The contents of a fridge tell a lot about the occupants of a house. Or, if the fridge contains a pint of milk and a lump of cheese, maybe the subject of culinary analysis cannot cook and will not cook. At least his talents will extend to ordering Chinese food delivery from his favourite takeout.
There’s something about Oriental take-out that beats all the others hands down. Be honest, at the end of the day a pizza is glorified cheese on toast in a cardboard box. Of course, that is not to say that it does not have its place.
The range of dishes from dim sum finger delights to rice and noodle dishes of tremendous variety can provide a family feast that is ideal for sharing. The Chinese see the sharing of a meal almost as a communication of love, and boy we do love to chow as well.
The huge 19th century influx of migrant workers from China resulted in a need to feed an army from the east. Chinese restaurants grew up in response to this and focused in clusters around communities that became know as the Chinatown of wherever it happened to be. Westerners caught onto the value for money aspect to the cuisine and soon fell in love with Chop Suey. As time went on the restaurants adapted their food to western tastes and flourished throughout the western world as a consequence.
Sweet and Sour pork is an example of a dish created very much with western tastes in mind, but with its roots in Asian cuisine. Also, the humble fortune cookie, albeit a novelty at the end of a meal, starts to look a little suspect when interrogated about its Asian credentials
This sweet little biscuit and paper strip message treat, was developed to keep bored diners from eating table cloths or each others faces in one particular restaurant in the 1950s. There was a story that fortune cookies extended from the practice in the Ming Dynasty of the emperor receiving hidden messages in sticky buns regarding an imminent attack, only for the emperor to have eaten the buns and suffered from massive indigestion. However, it seems unlikely there is any truth in this hokum.
In the 1950s there was also a boom for ordering food for the road, which to the greater extent the Chinese can take responsibility for. 19th century waiters would take dinners with plates, bowls and silverware to cater for private homes. Given the length of time they have had to practice the art of home delivery, oriental restaurants have got it down to a fine art.
Something of the history of the early oriental restaurants still exists in the tradition of having set meals, and numbered items on the menu. This, apparently, was to help assist in the communication problems of ordering a meal. To this day many people who have had a few too many beers still have a communication problem and often favour this system of number ordering when ringing from home.
Unlike many other restaurants, the Chinese entrepreneurial spirit knows no bounds and they have no objection to providing all sorts of delights from south east Asia This adds to the diversity and interest. No doubt many fortune cookies have predicted correctly that there will be more ordering of Chinese food delivery in the not so distant future.
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