SF dish is "Chinese chicken salad,"
an Asian-American variation of the Tostada salad.


> 8) Egg Rolls: Does anyone eat these? These thick-skinned, blistered
> rolls that look like Linda Blair's face in The Exorcist are nothing
> like the real Chinese spring rolls, which are smaller, thin and
> crispy—and edible.

Spring rolls are crispy? I think the author's thinking of lumpia, which
are crisp. Eggrolls always contain shrimp.

>
> 9) Beef and broccoli: There's really nothing wrong with this dish,
> except that we don't have Western broccoli in the East.

If you are going to sell Chinese food without having access to Chinese
vegetables, broccoli is a reasonable substitute for gai lan.