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Comment by inopinatus | Hacker News Reader

I'm married to a first-generation offspring of Chinese parents, a source of regular and scathing remarks on how what is served in the US as "Chinese food" is often a many-generations-removed facsimile thereof.

Three items in particular (Chop Suey, Chow Mein and General Tso Chicken) receive very special ridicule and their appearance on a menu can effectively disqualify any restaurant from further consideration. As the spouse of the above-mentioned I consider it essential that I can avert any incipient noodle deficiency crisis; there are a very few joints - so few I can count them on two fingers - between SFO and San Jose that have received grudging consent and pre-approval for takeout.

(It probably doesn't help that we generally reach SFO or LAX via a layover in HKG or SIN)

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There is a lot of ego around food when it gets tied to identity. Your spouse is probably rejecting many restaurants that are run by immigrants cooking recepies brought over.

Seriously, though. California, and the Bay Area specifically, is one of the best places in the US to find authentic Chinese food. OP's spouse is just a snob. Sure, a lot of restaurants feel the need to put some "standard" dishes like General Tso's Chicken on the menu, just in case. You don't have to order those. Outside of tourist traps like SF Chinatown, Chinese restaurants mainly serve Chinese food to a predominantly Chinese clientele.

Sichuan cuisine in the Bay Area is atrocious compared to the real deal. Maybe Cantonese or Hunan fare better but unfortunately I don't like these cuisines nearly as much.

BTW, I'm neither American nor Chinese, so I don't have any national pride involved either way. I just happen to have spent multiple years in both countries.

China Lounge in Pleasanton is every bit as good as a restaurant in Chengdu (which is where the chef previously cooked).

Thanks, I'll try it out.

There is plenty of reasonable sichuan food in the Bay Area, especially outside of San Francisco (e.g. Little sichuan in San Mateo).

uhhh, I disagree with your assessment of him/her as a snob. I go to San Gabriel Valley every weekend for dinner and lunch, and I've never seen any of those things on the menu anywhere. Chinese food in SF is abysmal. I'm not a snob, I'm not even Chinese.

Yeah, SF is crap and overpriced, but the surrounding cities have pretty good food. Like every other metropolitan area, you have to get out of the city center to the suburbs where Chinese immigrants actually live.

Actually she did turn to me after I had been complaining about my cultural equivalent (that is, the quality of American coffee) in the car yesterday and say "darling we are both terrible snobs". So I think you are right. We're picky, we have selective high expectations, and we're not afraid to grumble when those expectations aren't met.

What's the difference between a snob and a connoisseur? You should taste the terrible coffee I make myself.

Much of this thread reeks of hipsterism, where nothing is good but the "original", as if cuisine isn't under constant evolution.

I think the issue is not that most westernised cuisines are different from the original, but that they end up tasting all the same. Here in Germany most people only care about the mandatory piece of meat/fish in each meal, so it's hard to find delicious side dishes that may exist in the "original" cuisine.

Yeah. All that matters is whether it tastes good, and stuff the rest. You can't taste a story you tell yourself. Or perhaps more to the point, you shouldn't be able to.

Considering how big the Chinese population is in Fremont, Cupertino, San Mateo, and Daly City, I'm surprised there aren't more approved restaurants on your list.

But then again, rents are outrageous, so maybe it's just impossible to open a restaurant as an immigrant who is good at cooking.

You left out Millbrae. I don't think the grandposter tried very hard. There's definitely a number of proper Chinese places in that corridor, but the average ones do suck. That or the in-laws are looking for a specific region in China that isn't well represented in the bay.

There's a reasonable argument to be made that Chinese food in the San Gabriel Valley in LA is better than in China, since you can find a large number of regional cuisines all in one place, and the raw ingredient quality is higher when compared to mainland China.

You can find every major Chinese cuisine in Shanghai, Beijing, Hong Kong, Guangzhou and possibly Shenzhen and Guangdong, with great quality. That said the selection of Yunnan, Tibetan, Mongolian and Xinjiang may not be great but they're all there. That said Vancouver, New York and Tokyo are all in the top ten cities in the world for Chinese food.

The Ranch 99 near the Cisco'campus in Milpitas featured a half dozen Chinese restaurants nearby with no English on the menu the last time I worked near there five years ago.

There's plenty of good, authentic Chinese food in Cupertino.

I actually really like general tsaos chicken and often seeek it out as it's a dish you can't get in China. It only appeals to more people more from the south though or have sweeter cuisines like Shanghai.

Many chinese people in the bay area who can't stand it don't like sweet dishes in general. If they're more from the west, they often complain about not being to find authentically spicy food.

Could you share the names of the places that they consider to be acceptably authentic?

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