A Historical Perspective Of American Cuisine and The Blend-in Of Asian Dining (3/6)

? 1886 Josephine Cochran invents the first working dishwasher. ? 1888 The first vending machines in the U.S. are introduced on New York City subway platforms, selling tutti-frutti gum. ? 1897 A cough medicine manufacturer creates an 88 percent sugar gelatin dessert that his wife names Jell-O. Immigrants have brought their own ingredients and traditions to the American table. But not every ethnic cuisine has had a lasting impact. Today, there are few culinary relics from 19th-century German immigrants, although a meat-and-potatoes dinner remains a classic American meal. Italian immigrant food, on the other hand, has a devout following, even if it is not exactly true to its roots. Throngs of southern Italians, arriving in the late 1800s and early 1900s, adapted native dishes to suit American palates and ingredients, adding more meat and reducing the spice in pizzas and pasta. Asian Food Invasion: Begin with Chinese Food. The Asian-food invasion began in the mid-1900s. Drawn to the West Coast by the California gold rush in 1849, Chinese immigrants made a living in food-service businesses, which were fairly cheap to run and required plenty of hired hands. Soon, "going out for Chinese" became the hallmark of adventurous dining, though restaurant chow mein, chop suey, and egg foo yong bear little resemblance to authentic Chinese food. By the 1890s, Chinese restaurants had sprung up in big cities on both coasts. Most early Chinese immigrants hailed from Canton, in southern China, and brought with them that city's celebrated cuisine. But as those restaurateurs strived to adapt to the tastes of their new land, they came up with something altogether different: chop suey. This mix of chopped meat, vegetables, and bean sprouts, which translates to "little pieces," may have been an amateur chef's improvisation or may have been created for the visit of a Chinese viceroy in 1896. No matter. Chop suey proved exotic and familiar, cheap and delicious, an irresistible combo that led to a proliferation of chop suey houses. Other innovations, including chow mein, egg foo young, and the fortune cookie, followed. Chinese restaurateurs, well aware of how intimidating the new cuisine could be, offered tips on ordering "family style" and came up with the "one from Column A, one from Column B" system to simplify choosing. Chinese restaurants also welcomed blacks and Jews when other establishments shunned them; Christmas dinner at a Chinese restaurant is still a tradition for many Jewish families. Chinese-American cuisine adapted again after 1965, when a new law loosened restrictions on immigrants from Asia. Spicier dishes like Sichuan chicken and Hunan pork, from northern China, started to push chop suey off the menu. New immigrants seeking opportunity ventured into new markets. By 1971, there were 28 Chinese restaurants in Utah. Now there are 263. Regional variations abound. Chinese restaurants in the Northwest don't shy from serving hamburgers. Southerners are more partial to fried chicken dishes. "There's a lot of inventiveness," says Cheuk Kwan, a Toronto filmmaker who visited 13 countries for his documentary series Chinese Restaurants. "In Mauritius, I found a woman doing fantastic cuisine fusing Chinese, Creole, and Indian. The resulting dishes are a wonderful fusion food unlike anything else in the world." More Asian Dishes Chinese food left Americans hungry for more Asian dishes. And there are now plenty of options. The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 turned Asian cuisine into a major force in American food history by adjusting quotas that favored northwestern Europeans. More important, it exempted close relatives of immigrants already in the United States from these quotas. As a result, Asian immigration more than quadrupled by 1970; Asians and Latin Americans made up 75 percent of the 4 million immigrants to the United States in the 70s. Going mainstream