The AP Slanders Chinese Food
Our own Megnut and my friend Andrew both sent me this article on the supposed unhealthiness of Chinese food written by Libby Quaid, based on a report released yesterday by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (which, by the way has serious detractors). All three of us were incredulous at how ignorant the piece is, the lede being a prime example: "The typical Chinese restaurant menu is a sea of nutritional no-nos, a consumer group has found. A plate of General Tso's chicken, for example, is loaded with about 40 percent more sodium and more than half the calories an average adult needs for an entire day. " Are you kidding me? Did someone just seriously start a piece on Chinese cuisine by holding up a dish invented in New York for the American palate? It doesn't get any better the further you go.
The problem with Quaid's piece is that it so happily sounds alarm bells about Chinese food without ever once taking into account that a) what most people in the US encounter at stripmall hole-in-the-walls would be pretty unrecognizable to what Chinese eat in China, or even in a proper Chinatown, b) people eat family-style, taking only a few spoonfuls from any given dish among many on the table, and c) individual portions of any cuisine in the US are usually twice to thrice the size of what they would be in their country of origin. If Chinese cuisine was really so intrinsically and terribly fattening, you'd think that after millennia of, you know, eating it on a daily basis, the Chinese would be both terribly fat and short-lived, but the truth is the opposite. The Chinese approach to food is all about eating well, but that means eating a wide range of food and eating in moderation, things every healthy eater already knows and follows.
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10 Comments:
How is that AP article even news anyway? Did Chinese food suddenly become trendy again and I missed the memo? I wish they would have done a study on all food groups not just Chinese. Me thinks the same can be said for just about any genre. What about the trillion calorie burrito or the ginormous plate of mac & cheese?
yumsugar at 7:11PM on 03/21/07
Seriously! I was reading the thing, and was thinking, did you even talk to any Chinese people?! Apparently not, since I can attest to a daily diet of Chinese food for most of my life and I am fine and healthy. And I have started banning people from ordering General Tso's chicken around me. It's so annoying when people tell me it's their "favorite Chinese dish". Or my favorite, "P.F. Chang's is my favorite Chinese restaurant". Okay...
You know what else also got to me? They factored in white rice as 200 calories without mentioning that white rice is a healthy food without as far as I can tell, much fat. Just because something has calories doesn't mean it's bad for you.
toastykitten at 9:29PM on 03/21/07
Ridiculous !
Christopher Balla at 9:31PM on 03/21/07
I think that the article points out several times that what it's talking about is not "Chinese food" but rather "Chinese restaurant food."
I suppose it would be nice if the article had also pointed out that more normal, traditional, not American-restaurant-style fast-food-type Chinese food was very healthy. However, I think the article was obviously about the Americanized "Chinese restaurant" so I think it made its point effectively.
Ellie P. at 9:53PM on 03/21/07
It's not the AP slamming Chinese food to be precise, but the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a food nanny group that seems awfully adept at getting lots of publicity. There was an interesting article about them some time ago that i linked to last year. The title just about says it - The Anti-Pleasure Principle: The "food police" and the pseudoscience of self-denial.
maki at 10:13PM on 03/21/07
Oops, I guess you said it's from the CSPI in the post :P
maki at 10:14PM on 03/21/07
You are exactly right when you say that the Chinese food most Americans are familiar with in the US is nothing like what you would find in China. As an American who currently lives in China, and who has been here for the last 5 years, I can say with some authority that the AP is full of it. I have gone from 2-4 servings of veggies a week in the States to 2-4 servings per day, and I hardly eat anything that is deep-fried (granted everything is fired, but I make a huge distinction between the two). Meat is usually just a flavor enhancer, and not the center of a Chinese dish. We also eat A LOT of fresh fish and other foods rich in the ultra-swank omega fatty whatever. Chinese food is also incredibly diverse, with regional distinctions similiar to that of Europe...
jonnywinter at 2:52AM on 03/22/07
The article is in no way ragging on Chinese food in general, but merely North American fast food Chinese.... I think they make that pretty clear...
winjer at 3:35AM on 03/22/07
When you think about it perhaps we should consider that it is the North American interpretations of other cuisines that we are examining. If you really look at this situation, the article was written in english for North American eyes. True people in China, do not eat these types of things. But people in North America certainly do. Don't you think the average person should think twice about those chicken balls that they are having for lunch?
Sweetie at 10:44AM on 03/22/07
I have trouble going with the apologists here. This article in no way clarifies between American-appropriated versions of these cuisines; it simply points out nationalities in an entirely generalized way.
Moreover, it brings Italian and Mexican food into it ! God, this country.
Christopher Balla at 11:25AM on 03/22/07