Last Post

For my last post, I will write about what I love most about food: eating it at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant with my family. This past Saturday, we all went to this place called Northern China Eatery, a tiny restaurant tucked away between a hair salon my mother frequents and a pawn shop on Buford Highway in Atlanta. Not a single white person was to be found--this was true regional Chinese cuisine at its most local and authentic. Families crowded around tables sprinkled haphazardly across the tiny space while we sat underneath a Budai altar, the incense sticks still smoking and recent.

Our server--a disheveled lady in a spotted apron--tossed us our menus. The food was split into several sections, ranging from "Breakfast" items to "Noodles." Indra ordered his usual: a bowl of beef noodle soup, a requisite at every Chinese restaurant worth its salt. Father called for fried pork dumplings and jajangmyun (black bean noodles). Mother had a vegetable sao bing (fried-bread-on-bread sandwich) while I wanted salted douhua and steamed pork buns. My mouth is watering just recalling that Saturday lunch. One of the plates the food came in had a reindeer design on the bottom.

In the end, we polished off every thing we ordered plus a kettle of hot tea. As we waddled out the door, I swiped a menu and the restaurant's number, determined to make a second appearance when time--and budget--allowed it.

Farmers Market

I went to the Dekalb Farmers Market a couple of weeks ago. My loot:

- a container of organic raspberries     $3.69
- a 127 oz. bottle of Orangina             $2.19
- a packet of strawberry croissants     $3.99

Total: Less than $10.00

Bummed that I couldn't take pictures. Some stray observations:

- My classmates seemed amazed/fascinated by the fish section where people were cutting up live seafood. Odd, it's what I see every Saturday at the Asian markets mother and I go to.

-The farmers market didn't exclusively sell organic items, which makes sense. The people who run it still need to make a profit.

- I was very impressed by the variety of potatoes sold there, along with herbs and spices neatly lined in packaged rows. The signs over each produce declaring its origins and species were interesting as well.

- There was an extensive wine/alcohol selection, especially the beers. I'm not much of a beer snob, but I spotted many unfamiliar ales and stouts.

- Afterwards, we visited a family-run bakery in Decatur. Support your local small businesses!

- I'm not sure Michael Pollan would shop at the Dekalb Farmers Market, though.

Hong Kong Barbecue

One of the most popular subsections of Chinese cuisine. The usual barbecued suspects are pork and duck--occasionally chicken.

Sweet Tea

This is how I make sweet tea at the restaurant when I have all the time in the world to make a good batch:

1. Here is my giant urn. I fill up 70% of it with hot water.

2. I drop 3 industrial-sized tea bags in there.

3. Then I let it soak for at least 2-3 hours.

4. I fish the bags out with a ladle and inspect the color of the tea-water. If it's lighter than a golden brown, something went wrong.

5. I keep the tea bags in an empty pitcher in case I still need them and pour hot water into a new pitcher--not much, let's say 25%.

6. I scoop 3-4 cups of granulated sugar into the new pitcher and stir until all of the sugar has melted. The sugar-water should feel slightly gooey against the ladle.

7. I deposit the mixture into the giant urn and mix for several minutes.

8. At this point, the urn should be about 80% full. Now I fill the rest with cold water or ice until it reaches the rim.

9. Stir more.

10. Taste-testing time! My ideal sweet tea is sweet, but not too sweet, and you should be able to taste the tea itself as well. It drives me crazy when I order tea and get brown sugar-water instead.

A Semi-Thoughtful Post That Trailed Off Near The End

I tried The Blue Fin the other day and ordered an eel sushi set. Baked, of course. I’m not quite ready for raw eel just yet. But that wasn’t the reason as to why I decided to have sushi for lunch in the first place. I was there to answer a question that has been dogging me since I’ve started working at the restaurant(s). Why do white people like sushi so much? Or more specifically, why do white people living in the U.S. like sushi so much? If easily offended, I warn you to stop reading at this point as my post will only grow more uncomfortable. If you still insist, be my guest.

There seem to be more white people at sushi places than Asians. I saw the odd Japanese couple or two (or maybe they were Korean—I wasn’t close enough to hear them), but the majority are pale-faced Americans waving their chopsticks around in animated conversation. Women, especially, filled the row of stools at the sushi bar. I had a good vantage point for covert observation in my little corner table, my black notebook open and blank at the ready. What is so appealing? I popped a roll in my mouth and hacked for a minute or two at the rush of wasabi up my nose. I had plopped too much on top.

Is it the small, “bite-sizedness” of the rolls? Could be. They do appear like finger foods at a party—easy to eat, easy to handle, easy to prepare if all you wanted was to stick a few pieces of cucumber and avocado inside a rice-seaweed roll and call it a day. Convenience then, in addition to appearance. It certainly can’t be the taste. Or maybe that’s my own personal preferences talking. I don’t balk at eating sushi, but I must be in a very specific mood to enjoy them.

The implications of dining on sushi then: do Americans feel hip and cosmopolitan when their hands wield a pair of chopsticks and pluck a single California roll to pop in their mouths? “Look,” they want to declare, “I’m open to trying new food—provided that it doesn’t look too weird or nonthreatening or isn’t staring at me with its eyes still intact.” Is it simply a 2000s-2010s culinary trend that will fade with time? If so, I’ll be waiting for Korean jjigae (a type of stew) to catch on within a few years.  

I hadn’t figured out a satisfying answer by the time I called for the check. Perhaps I never will. 

Over The Telephone

No this restaurant does not sell sushi. No, we also don’t have a hibachi grill either. Well you see, sir/ma’am, we have neither of those things because this is a Chinese restaurant. That means we cook and serve Chinese food. Food whose recipes loosely originate from China. Therefore, we don’t have sushi or hibachi grills because—no, sir/ma’am, no miso soup either. Those are all culinary features of Japanese cuisine. From Japan. So they should be easily found in establishments that sell Japanese food—like a Japanese restaurant.

Why don’t we sell them too, you ask? Well because, sir/ma’am, this is a Chinese restaurant, not a Japanese restaurant. If we had things like sushi and miso soup, House of China’s original tagline “serving good Chinese food since 1989” would be replaced by “serving good Chinese food since 1989 only to have its culinary integrity trampled upon by ignorant consumers in need of some home training in 2008 and beyond.” I hope you understand then why we simply don’t have what you’re looking for? Oh, I beg to differ: Chinese and Japanese food are not, as you say, “the same thang anyhow.” What’s that? Alright then, gracious sir/ma’am, have a good day. You too, Goodbye.

Sweet Tooth

The food I serve you is not what I eat at home. Don’t look so surprised; did you really think we have something as tongue-numbingly sweet as Sweet & Sour Chicken for dinner? Chinese cuisine, since the dawn of Chinese cuisine, has never had a penchant for sugary dishes masquerading as appetizers and entrees. The only sweets we serve are either fruit for dessert or not that sweet at all—to the Western palate, anyway.

We aren’t completely devoid of delicious confections however. There are red beans with milk, seasonal moon cakes, the bird’s nest delicacy, rice cakes, dried melon strips, and even candied ginger. These are snacks to be tossed into one’s mouth on the road or on the go, not mainstays at the dining room table. It amazes me to watch, sometimes, as a customer calls for an order of Chinese donuts from our menu, convinced that he or she could get this at any other “authentic” Chinese restaurant. Whoever heard of frying biscuit dough, dusting powdered sugar on their golden tops, and slapping “Chinese” next to their names like a moniker? I want to tell them the truth, leaning close to the table with my head dipped low like I’m confessing an ages-long secret. Instead, I step back with my hands folded on my apron and let them think otherwise. As my mother likes to say, it wouldn’t do to burst bubbles.

No My Food is Not Weird-Looking

Long Beans with Egg

Mapo Tofu (non-vegetarian)

Steamed Pork Short Ribs

Potato Soup

Epic Mealtime Sweet Potato Soup

Chinese Vegetable Pancake

Bargain Priced

Ground spice makes everything nice. There is something inherently more satisfying about munching on a snack bought at a roadside stall than wining and dining in a four-star restaurant whose bill would rival the down payment you made on your car. More often than not, the roadside stall you’ve stopped at is a mom-and-pop joint, owned by a grandmotherly matriarch or cantankerous old man who has manned the store for longer than you have been alive. S/he has his or her hands on everything, from the recipes used to the cutlery served (or lack thereof) to which frying pan the cook is supposed to use. Most of the time, the owner is even there too, fixing his or her one good eye on you as s/he rings up your order.

You watch the entire cooking process from your rickety bench or stool. You see every ingredient the cook throws into the fire that will eventually appear in your meal, on your questionably washed plate. When you take that initial bite, you taste the road it was made on, the hands that have shaped it, the history of the dish’s conception. You taste an experience. You taste a life. 

The Horror, The Horror

Here are just a couple of examples of what I meant in my earlier posts with people screwing around with the food I serve them and wasteful behavior:

 This used to be wonton soup, which is a CLEAR SLIGHTLY YELLOW COLOR. Someone dumped all of the soy sauce in there. What is this madness?

Some teenagers decided they simply weren't hungry anymore and left. This. On. My. Table. For Christ's sake, at least take it home and feed it to your dog. 

I Thought I Wouldn't Do Rants Anymore

I believe in a food's structural integrity. When I serve you [insert dish], it is perfect as it is. All the seasoning needed has been cooked in there while the guy in the kitchen was tossing the wok around. Every vegetable present has contributed its unique flavor to the overall taste. The sauce is at the perfect consistency and texture, the rice fluffy but not too sticky. What makes the restaurant I work at a true mom-and-pop joint is that my mother makes all the cooking sauces for every stir-fried dish on the menu. Indirectly, my mother is in the food I place in front of you. It is delicious. There is love and dedication and attention in every bite you take.

So when you pour out half the contents of that sweet-and-sour sauce bottle into your rice or drown your soup in soy sauce, I suddenly get the urge to upend the table you're sitting at. Why would you ruin something that already tastes wonderful without your excessive add-ons? I know that is this is the way some people feel about adding A1 sauce to their BBQ or adding sprinkles on their ice cream. It is a legitimate concern/pet peeve of mine. The next time you go out to eat somewhere, instead of instantly slathering your food with something from the condiments station, try some of your pristine, untouched meal. Let the sauce sit in your mouth. Absorb the taste of those vegetables. You might be surprised.

Rant #932569735

I’m a waitress at a Chinese restaurant (or several because my parents own more than one), and I see a lot of people waste their food—which is my number one pet peeve when I work. It’s especially annoying when they do bother to put their unfinished meals in to-go boxes only to leave them at their tables, neglected and forgotten. I see parents allowing their children to take one, two bites from their chicken or beef or pork and announce themselves full. At the very least, take the food home. Not only does it save the parents cooking, it also makes for a tasty midnight snack.

In my opinion, it is shameful to waste food. It smacks of extravagance and unfortunate implications about class privilege. There are people all over the world who starve from malnutrition, people like my grandparents whose childhoods consisted of scraping enough rice to get by for the day, and watching the customers throw their food away without a second thought is like a slap to the face. What kind of culture is this? It’s mind-boggling and saddening.