One very irritating thing about American foodies is when they say ‘but this place is run by Chinese people, how can it be Japanese / Korean / Chinese / Vietnamese / Thai’ (when all of these nationalities have significant and intersectional people of Chinese origins). Like, the great Thai restaurant and the good Vietnamese noodle shop on my block is run by Thai-Teochew people and Vietnamese-Teochew people.
It’s not great to have one’s cultural identity being guessed at by random foodies.
@skinnylatte it’s also very common for e.g. a Korean family to own a Japanese restaurant, simply because people in the area are familiar with sushi (the only Japanese food most Americans are familiar with), but then also have a ton of amazing Korean dishes on the menu.
Very often how they ‘guess’ your nationality is to try to hear what language you’re speaking, too. Well all of those people speak 2-5 languages, different ones to different people and it’s really none of your business
Someone was even like ‘if I walk into a taco shop and see a Chinese person cooking I leave’. Have you heard of Chino Latino people? In Oakland there’s a whole ass taco popup that does CHINESEISH TACOS (Tacos Sincero)
Pick any country! Indian-Chinese food? It’s Hakka. Korean-Chinese food? Definitely have the jajangmyun (or za zang mian). Japanese-Sichuanese food has a whole Michelin starrred restaurant (Shisen Hanten). There are Chinese-Venezuelans and Chinese-Peruvians. This is so ignorant
There’s an especially weird thing where I think in the trinity of ‘East Asian things we know’ there’s some white foodie ranking of foods and cultures. Japan, then Korea, then China. So a person who looks Chinese can’t possibly cook real Japanese or Korean food and it’s all a money grab. But often the people they’re accusing of being Chinese aren’t from China at all. They’re just Chinese-ish from somewhere.
@skinnylatte I feel like sometimes the notion of "authenticity" in food, especially with foodies, is about turning cultures into a product if that makes sense. Like the purpose of buying the food for them is to possess someone else's culture - and show to their friends that they have been able to collect the trendiest cultures - it's all about conspicuous consumption and for that all the people at the restaurant need to play the right role. Similarly with some foods needing to be visibly cheap
@skinnylatte Chef José Andrés has an amazing Chinese-Peruvian restaurant in DC (China Chilcano), and a Chinese-Mexican street food restaurant that is probably my wife and my favorite restaurant in Las Vegas (China Poblano).
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