Andrew Coe's Chop Suey.

[ratmmjess]

Andrew Coe's Chop Suey: A Cultural History of Chinese Food in the United States is informative and entertaining. Coe's a professional food critic and knows his subject, and he spends a decent amount of time on the history of Chinese and American interaction, the evolution of Chinese cuisine, how Chinese writers have viewed Chinese food, and so on.

Comments

[immlass]

That was a really fascinating book for me (I'm more and more interested in 19th c. American social & cultural history and historical fiction) and I'm glad to see you read it and have comments on it.

[ratmmjess]

It was a fun read. Just lacking in that ineffable Awesomeness I hope for.

[immlass]

It was definitely a pop read, but my foundation in 19th c American (really urban) isn't strong enough to cope with much more. But yeah, it was fun and that's mostly what I'm looking for in pop histories. I don't expect them to be accurate--except when they're in MY AREA and then they damn well better be AWESOME and PERFECT, so I totally get your point

[ratmmjess]

I don't demand perfection, but I want at least one anecdote that makes me think, oh, you lucky bastard for having discovered that, I would have wanted to be the one to tell the world about it. (Because it's all about me, of course).

I take your point about stratification--same effect as places like Olive Garden on neighborhood eateries, unfortunately.

[richardthinks]

I take it you're familiar with Van Tilburg's Chinese Junks on the Pacific? - although that's exactly the sort of exploration-of-the-exotic study that a Chinese fishing fleet in SanFran would rather tend to trouble.

As for learning more about the junks, if you do, please let me know. Interior descriptions are pretty much non-existent. The recent exhibition here in Paris - tous les bateaux du monde - showed a section diagram of a Japanese Fune from the 19th c, done by a French admiral. It's the only one I've ever seen. The catalogue's worth getting, if you're buying for the library, but alas it doesn't have the diagram! I believe there must be great documentation of SF's junks somewhere.

And I'm persistently amazed at how late SF and the west coast in general "enters history." It seems to me there are still Alaskan log rafts meandering into town in the 1870s and 1880s, and fur trappers and stuff like that. I'd be curious to know what happened between then and say 1930 to create a modern city.

[britgeekgrrl]

The SF public library has an AWESOME (and searchable) collection of pix from SF's history, including pix of the waterfront in which you can see - you guessed it - junks.

(and the pic they have of Chinatown on New Year's in, erm, 1904 I think it is is just FANTASTIC. No indication that it wasn't actually taken in China)

The other resource I suggest you tap is the Hyde St. Pier Maritime Museum. They've even built their own (albeit rather small) replica of a junk used by the Chinese population. They run a gift/bookshop and I suspect that whoever is behind the counter could recommend a title or two as I'm sure books have been written about 'em.

[nitasee]

I'm putting that book on my want list. It fits into my sooper-secret project on food history. (A personal interest of mine and something I just might write a book about.)

Sounds interesting.

[ratmmjess]

Food history is fascinating stuff, I think. Looking forward to what you do with it!

[caprine]

How cool!