So went to dinner at foo Chow. The menu has gotten to the point they have only one page with Fujian specialties
They no longer have the oyster cakes, similar to crispy donuts with oyster fillings. No fo tiao qiang special ordered. They never had razor clams. They had the omelette if I asked them to make it. It was more like a Cantonese oyster omelette but it was still very good. Just very limited dishes. Jonathan Gold wtote that
there were a bunch of restaurant specializing in this cuisine but I don’t recall him ever listing any
It’s not the same as Taiwanese cuisine. Even though Taiwanese cuisine derives from this. Eight metal
Even in New York it’s not always easy. I remember going by Restaurant and flashing with the sign in the window saying in Chinese authentic FUjian cuisine
Inside I was having a menu it was only Cantonese dishes. As a server where the Min cuisine food was . He says it was the second menu only in Chinese. I said fine bring it. And I had a wonderful meal
Not to say that the Cantonese dishes would not have been wonderful as well. It’s just that’s not why I was at this restaurant
I knew a gal that was Fujianese and was family friends with the folks that owned Foo Chow. The thing to do then was to find out when the chef was in town from Taiwan and make special orders. This was over ten years ago so who knows if that’s still the case. I replied to a Johnathan Gold post on Chowhound asking about Fujian cuisine back then…
Did a quick search and found your (Jerome) from 2007!
warrior: i don’t know a whole lot about this stuff, but i believe the cuisine at seafood palace on garvey in monterey park overlaps with fujian cuisine. i haven’t been there in several years, but it’s not bad.
There used to be in Arcadia a restaurant called Fuzhou Cuisine but they closed. I liked this place better than Foo Chow in terms of the Fuzhou style wontons.
Besides Manhattan being essentially the sole port of entry for Fujianese migrants, the main mode of transport for Fujianese Americans is an intricate network of Chinese operated bus companies that regularly run between Manhattan and just about any major city east of the Mississippi River. As such Fujianese Americans operate the large majority of Chinese restaurants (a good chunk of which are Chinese buffet restaurants) in the eastern United States. And the further west you go, the fewer Fujianese residents you find, so when you get to California the number of Fujianese is very small, making the demand for Fujianese food likewise quite small.
Fuzhou/Fujian cuisine has been rare in the decade plus that I roamed the SGV. In addition to Fuzhou Cuisine in Arcadia, I only recall one other fairly short-lived place, and it was c. 2010. I believe it was located in the Golden Deli plaza in San Gabriel. The name escapes me. Perhaps, chandavkl can fill in that blank.
EDIT: Dug around and found it. Sweet Aroma Cafe. Also, an even more short-lived place across Las Tunas, next to Luscious Dumplings: Liu Xiang Yuan, from early 2011.
I’m around
Just tried the Wuhan’s reganmian that’s so famous. At tasty, 301 w valkey blvd we have the big dry hot pots as well but I was one person so not getting it. I would go back to try it. As for the noodles, they were all right. I could see they would be a good breakfast dish. Not too impressed. And realize there’s a reason that Hubei isn’t considered one of the eighth great cuisines
Shanghai restaurant at focus plaza is really good. Had the Manchurian wild rice stems zizania bith ways
Happy to go back
At 301w I was intrigued by two places. One, man Chang seems to have a real Hainan chicken and rice maybe even Hainan style. Other has signs for braised yellow stuff (Huang men) Chicken, etc. Looked it up later. This is the style of cooking which I’m not familiar originally from Shandong provenance but has been adopted by a lot of the country. Never had it. Might go try it.
This is an explanation I guess. My other guess is that people from other parts of the country don’t know the food that well. I’ve really liked it whenever I’ve had it. The razor clams are special. The meatballs made of forcemeat wrapped in a slice of meat are really good. The fried cakes of oyster or shrimp are amazing
There are reasons why there are Thai restaurants all over this country in areas without Thai coimmunity. I am just surprised that there isn’t demand at all here. After all we have three or so Tibetan Momo houses
Also, many immigrants might know how to make homestyle food. But this is one of the eight great cuisines. There is a whole tradition of food at every level. I don’t expect immigrants who come here for economic reasons to necessarily be masters at making Buddha jumps the wall
The dark side of this is a lot of Fujianese restaurant operators gotta pay the Dragon Head in Manhattan Chinatown. So you won’t see much on the west coast.
Another dark side is the reason for the bus network out of Manhattan is that a good portion of the Fujianese restaurant workers are here illegally and cannot use traditional forms of transportation which require identification. Those who are unfamiliar with the episode of the Golden Venture, which sank off the coast of Queens in the 1990s, killing 10 migrants, might want to check the story out. The survivors were eventually deported back to Fujian, yet some tried migrating again to New York not long after their return to China.
Yes, Sweet Aroma Cafe was open for just a few months starting in 2010. It was in the plaza on the SW corner of Las Tunas and Mission, in the spot that later became Emperor Noodle with the giant Shanghai dumplings. The only notation I have is that I ate fish in red wine sauce there.
Illegality /lack of documentation?
Aren’t there plenty of folks working in food service without proper immigration documentation? Maybe not restaurant owners but…
Still you need a population base although not as much as in the past
Quanjude had a branch in Rosemead in the 90s that was excellent but local Chinese /from different regions couldn’t see spending that kind of money for .18, duck dish banquets. They tried to cater to locals by adding some abalone and sea cucumber dishes to new banquet menus but to no avail.
Still 101 noodle did well without a huge Shandong beifang population
The issue with the Fujianese workers is that while most of them first land in Manhattan Chinatown, they fan out from there to all parts of the eastern United States. Basically staffing for Fujianese owned restaurants occurs in Manhattan Chinatown, whether the restaurant is located in St. Louis, St. Paul, St. Petersburg or St. Albans. A worker looking for a new gig will hop the bus back to Manhattan, and get a new job via one of the dozens of Chinese restaurant employment agencies. Then in less than 24 hours he can hop another bus to a new job in a completely different part of the country.
My knowledge of the sinking, and the history around it, is thanks to Patrick Radden Keefe’s “ The Snakehead: An Epic Tale of the Chinatown Underworld and the American Dream”:
I liked this place better than Foo Chow in terms of the Fuzhou style wontons.