Have You Eaten Yet
Stories from Chinese Restaurants Around the World
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- $28.99
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- $28.99
Publisher Description
An eye-opening and soul-nourishing journey through Chinese food around the world.
From Cape Town, South Africa, to small-town Saskatchewan, family-run Chinese restaurants are global icons of immigration, community and delicious food. The cultural outposts of far-flung settlers, bringers of dim sum, Peking duck and creative culinary hybrids, Chinese restaurants are a microcosm of greater social forces. They are an insight into time, history, and place.
Author and film-maker Cheuk Kwan, a self-described “card-carrying member of the Chinese diaspora,” weaves a global narrative by linking the myriad personal stories of chefs, entrepreneurs, labourers and dreamers who populate Chinese kitchens worldwide. Behind these kitchen doors lies an intriguing paradox which characterizes many of these communities: how Chinese immigrants have resisted—or have often been prevented from—complete assimilation into the social fabric of their
new homes. In both instances, the engine of their economic survival—the Chinese restaurant and its food—has become seamlessly woven into towns and cities all around the world.
An intrepid travelogue of grand vistas, adventure and serendipity, Have You Eaten Yet? charts a living atlas of global migration, ultimately revealing how an excellent meal always tells an even better story.
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Filmmaker Kwan explores the Chinese experience through the lens of Chinese restaurants the world over in his charming debut. His travels take him from Outlook, Saskatchewan, Canada, where he visits prairie cafés that serve American Chinese rather than "anything remotely resembling Chinese food," to Mombasa, Kenya, where he discovers a restaurant that offers stir-fried beef with watermelon, and double-boiled papaya chicken soup, a dish that reminds Kwan of the Cantonese cuisine his mother used to make. Inspiring profiles of chefs and restaurant owners are interwoven throughout; such as that of Bar Pekín chef Abel Lam, a Black man of Chinese Cuban heritage who follows the culinary traditions of his grandfather at his Havana restaurant. Kwan sheds light on how Chinese cuisine has integrated itself into cultures across the globe (when visiting Peru, Kwan learns that "words such as sillao (soy sauce), chaufa (fried rice) and kion (ginger) are part of Peruvian lingo"), as well as its cultural centrality (the colloquial Chinese greeting of "Have you eaten yet?" is akin to asking "How are you?"). Expertly told, this is a winning blend of travel, food, and culture writing. Readers will be enlightened.
