As an expat who lives in China and loves Chinese food, it makes me incredibly sad that in the Western world Chinese food is basically greasy bland cheap garbage generally inspired by 19th century Cantonese immigration (chop suey, fried rice, and various stir frys, plus uniquely American inventions like orange chicken or fortune cookies). What happened to the amazing food of Taiwan, Hunan, Sichuan, Shaanxi? There's so much better Chinese food than what you'll find at your average American Chinese restaurant.
It's getting a bit better but there's still a long way to go even in the cities that have more Chinese options (NYC, west coast cities)
Sichuan seems pretty popular in the USA these days.
In the medium-sized city where I live, there is a standard American Chinese place by a university which is frankly not very good even for American Chinese food, but was owned by people from sichuan and would make off menu sichuan dishes for immigrant students. But they noticed non-immigrant Americans ordering them too, and wisely noticed the general trend going on, and the same owners up a different place a few miles away with actual sichuan food and prices 2x+ higher, which has been very successful. :)
In Philadelphia there's also the popular Han Dynasty chain of sichuan places.
I'd imagine even the places with food closer to "actual" sichuan food, if they are popular with non-Chinese people, have "Americanized" to some extent. I couldn't say as they are my only exposure to it! But I know sometimes I get something where the flavors/textures are just TOO different than what I'm used to, and I just don't like it!
what you're witness isn't actually Chinese food it's the melting pot of multiculturalism in action. Just like curry in UK, General Tso's chicken is now part of the US identity. New comers will bring new forks but the old dare I say classics are here to stay.
> There's so much better Chinese food than what you'll find at your average American Chinese restaurant.
One of the reasons I love living in Toronto: its many ethnic neighbourhoods from just about every nationality on earth e.g. Hungarian, Vietnamese, Iranian, Jamaican. Perhaps only matched by NYC, their local restaurants are 100% authentic to the point of importing fresh ingredients almost daily.
why is it sad that most of the chinese restaurants in america cater to american tastes? american style chinese is a valid food cuisine, and lots of people like that. if you want authentic food those retaurants exist as well. are the "american cuisine" restaurants in china exact reproductions of american food?
>why is it sad that most of the chinese restaurants in america cater to american tastes?
Their heavy reliance on immigrants. Imagine moving to another country eager to start a restaurant featuring the food you've spent years cooking only to show up and be told you need to learn all their recipes and call it American cuisine.
Do you have any tips on getting real Chinese food in America. I was planning on living in Asia later this year, but it doesn't look like the pandemic will be under control by then
That's a pretty broad question, especially if you live in an area without an established Chinatown. If you do, it should be easy enough to go there and scope it out. As far as restaurants go, don't be afraid to ask the servers about this. You could also seek out specific dishes. I like to look for a place that has dry friend green beans (or gan bian si ji dou), chongqing chicken, three cup chicken, congee, dandan noodles or mapo tofu on the menu. Also, don't just look for a "Chinese restaurant", look for a "dim sum restaurant", a "hand drawn noodle restaurant" or a "Sichuan restaurant", etc.
If you can't find a decent restaurant, you could try to make stuff on your own. Search foursquare for "Asian supermarket", it will likely carry real Chinese ingredients even if it is primarily Vietnamese or Korean. As far as what to cook, I think https://omnivorescookbook.com/ always comes up with something pretty good. I also swear by the Mission Chinese cookbook. While some of those recipes aren't exactly authentic, they are close enough (and the author explains the ways they differ, like they have a recipe for kung pao pastrami - you're not going to find pastrami in China, but the kung pao part is pretty close).
China is also a huge place that has many regional variations. Just like BBQ in Texas is different from BBQ in Eastern North Carolina, it's hard to say what is or isn't authentic in terms of Chinese cuisine, or what is authentic to a particular regions, etc. I'm sure they're arguing about it over there, too.
Go to a homey, family-owned Chinese restaurant when they are not busy. Some have a separate menu for more authentic cooking; you can ask about that and if not, just tell them you want to try authentic regional dishes. I have had good luck with this even in the midwest. Make sure to tell them how adventurous you are - will you eat feet, intestines, head-on fish etc.
Just talk to first generation Chinese immigrants. I have to say American Chinese food and authentic Chinese food are belong to different categories and serve different sets of people.
NYC (+ metro area) at least has a number of places doing those things.
I'm not exactly qualified to judge their authenticity (although I've been taken by a Taiwanese acquaintance to more than one in the past - no names, sorry), but a lot of them are in immigrant communities where the primary customers seem to be people of those ethnic backgrounds, not "average Americans".
It's getting a bit better but there's still a long way to go even in the cities that have more Chinese options (NYC, west coast cities)