Eventually, the Chinese cooks learned that to appeal to American palates, they could disguise animal bits within golden-fried, friendly packages. Americans were suspicious of the unfamiliar flavors and textures of China’s nose-to-tail approach to cuisine. Called “chow chows,” these eateries catered primarily to their Asian brethren. In the 1850s, the California Gold Rush attracted fortune seekers from all over the world, including Chinese immigrants from Canton, who used their traditional cooking skills to operate the first hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurants. (Cue the old-timey piano music and sepia-toned photographs of mid-nineteenth century Barbary Coast.) From Canton to California To understand how foods like chop suey and egg foo yong, along with the people who ate them, landed in my somewhat sheltered corner of Pennsylvania, I had to go back to the California Gold Rush. They were so foreign (and, therefore, intriguing and attractive). If it’s traditional, it’s served as small, “pancake-like rounds of egg swimming in a rich brown gravy,” as The New York Times described it in 1936.Įven as a kid, I wondered how the Chinese family I saw working in that restaurant ended up in “nothing new ever happens here” coal country. Cooked, diced meats - shrimp, chicken, ham, or bits of crispy-chewy pork char siu - dot the omelet like confetti.
Some purists insist on the crunchy triumvirate of water chestnuts, celery, and bean sprouts - but carrots, cabbage, peas, and chopped broccoli have been known to make an appearance. It starts with lightly beaten eggs that are mixed with a variety of Chinese vegetables, the exact medley and quantity of which are up to the discretion - and available leftovers - of the cook. It’s an American dish, but its culinary roots reach back to Shanghai, and its name is Cantonese, with at least six accepted spellings including egg foo young, egg fooyung, egg foo yong, egg fu yung, and egg furong.įor the sake of simplicity, you may think of it as a deep-fried omelet. It’s not quite a fritter, almost a pancake, and somewhere beyond an omelet. What the devil is egg foo yong?Įgg foo yong has a deliciously confused identity. The food looked weird and appealing and confusing all at the same time I’d never seen anything like it. The cook casually threw a handful of sliced scallions on top with one hand, as he passed the white china plate off with the other. The fritter-like patties were piled on a plate, and then buried under a blanket of thick, brown, shiny gravy. I’d already decided to order my standby favorites - won ton soup, spare ribs, and plenty of fried noodles with sticky-sweet, apricot-colored duck sauce – but I watched with curiosity as another customer pointed to the stack of egg foo yong. Standing on my tiptoes for leverage, I saw a stack of crispy pancakes piled on a tray inside. The smell of hot, fried things hung in the air. It was amber from the perpetual grind of the grease and fogged with moisture. To peer into the display window, we had to get close - nose-touching-the-glass close. Its storefront was rimmed with gold filigree, and red dragons slithered up the doorframe. Sometimes on Saturday afternoons, my dad would pack us up in his ‘74 Cadillac Deville and steer us north on Route 61 to the Chinese restaurant in the next town over. I was seven years old, and my family lived in Orwigsburg, a small town tucked in the mountains between Amish farm country and smoke-tinged coal mining towns. Things weren’t often exotic in rural Pennsylvania.
The magazine went kerfluey and the story never got published, but I wanted to share it with you. A few months ago, I had the great pleasure of collaborating with Nom Nom Paleo on a magazine piece about egg foo yong.
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