I went to one Vietnamese restaurant all the time that was exactly like this. I ate there so often, one time when they were full they let me sit at the table with their son doing homework. I felt so honored.
Did you copy their work
Probably too high level to understand
Oh yeah, I know that place.
- constant stream of Asian students from the nearby university
- enormous menu, but somehow everything is made quickly
- additional staff are either family from the old country, or Latinos
- flyers in Mandarin (?) for things like churches, lawyers, and real estate agents.
Also the menu is huge but it’s all composed from like 6 ingredients.
To your last point they have at least one Shen Yun poster.
Idk, every Chinese person I know hates Shen Yun
it depends on the chinese in question. its because the people in Shen Yun are from the Falun Gong, which was a notorious religious group im china that was exiled and migrated to the U.S. The are staunchly anti CCP
And staunchly religious. This is one case of enemy of my enemy is not my friend.
And also staunchly nut jobs
everything is made quickly
Like instantly
It’s because of the 4 jet engines they call wok burners they got back there. Brings chicken from frozen to perfectly cooked in thirty seconds, complete with that smokey wok hei flavor
TIL about wok burners. And about a upgrade for the gas range at home.
But high heath and vaporizing cooking oil, sounds really unhealthy to me.
But it’s so delicious
Close; it’s usually Cantonese and not Mandarin. But yes, otherwise true.
My understanding is Fuzhounese is also very common to be heard in Chinese restaurants. Fujian cuisine is one of the more commonly exported forms of Chinese cuisine.
But let’s face it a P.H.D. Quantum mechanics is probably easier than understanding the regional languages and dialects of spoken Chinese.
Can you order my food for me in quantum mechanics?
Sure quantum entanglement should allow for instantaneous ordering and instantaneous delivery.
But what if I can’t decide what I want instantaneously?
It is always the human factor screwing things up.
I can usually tell Cantonese apart but you really have to be exposed to the sounds as a kid. I don’t know any of it, though, I can only figure out the language being spoken and there’s no way I’d know every dialect, haha.
You have me beat the best I have is knowing it is some form of Chinese. They only way I know it mandarin is if I catch some one saying “nǐ hǎo”
Yeah was gonna say the majority of Chinese immigrants who own restaurants in America speak Cantonese. Definitely true in SF an NYC.
Do chain Chinese places even exist outside of malls and tourist traps?
I’ve got one near me and I love their chicken fried rice. Felt real old when they mentioned said kids are going to college now.
Came here to post about how weird it is when the kid goes off to college.
Change that to Cantonese and you have my partner’s childhood.
We have one of those and it’s amazing. They even have a drive through. The only problem is I can’t understand a word she says over the order speaker. It sounds like yelling from inside a tin can in a hurricane with a heavy accent. But honestly it wouldn’t be the same without that.
And then?
No and then.
And you get a meal that is like two full dinner’s worth for $7
Nothing like scooping a full serving of lo mein out of the container and it’s still full afterwards.
Extradimensional takeout box.
The best Chinese place I’ve ever eaten at is exactly this. My sister was on the son’s soccer team and my mom gave the kid a ride to practice a few times. The parents paid us in our usual orders for helping them out.
I used to live near one where neither parent spoke very good English, so they had their teenage daughter answering phones and handling payment while her five year old brother rolled around on a tricycle.
The amazing thing was she was better at taking phone orders than anyone I’ve had to deal with. Her voice was clear and easy to understand, with no pots clattering in the background. She would read the order back to me and then tell me how much it was going to be and when it would be ready. You’d think this is normal stuff but it almost never happens when I call in an order, which is why I use DoorDash instead.
10/10 would order from there again.
I have a place just like that around the corner.
The food sucks.This perfectly describes a Chinese joint near me called Jewel’s Noodles.
I worked at one of these places for a while. My primary duties: Delivery, manning the phones, being a native English speaker. I gained a lot of insight about the Chinese takeout industry.
Also, you’ve never lived until you’ve seen the owner’s wife march out into the lobby and whack the shit out of some hood rat with a giant spoon.
I am guessing that the giant spoon was something like these
It was a massive stainless steel ladle used for the stock pot. Must be every bit of three feet long, including the hook on the end of the handle.
Ahh so that was the flavour I had a hard time identifying in my won ton soup
For a viết place you can tell because they keep the mop and bucket in the bathroom with the big ass container of that pink liquid soap.
Nah, the real Viet place is where the old men congregate to smoke cigarettes and play pachisi all day.
We have a local coffee and bahn mi place that had to buy a whole other set of outdoor tables and chairs to set up away from the other customers, chasing off the gaggle of old men gambling became too time consuming, so they just gave in and planned around it.
Never start a terf war with old vietnamese men, it never pans out.
Oh so that new place that opened up next to my local Walmart is Vietnamese; there’s always a bunch of old dudes from the kitchen (I assume from the aprons) playing dice and smoking right next to the front door lol
Prob, pachisi does feature a fair amount of dice action. Unfortunately the gambling itself doesn’t really narrow it down too much. East Asian peeps tend to like their gambling, myself included.
That last part is too accurate lol. We sometimes visited our friend’s family restaurant and he would always be at the counter doing his homework when we walk in.
