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Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
In Vancouver, which has a beautiful Chinatown/Asian section, depending on what bit you're in. The wife was running a marathon the next day, but we still wanted to see the city, so myself, her, and her mom went to this second floor dim sum place. The better half being a vegetarian at the time, and both of them being Asian, things got complicated. First off, a rapid fire burst of Cantonese, then Mandarin from waiter #1. She waved over waiter #2, who offered up Thai, Malay, and something else. We only know English, so we're stuck as carts start coming. And to top it all off, the only way I can express 'no pig' is to push my nose back with my finger and oink, followed by a head shake. Good food, though, I'd go back.
Cook the Book: 'Eat Me: The Food and Philosophy of Kenny Shopsin'
I think everyone makes up a dish or two, they probably just don't realize it at the time. Me, I do a few things, that just came to me, like a honey lavender ice cream, because, of course, I like those things, and I said, sure, put them together.
The two things I've really, purely invented: the (just to be funny) Deep Fried Turkey Napoleon, which is just layers of my deep fried turkey, mashed potatoes, and wild rice stuffing. Even used a pseudo-ring mold.
And the Triple Decker PBJ Plus, three slices of bread, a slathering of peanut butter and jelly (two each, of course), and slices of banana throughout. Good on its own, not bad grilled, either. The King would love it.
Restaurant Shirts Are the New Concert Tee
I've seen a lot of restaurant shirts lately, but hadn't put the thought together in my head. Guess it makes sense, it's definitely a culture. And I do understand what you're saying, it goes back to PCU. Don't be that guy. Don't be the guy at the show that wears the t-shirt of the band that's playing. It's hard to pinpoint the lameness, but it's definitely there.
My friends and I have a fake restaurant that we'll never actually start, but we already have the t-shirts drawn up for it, logos and everything. Guess we're ahead of the curve.
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Recent Comments | Response to Comments
Ferran Adrià Knows Foam, Not Burgers
I'm not going to go all ga ga for McD's, I don't like them, but I'll say this. I know in London McD's has samosas, it's veggie in India, different menus for different places. I even looked inside the one across from the Parthenon, and I think they might've had pasta? I'd be willing to bet that a McDonald's cheeseburger in Spain is far better than an American one, regardless of price.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
In Vancouver, which has a beautiful Chinatown/Asian section, depending on what bit you're in. The wife was running a marathon the next day, but we still wanted to see the city, so myself, her, and her mom went to this second floor dim sum place. The better half being a vegetarian at the time, and both of them being Asian, things got complicated. First off, a rapid fire burst of Cantonese, then Mandarin from waiter #1. She waved over waiter #2, who offered up Thai, Malay, and something else. We only know English, so we're stuck as carts start coming. And to top it all off, the only way I can express 'no pig' is to push my nose back with my finger and oink, followed by a head shake. Good food, though, I'd go back.
Cook the Book: 'Eat Me: The Food and Philosophy of Kenny Shopsin'
I think everyone makes up a dish or two, they probably just don't realize it at the time. Me, I do a few things, that just came to me, like a honey lavender ice cream, because, of course, I like those things, and I said, sure, put them together.
The two things I've really, purely invented: the (just to be funny) Deep Fried Turkey Napoleon, which is just layers of my deep fried turkey, mashed potatoes, and wild rice stuffing. Even used a pseudo-ring mold.
And the Triple Decker PBJ Plus, three slices of bread, a slathering of peanut butter and jelly (two each, of course), and slices of banana throughout. Good on its own, not bad grilled, either. The King would love it.
Restaurant Shirts Are the New Concert Tee
I've seen a lot of restaurant shirts lately, but hadn't put the thought together in my head. Guess it makes sense, it's definitely a culture. And I do understand what you're saying, it goes back to PCU. Don't be that guy. Don't be the guy at the show that wears the t-shirt of the band that's playing. It's hard to pinpoint the lameness, but it's definitely there.
My friends and I have a fake restaurant that we'll never actually start, but we already have the t-shirts drawn up for it, logos and everything. Guess we're ahead of the curve.
Restaurant Shirts Are the New Concert Tee
"I still go to concerts but rarely buy the shirts anymore. I'd like to claim I've outgrown this, but in all honesty, the obsession remains—only now restaurant shirts have replaced the concert tee."
I'm still a fan of rock tee shirts. I wear some restaurant shirts but all that often. But I agree, restaurant tee shirts are replacing rock tee shirts in some areas.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
Just realized I never formally announced winners here in this space. My bad. We all had a look-see through the amazing stories here, and these emerged as our faves once we balloted in secret and compared notes:
jellybeans
tina_eats
astiles55
cdziuba
pequenalooloo
Thanks -- I think ;) -- to everyone who shared their stories of mortifying proportions. We cringed as we went through this thread.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
We were all out eating dinner at a Japanese Steakhouse, doing the Hibachi thing one evening. All of us consisted of myself, my husband, and our two daughters, ages 3 and 5 at the time. The girls love to eat with chopsticks, even though they were still using the ones fastened with a rubber band, to make it easier for children to use. Well, my older daughter was playing around, and threw her chopsticks at her daddy. He retrieved them for her, and in a stern voice, told her to do it again, and see what happened. He was being sarcastic, of course, and meant for her to not do it again. Well, she did as she was told, and threw them at him again, as I busted up laughing at him. I had to gently remind him that children her age do not 'get' sarcasm yet, and she was only doing as he said. He sheepishly had to agree with me, and even though I was trying hard to regain my composure and stop laughing, I was also a bit mortified at the actions of my child AND my husband.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
I've taught our daughter to try something new every time she has the chance. Well, that's tough to say when her dad orders the same thing every time we go out for asian food: Teriyaki chicken. The last time we went out to eat, she shocked both of us by ordering sea urchin sushi. Oh, my!
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
There is this Vietnamese restaurant in Chinatown NY, Cong Ly, one of my favorite Vietnamese restaurants, that has a "House Special Rice" on there menu. There is no description. You think to yourself, is there meat? Are there veggies? Am I going to get frogs and feet with rice? Sometimes I find it difficult to order from Asian places (and I'm Asian American) because it has the worst description. But what I've learned is, always order a house special dish even if you don't know what you'll be getting yourself into. It happens to be one of their best dishes on their menu with grilled porkchops, shredded pork and a steamed egg cake which is fabulous!
This brings me to my next point of hidden things beyond the exterior. There are many Chinese restaurants where there is a "secret" menu that's all in Chinese. Most likely, when you walk in, and you're not Asian, even if you are Asian but you look like you don't know how to read and speak, they'll give you the "tourist" English menu which normally has microwaved food. So note to self, always bring someone who knows how to read Chinese or ask for the Chinese menu and hope that there is English on it too. Some of the Chinese menus still have scarce English descriptions on it.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
At least everyone else's embarrassing/odd moments appear to be at GOOD Asian restaurants.
I am Korean (adopted as a baby, cultural background Midwest, USA) and my husband is Caucasian. However, we like Asian food, authentic when we can get it, Americanized when we can't (my husband gets late-night eggroll cravings).
Once, we were on a long car trip, were somewhere in the Toledo OH area, and decided we just HAD to stop and get some food. We were at the "don't care what it is as long as the neighborhood is safe and the food is edible" stage. We got off the highway and drove along a main road for awhile and found a small Chinese restaurant. It had a karaoke stage and a neon Tsingtao sign in the window...but by then we didn't care. I don't think there was anyone else in the restaurant.
Truthfully, I don't remember what we had (so it can't have been horrible) but what I do remember is that when they brought out our drinks (I think we'd ordered a pot of tea) they also brought out a small plate with a stack of...
Wonder Bread slices.
I think we were laughing too hard to taste the other food.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
I usually manage to not embarrass myself terribly, but during my first bibimbap experience, I didn't really get what to do with the sauce. So I left it on the side and this greatly confused my waitress when she came back at the end of the meal to find a full dish of sauce left. Oh well.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
What I don't like in our local Chinese restuaurant is the lack of teaspoons. I like sugar in my tea (gasp!) and find no utensils available to stir it in. At least there are forks, I could never master chop sticks. But the taste of the food keeps us going back.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
When I was about seven, my mother thought it would be funny to order me cumquats for dessert at a Chinese restaurant. She said they were yummy. They weren't.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
While travelling in Vancouver one year, a friend and I decided that we really wanted som authentic Chinese food from their Chinatown area. So off we went to try to find the most foreign place to eat that we could. We found a stairway to an upstairs restaurant above a store. Looked good, so we went up. We were the only non-asians in the place. The menus were all in Chinese (or so I assume). We simply pointed to food and ordered it. It was wonderful, but some of the spices were very foreign. Whilst enjoying our adventure we looked out the window to the store below. It was obviously the market where the local restaurants got their fresh seafood. One man put his entire arm into a tank and proceded to pull out a bunch of snow crabs. When he had all that he wanted, the store clerk reached in the tank and pulled out a bunch of loose crab legs. I realized that being a crab in a tank with hundreds of other crabs must not be fun. They were literally tearing eachother apart.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
My girlfriend used to work in China many years ago, so she pretends to still know some Mandarin and Cantonese. We ended up with sea cucumber at one restaurant, which looks and tastes like a big slug. It was gross, and we still dont know how we ended up with it.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
Probably my funniest "Asian food experience" is also my earliest experience with Asian food. In fact, it was my first experience with any solid food at all! There is a family-owned Chinese restaurant walking distance from my parents' house. It's a place that we've gone to countless times over the years, and is always a nice place to take company when they come to visit. When I was very small, my parents took some guests out to eat there, and set me up in the highchair to entertain myself. Well, apparently at some point, the conversation must have gotten very intense and no one was paying much attention to me, but the next thing anyone knew, I had reached over and helped myself to my fatther's rice bowl, using my little baby hands to try and shove as much of it into my mouth as possible! There was rice all over me, all over the floor, pretty much all over everything in a fairly wide radius around my highchair. I had only managed to get a few pieces actually in my mouth, and fortunately the staff thought it was hysterically funny, and I was young enough that there was no embarassing stigma to prevent me from going back. ;) My parents still say that my first solid food was a Chinese dish called "Sticky Rice All Over The Floor".
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
eating a bowl of pho and accidentally eating a slice of chili. The hiccups started as well as the burning. I had to stop eating for at least five minutes to make sure that I wasn't going to get sick.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
I enjoy eating Asain foods but I really don't know how to use chopsticks. I just visited my daughter in New York ,she is a big fan of sushi and knows how to eat with chopsticks. Her belief is when you vist a ethnic resturant you should go by their customs,which is wonderful. I tried sushi for the first time,I liked it and would eat again. What I loved was the wasbi sauce and the thin slices of ginger.( I used a bit more of the wasbi the first time ,now I know better.) I really enjoyed and was surprised to see on the plate.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
pretty easy answer for me -- i don't eat seafood so any meal at a southeast asian restaurant is an adventure..fish sauce, oyster sauce, etc.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
A friend of mine lived in Japan for a couple of years and acquired a conversational knowledge of the language. Now his grown daughter is taking Japanese language courses in college. I went with them to a Japanese restaurant in southern Indiana. He was so excited to have an opportunity to practice his Japanese, so he went right up to the Sushi-ya and started talking to him in Japanese. The chef listened to him chatter away for a few confused minutes and then told my friend that the staff was all Korean! My friend was so embarrassed...
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
While dining at a Szechuan restaurant with some colleagues, we were debating a third dish and decided to try something new. Pointing to a menu item that looked interesting, we asked the waiter what it was. "Beef tender" was the response we heard (though not very clearly). Having had difficulty communicating (in the moment as well as on previous visits to the same restaurant) we thought we should clarify. "Beef tender", he repeated. "Beef tender?", we asked. "Yes, beef tender", he said. We thought that sounded good and decided to give it a try. When the food arrived one of the dishes was sort of stew-like and something about it triggered a memory of beef callouses that I had tried in Spain. Not sure what it was, the most adventurous of our group pulled out a piece of the "meat" which turned out to be almost flavorless, but very rubbery. "What's this?", we asked. The answer this time was much clearer: "Beef tendon", he said. Embarrassed and not wanting to have them throw away the whole thing we all managed to choke down a serving and chalked it up to an Asian dining learning experience.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
The most embarrassing sushi story was when my hubbs and I went out with some friends for dinner. The waitress managed to not write down my main order, but DID write down my order for the natto roll. I had heard of natto and figured I should try it at some point. She delivered the roll and I dunked it in a bit of soy sauce and put it in my mouth. It was a real trial not to start gagging and spit it out immediately. Natto, to me, tastes like what would happen if someone leaving soy beans out to rot in a gym sock that was worn for a few months without being washed, then ate that gym sock full of beans and upchucked a little while later on to the plate of sushi rice. That's natto. Nasty.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
Chinatown in Chicago when very young and visiting a friend and both were fairly new to Asian cuisine. The menu was 20 pages long, at least, with very little english and there was certainly a language barrier between us and the staff. I ended up with some plate of wide noodle and some glutinous brown gravy. Too hungry and confused and embarrassed to cause trouble, ate it, hated it.
Went back a couple years later though and had a lovely meal.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
It was a Sunday, in 2001, and I was hosting 5 good friends at my favorite Chinese restaurant in nyc - Phoenix Garden - on 40th between 2nd and 3rd. It was one of those special nights where everything that came out of the kitchen was perfect; honey glazed ribs, pea shoots with crab, salt baked prawns, squab in lettuce leaves, filet mignon casserole – it was all bang-on! I was the king. I could do no wrong.
Being a collective group of greedy pigs, we decided to order one more dish. I call over the proprietor who has been running restaurants for longer than I’m alive and ask his help selecting our perfect ending.
The exchange went something like this…
(Me: Long haired blonde, typical sarcastic ny’er)
(Him: Looks and acts a bit like the father in Ang Lee’s “Eat, Drink, Man, Woman”)
Me: “What a great meal. What do you suggest we get to top it off?”
Him “You should get Peking Duck. Best in Ny”
Me: “That sounds great, we’d like a whole duck”
Him: “Very good. One duck takes 30 minutes”
Me: (said with a wink) “Oh no, that’s a long time. If we get ½ a duck can you do it in 15 minutes?”
Him: (said in a loud, agitated voice as he stormed away from table) “You can not rush good food. I get you check”
Clearly, Im not that funny, but I have a long track record p1ssing off asian
restaurant proprietors and wait staff.
More recently, I asked our waitress at Noodles on 28th if they would be changing their name to Noodles on 29th when they moved a block uptown.
She didn't even crack a smile.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
While I haven't had any major 'incidents', I do remember that at one of the local Korean places there were those little tiny whole dried fish in one of the banchan dishes. Freaked me right out as I was not expecting any of my food to be staring back at me.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
when we once went to the china buffet which is an all you can eat..we were eating and my daughter found a fly in her lo mein.. she just went up and got another plate full i was sooooooooooooooooo grossed out i couldnt even eat..how many did she eat that she didnt find..lol im feeling queasy just writing this :(~
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
My cousin has a Chinese New Year celebration each year - she is not Asian, neither am I, but we love the cuisine. I still can not get the hang of the chopsticks - and it has been at least 20 years - I would say that that is my most befuddling experience. (albeit not in a restaurant) Thanks for this chance.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
I can't think of any befuddling experiences at any Asian restaurants.
Weekend Book Giveaway: 'Asian Dining Rules'
I think the mountain yam dish that we got at one sushi place probably qualifies. The waiter tried to warn us, "It's not to all Americans' tastes." We got it anyway.
It was a mistake.
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I'm not going to go all ga ga for McD's, I don't like them, but I'll say this. I know in London McD's has samosas, it's veggie in India, different menus for different places. I even looked inside the one across from the Parthenon, and I think they might've had pasta? I'd be willing to bet that a McDonald's cheeseburger in Spain is far better than an American one, regardless of price.