Two Women Brought Northern Chinese Food to America

In this episode, we will talk about the first wave of the impact of the Chinese Revolution on Chinese food in America with two pioneer women - Joyce Chen in Cambridge, and Cecilia Chiang in San Francisco.
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
0:16 Chinese Revolution and Chinese food
1:45 Joyce Chen
2:03 Cecilia Chiang
3:40 Joyce Chen Restaurant in Cambridge
9:30 The Mandarin in San Francisco
Credits:
- Joyce Chen Restaurant menu: ciadigitalcollections.culinary...
- PBS China a Century of Revolution: • Video
- Report from China 1967: • " REPORT FROM CHINA" ...
- 2013 James Beard Lifetime Achievement Award: Cecilia Chiang: • 2013 James Beard Lifet...
- San Francisco Chinatown: • The Mills Brothers - C...
- San Francisco Chinatown: • 1960s San Francisco, C...
- San Francisco Chinatown: • 1960s San Francisco Ch...

[@DigitalIslandboy]

It was quite entertaining to learn Joyce Chen's history. I didn't know a lot about her as she was pretty quiet person. She lived the next block over from me. I just happen to catch the special on Chinese Global Television. I used to visit her restaurant that was on Rindge Avenue before it was knocked down. Very nice lady.

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

Wow!! Did you run into her from time to time?

[@algernon5776]

Fantastic!!

[@MichaelJi8]

Amazing channel! Enjoyed the content

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

Yay, thank you so much!

[@HootOwl513]

Danny Kaye was a big time commedian in the '40s, '50s and '60s [11:00] He loved Chinese food, and his hobby was cooking it.

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

I didn't know about it at all. It would be interesting to do an episode that talks about "famous" folks that love Chinese food.

[@HootOwl513]

@@AmericanChineseFoodShow Also Donn The Beachcomber's was a very early Tiki bar. [The Original]. Donn had been a bootlegger during Prohibition. so his Hollywood liquor license required he serve food. To go with his tropical drinks, he served ''Chinese'' Food. Also celebrity patrons could keep their personalized chopsticks in laquer boxes in a rack behind the bar, for when ever they ate in the club. The names figuring prominently.

[@variatings]

This channel is so good! I can’t believe how few views this has! May I suggest reworking your thumbnail icons for more engagement?

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

Haha, unfortunately, you can't change the thumbnail once the video is made public. I DO REGRET spending zero time on the thumbnails in my early videos. Usually it's late at night, I had already spent hours editing, but I still needed to make a thumbnail and I went MEH

[@norbertk9595]

I enjoyed this very much.
My family moved to MA. from CA. in the 70s and one of our favorite places to visit in Cambridge was Joyce Chen's restaurant. I even obtained a copy of her cookbook, which came out in the late 1950s.

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

Wow, you have to tell us more what the dining experience was like. Did you try the buffet dinner? Did you meet her in person?

[@norbertk9595]

@@AmericanChineseFoodShow Visits to Joyce Chen's Alewife restaurant were a very important part of my childhood -- in fact, my brother and I reminisced about this recently in email.
The Alewife restaurant was very spacious. We began to visit in 1977 or 1978 and it became a ritual. We would go for the buffet lunch and add dishes from the menu. I was enthralled with the Peking Ravioli and the moo-shi. I also remember egg rolls, spring rolls, a spicy tofu dish (it must have been ma-po tofu), a crispy fried tofu dish., and multiple types of fried rice.
This was all very exciting to me because we had moved from multi-ethnic Los Angeles to suburban Massachusetts where people were content with pizza. Visits to Joyce Chen's restaurant were an opportunity to thwart the monotony of the small-town Massachusetts diet. I am crazy about Chinese food to this day.
Joyce did come out from the kitchen area and interact with customers, but I don't remember speaking with her myself.
There were striking examples of Chinese art in the restaurant. I remember a bust of Confucius, and an incredible dragon that appeared to have been carved out of ivory.

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

@@norbertk9595 I am so jealous a food legend was a big part of your childhood memories and influenced your relationship with Chinese food. We really should talk about Joyce Chen more often. I have content for another episode on Joyce.

[@norbertk9595]

@@AmericanChineseFoodShow I look forward to that episode!
Do you have a copy of Joyce Chen's cookbook?
There was a time when I thought it would be an interesting project to write a book about the history of Chinese restaurants in Boston, but I realized that my inability to speak in Mandarin or Cantonese would be too great a handicap.

[@dushman888]

Excellent narrative

[@AmericanChineseFoodShow]

I really should've made two separate episodes for each of them :p

[@Alex.8081]

Well done!

[@kennylee1732]

Love this