When people bring this up it always reminds me of this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fo59LlkTDe4

All the older first gen immigrants are like, it's not all authentic but it's pretty similar and tasty would eat it again. While the later gen kids are acting like its dog food.

It's also hilarious to act like there is one authorative version of a Chinese dish.

China is 1 billion people over a large geographic area that has culturally exchanged for hundreds and in some cases thousands of years; at this point, the same dish can have many regional variations in preparation. The mapo tofu or kung pao chicken you find in its homeland of Chongqing is going to be very different from the versions of the dish served to locals in Beijing, Shanghai, or Guangzhou. In that sense, American preparations of the same dish are adjusted to local taste and ingredient availability.

What exactly is hilarious about the concept of authenticity? I don't see the argument

>"Thirty years ago, there was no sushi in the U.K. or the U.S. Then someone introduced it: It was strange, it was wild—oh my God, it's raw fish with vinegary rice and horseradish—give me a break, why would I want to eat that? But people persevered and now there is sushi in every major city in the world. And it's popular too. What if I said sushi was a fraud, that it was never a traditional cuisine in Japan, and this guy called Mr. Sushi invented it? So instead of it being an authentic regional cuisine, no we lied to you, it is an invention. Would that make a difference or not? If it is really delicious, does it matter and should I care if it comes from Japan or California or even if it has no regional origin?"

I think Nathan Myhrvold’s takes on the “authenticity” of food are nice.

I've read that Salmon sushi is a recent thing for the Japanese after Norway marketed their salmon to them.

https://www.npr.org/2015/09/18/441530790/how-the-desperate-n...

Yes, it doesn't matter for taste, and I am not saying the authentic version of a dish is inherently "better". But of course it makes a difference, it affects how we perceive Japanese culture.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with enjoying non-authentic foods or being inspired to make variations/fusion dishes, but ignoring their origins is very insensitive IMO. I don't see what is so painful about acknowledging authenticity.

Edit: really it boils down to food being a huge part of culture. For example, when you say Pizza Hut is authentic Italian cuisine, you are saying something about Italian culture, and wanting to correct that is a perfectly normal thing to feel. We should not conflate authenticity with quality, but authenticity still matters.

authenticity is a product of time and place. most traditional recipes, if they have ever been standardized, have only done so in the past 100 or so years. what we consider authentic Italian food now would not have been considered as such 2 or 300 years ago, but now we want to gatekeep based on arbitrary lines in the sand.

as an example, a historic cooking show I watch got a fair amount of heat for making his Scottish-descended grandmother's Scottish shortbread recipe, which used rice flour. According to the authenticity experts, this was sacrilege because no true Scottish shortbread is made with rice flour, you use corn flour. And that may very well be true in 2021, but the show managed to pull a 1929 Scottish cookbook that used rice flour in their recipe; it turns out that corn flour is now common because corn flour became extremely cheap due to American corn production, but that is a fairly recent change. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnYltDdE8Cw

Sure, so authenticity is a moving target defined by the current members of a culture. I don't think that is enough justification to ignore it entirely. Regardless of how murky the definition is, surely I can say that a margherita pizza is more authentic Italian than a Domino's pie. It's a spectrum, and I am arguing more for the idea of distinguishing between large differences on the scale rather than quibbling about minor ones. I can agree that example is taking things too far without much productive purpose.

I agree to that quote, and, I think Dishes feel "inauthentic" when they taste not good, or considerably worse, like the BBC rice[1]. California rolls, Katsu curry without katsu - can't have issues with great food.

1: https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/uncle-roger-rice-food...

ps: The conversation here brought up a question inside me regarding English tea and tea preparation; never had a cup of English tea better than the shot of best Chinese tea I have had in my life. Shouldn't it be considered inauthentic then?

There is no single ‘authentic’ version of a given dish, just infinite variety and shades of authenticity depending on what you mean by that and your particular experiences.

I agree with most of that (I don't think personal experiences play much of a part; it's more about culture IMO), but I read the comment as suggesting authenticity is meaningless, which is a sentiment I have heard before and very much reject

The fetishization of the authentic is overwrought and is basically just exoticism.

Most traditional recipes, if they were even standardized (and the aforementioned mapo tofu, as an example, is not at all) have only been like that in the last 100-150 years. In fact, I have seen people claim food that actually does come from China/Hong Kong as inauthentic. As an example, honey walnut shrimp is actually a dish from Hong Kong style western cuisine, which lost popularity in its homeland but is still made by the diaspora.

To fetishize the authenticity of food is to reject progress and innovation. Korean or Indian food is no less authentic with the addition of chilis, even though those are not native plants to those regions and were introduced from the New World.

What a coincidence, I was actually thinking of honey walnut shrimp!

If you conflate quality with authenticity I could see how "fetishizing" authenticity is tantamount to rejecting innovation. But I think they are distinct concepts, so I have to disagree. I also wouldn't characterize my stance as fetishization, more that authenticity is also something to appreciate, below more important factors like taste.

Plenty of people conflate “authenticity” with “real”, and the implied antonym is “fake” which has plenty of negative meaning and has certainly been used to that effect. E.g. “real food does not contain MSG.”

Old Chinese people have experienced starvation. Young people have not.

Young people have something to prove, or differentiate themselves. See: hipsters.

White kids would also talk about how bad say, Chiles or Applebee's is, for the same reason.

I think in this case, "something to prove" is the desire to defend their culture

There is a difference between saying 'this is nothing like food in China', vs 'ugh its so bland/greasy/lifeless.'

In the video in question, the young people's complaints were very much the latter.

The old people seemed to more correlate it vs food in their country, but rated the food on its merits.

I used to think this, but then I visited China and the food isn't that different from Chinese food in the US if you are comparing food from the corresponding region of China.

Yes Kung Pao Chicken is very different from Cantonese dishes, but that's because Kung Pao Chicken is from a different part of China.

Why is that “sad”? If people enjoy the food, that’s a good thing right?

I suppose it's "sad" that you can't find the original or traditional dishes if you want. Immigrant Chinese cuisine has a long history of incorporating local ingredients and adjusting flavors preferred by locals. The new creations make me happy to eat. Bangkok has 1-3 American Chinese take-out restaurants with the New York menu for the large expat communities.

nothing sad about this. People grow up being used to different taste tone / palettes depending on local region, so businesses choose to cater to benefit of both customers and the business.

> sad part

Feel free to serve authentic Thai and Chinese cuisine in the west. Surely it will be a successful venture.