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.
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