About chinese food!

I like it. But the Americanized version might not be the same as what Chinese food actually is. I've never eaten in China.

I started this thread ages ago hadaji, in order to ask about real Chinese food.
welcome to A2K.

http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=31897&highlight=

IMHO, that's truly not a fair comparison.

How many Americans you know have really tried real Chinese food?
...not the "average" person.

Chinese restaurants make "American-Chinese" food. If you went to China, you'd hardly recognize some of your favorites you eat here. That's not an exaggeration either.

BTW, I love anything hot! Welcome to the board too.

While I'm on the subject, I think it's funny watching many people eat oriental food. Maybe rice should be considered a side dish and half the price because that's how it's treated.

i love rice. mmmm....

Hadaji-I would like to THANK YOU WITH ALL OF MY HEART for chinese cuisine.
It has some of the best dishes ever.S+S chicken,seaweed with ginger,prawn toast,crispy duck and plum sauce,beef with cashew nuts etc.

Admittedly I have to agree with the others that UK chinese probably doesnt taste exactly the same as in China but it is my favourite takaway and could happily eat it everyday.

chicken with cashews....a definite favorite.

I gladly eat rice (do pretty much every other day), but it tastes so much better with barley in it! Adds so much to the flavor of it. Brown rice with barley is heavenly too!

barley is good too. my mom used to make a great barley soup

I've never had that!!!

Me neither. I like white rice on its own but brown rice should be banished.
Il give barley a go.What does it look like so I can i.d. it in a shop?

Barley looks like.. hmm, let's see if this pic works.



However, the one we get is lighter and more Smacks Cereal looking. whatever that cereal is with the green frog. that's what it looks like. The pic above is not what I get.

Depends how you cook the rice.

Ex:

I put rice in bowl with water (after it's been washed). Insert cup of barley. Let it sit overnight or half a day (when i get home from work).

Then cook in rice cooker. Takes less time to cook, and the barley will have an easier time cooking.

It adds SO much to rice. VERY VERY good. I buy mine at the Korean store downtown.

You can get peas in a bag similar to what you'll find of barley, but imho ...you have to go with real ones not the dried ones. My mom said her friends probably wouldn't eat my rice if I used the dried peas.

Not only is Chinese food in America not the same as that which you would find in China. Chinese food from area to area of the US is not the same. The food served in Chinese restaurants in NYC is a far cry from that found in San Francisco.

Chinese food is fabulous. So is Korean, Thai and Indian. All different, all fabulous. I try to eat at ethnic restaurants where the local natives eat. Our local Korean restaurant is packed with Korean people and we go so often that they give us the traditional side dishes, not just the gringo ones.

My favorate Chinese dishes are twice cooked pork, ma po bean curd, mu shu pork, and hot and sour soup. Oh, and garlic shrimp and govenor's chicken, and anything else that has hot chilis in it.

Regarding differences in Chinese food between San Francisco and New York, I think there are regional differences in China too...

I haven't eaten Chinese food in New York, have had a few meals at Chinese restaurants in San Francisco, and countless meals at Chinese restaurants in Los Angeles -
and there are wide variations of the food in the LA region, which is quite a chinese food mecca.

Martin Yan (Yan Can Cook on PBS) has a cookbook out with recipes from Chinatowns throughout the US. His most recent PBS show is based on this book. I do a lot of Chinese cooking and I've enjoyed the recipes from this book.

If LA is a mecca for Chinese food than NYCity must be Gods country. Absolutly no comparison. Been there done that.

The largest Chinese community in the US is now in the San Gabriel valley in the LA metropolitan area. There are many well regarded chinese restaurants there now.
Here's one article from the LA Times.

http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-dimsum26jan26,0,2746848.story?coll=la-home-food