Quote:
Originally Posted by steven
Chinese food is vastly more popular in the UK than it is in the US I think;
That may be true on the whole... but I think that in California that may not be the case. Especially in San Fransisco! Even in southern CA, though, there were a ton of Chinese restaurants.
|
Not only is Chinese food prevalent in California, but throughout the U.S. Almost every little town has at least one restaurant, and usually more. When I was a child in England, almost the only option was eating with family friends who were Chinese. If you weren't in a large city like Birmingham or London, you were out of luck.
Unless there has been a sudden avalanche of Chinese restaurants in the U.K. since my last visit in 1999 (or they are mostly around Liverpool, which I seriously doubt) there are FAR less options for Chinese food in the U.K.
On my last visit I recall searching for them and being surprised by how few there were. The other difference I discovered was that at least in London, there seemed to be a preference for Cantonese over other styles. There were many more Thai and other more SE Asian restaurants, but not traditional Chinese.
Quote:
|
Just as a little useless tidbit of info, some Chinese study abroad students (who have been to Japan) said that Californian Chinese food was more faithful than Japanese Chinese food, which I found ironic considering the distances between the countries. I've heard this from Japanese people who have been to China and California before, too. I'll never know for sure until I go to China, though (if I ever go).
|
That is a surprise - and a pleasant one. Maybe more of the California cooks are actually chinese descendants or trained with them. In Dallas we have a misture of some very authentic ones and then the other cheap, Americanized ones.