Hey guys, I know that this video got a little… sassy… in parts. Wasn’t our intention, but it is what it is. *Please* don’t interpret this video as directed at any individual creators or anything: 1. The quick cuts of everyone saying ‘better than takeout’ were *only* to illustrate the ubiquity of the term. I also included the La Choy dragon in there to show it’s got a really deep history - I even remember seeing old recipes from the 70s and 80s also claiming stuff as ‘better than takeout’ (couldn’t seem to be able to dig them up from a quick google though). Again, all we want to do is get people to think twice before using the quip. I’m also aware that some creators’ livelihoods depend on owning that term for SEO purposes - I wouldn’t expect (or even want) them to make some kind of change just because we’re a little miffed. 2. “Better than takeout” also certainly isn’t *solely* a Chinese phenomenon. Other Asian cuisines - and Mexican! - also seem quite popular to categorize under the label. And yes, you *can* definitely also find ‘better than takeout pizza’ and ‘better than takeout burgers’, but the quantity definitely seems to pale in comparison. 3. Anyway, I know this is definitely another video that could be put in the bucket of “Chris and Steph tilt at the people-obsessing-about-restaurant-stove windmill” (maybe one day we’ll make a playlist, lol). I’m definitely aware that our position runs contradictory to a lot of people in the space. 4. In my personal view, the biggest advantage that that people don’t talk about re those restaurant stoves is *speed*. Like, take a look at the video of that dude whipping up some stir-fried Horfun: www.bilibili.com/video/BV1EV4y137ad/ He’s able to pump that thing out in basically two minutes flat. If it was us, working on a home stove, that whole thing might take… 6 minutes? 8 minutes? Now imagine a dinner rush… the chef that knows how to work that burner would be able to get three to four times the sales! It’d be stupid not to opt for it, provided you had the ability. 5. Are there some advantages, flavor wise, that those stoves provide? I’d grant that they do seem to provide *something*, but if we control for everything else (restaurant techniques like guoyou, restaurant approaches to seasoning, the skill of the chef, the fact that a restaurant stir-fry is served hot from the wok instead of needing to wait at the table) we believe that that something is… subtle. Much of what the flavors that people attribute to ‘wok hei’, we believe, is actually just the flavor of chefs being good at their jobs. 6. Generally speaking though, if you look online in English, people talking about wok hei will begin to extol the ‘char’ that the stoves provide. But next time you’re getting Cantonese food at a restaurant, I want you to ask yourself - how “charred” is the food that you’re eating, really? In Cantonese, ‘breath of the wok’ and ‘char’ are two separate concepts - the former, “wok hei” (镬气); the latter, “nong” (燶). In the Cantonese cooking system, wok hei is something that’s valued; nong is something to be avoided. American barbecue would be an example of something that would be very ‘nong’, which is likely why American-style BBQ joints seem to struggle in Guangdong. Those ‘nong’ bits are, in a TCM context, super ‘shanghuo’ (i.e. 上火, “warming” in a bad way) - like, Steph’s mom will obsessively snip off any charred bits from her food. Hell, some of Steph’s friends even avoid the crispy rice at the bottom of claypot rice for the same reason… 7. In sum, char is a quality that *American* cuisine values, not Cantonese. THAT SAID, if you personally enjoy your stir fries charred? Do it! Char your beef! Adjust to your tastes! International adaptation is fun. We just think there’s a certain level of oddness using a Cantonese term to justify something that is a very non-Cantonese end result. 8. The elephant in the room, however, is that online some of the proponents of actively charring stir fried ingredients are actually Americans with Cantonese ancestral backgrounds. So I do think we have to be open to the idea that wok hei might actually mean something *different* to Cantonese-Americans than it does to Cantonese in Guangdong. But like, maybe that’s to be expected? I mean, Chinese communities in America’ve been around just as long or longer than Italian communities, right? It makes sense that many people’s tastes would be more ‘American’ in nature, because I mean, they’re… Americans. So while something like Tim Chin’s ‘Torch Hei’ might cause Steph’s mom to recoil in horror, it’s probably correct for him in his kitchen according to his tastes. 9. In a similar sense, there’s another sort of category of video out there that earnestly tries to make a ‘superior’ homestyle version of [insert takeout dish here] - usually using some sort of variation of one of Kenji’s classic SE recipes. But if I remember correctly, in those articles Kenji’s very upfront that he’s uses a sort of ‘Korean Fried Chicken’ approach in order to add crunch. And if you like that sort of crunch like Kenji does, that’s cool! Cook it! Enjoy it! Kenji’s one of the best recipe writers of our time for a reason. But then, it’s not fair to compare the ‘crunch’ of your homemade version vs takeout, because the takeout version isn’t going for ‘crunch’. 10. A few years back Priya Krishna coined the term “Crispy Gone Soggy”, and went on an offensive of sorts to try to convince people that many of the best deep fried dishes aren’t necessarily ‘crispy’ anymore. For example, everyone loves Chicken Parm, but the deep fried coating there’s less for crunch, and more for absorbing the flavors of the sauce. It’s something that I deeply deeply agree with, BUT I think a Chinese culinary term - ‘pao’ (泡), i.e. ‘puffy with sauce’ - could also be used to describe the phenomenon (and might be a little more appetizing-sounding in English haha). 11. Because quite often (but certainly not always!), the point of certain coatings in saucy stir fries is in order to *absorb the sauce*. Because if you want something crunch + saucy, a question that’s worth asking, I think, is… why not just dip? Like, for me personally, if I’m getting something quite crunchy like Korean Fried Chicken, I personally actually prefer the plain sort and to dip in the sauce. The chicken stays crunchier, I can control the sauce quantity, and it’s less messy to eat. 12. But if YOU like your stuff crunchy, that’s cool! You’re allowed to adjust to your tastes, whether cultural or otherwise - that’s part of the fun! I just think it’s a little silly to then claim that these adjustments then are somehow intrinsically superior. Like, there’s this book on Cantonese cuisine (that we otherwise really enjoy), that in one part discusses the history of Cantonese chefs going abroad and spreading the cuisine. In the 1970s, they mention, that Cantonese chefs went to Singapore and Thailand and - his words - “significantly elevated the local cuisine”. Recently, living here in Bangkok, we’ve been enjoying whipping up a bit of Thai food, but sometimes I find that I can’t help but cut back a bit on the sugar, marinate my meat, etc etc. Sometimes I’ll joke around with Steph “here, try some of my Pad Krapow, but SIGNIFICANTLY ELEVATED”. The joke is that I’m not actually elevating anything, I’m just tweaking Thai cuisine based off of my own tastes and a few techniques employed by the cooking system I’m most familiar with (probably Cantonese, by this point). Want to do the same thing with Cantonese food and American techniques/tastes? Awesome! Even on this channel I’ll find myself doing so for a bit of Cha Chaan Teng fare. Just know that you *are* adjusting, and (given the popularity of Chinese food worldwide), your adjustment probably won’t be intrinsically ‘better’, though they’ll probably be better for your own tastes. 13. Quick aside that for the ‘not saucy’ seasoning at 8:02, the correct water quantity is the second (yellow, highlighted) one - i.e. 1 tbsp. Sorry about that - forgot to correct the first textbox. And of course, the recipe in the description box is the correct :) Oof. Apologies for the novella there. We’ve obviously got… a lot of stuff to say lol. Again, HUGE thank you to everyone that’s watched over these six years; and an especially huge thank you to everyone that’s supported us on Patreon. Being able to have ‘freedom from the algorithm’ has been huge in being able to create the sort of content that we’re passionate about :)
The sass is warranted! There can be some very dismissive attitudes towards takeout cuisine that really belittles the history and reasons behind why food is prepared a certain way, and it sucks even more when it's weaponised to dismiss the quality of any food.
It's fine, but also kind of silly to imagine some kind of insult (feigning insult is merely a manipulative way of controlling other people). People say 'better than takeout', because takeout is their only experience eating particular styles of food. And let's be honest -- places like P. X. Press are the T. Belle of """Chinese""" takeout (both likely to cause food poisoning). Anyway, people sit around at home wondering how to make their favorite takeout meal at home, and titles like 'Better than takeout' get more clicks than 'Let's appreciate the thousands of years it took for Chinese to invent broccoli mixed with beef'. 'Takeout' is the only common frame of reference that we have.
Please please, sass away. I won't get into it, but I've noticed the disparagement of Chinese cooking in particular as well. They love it, but they hate that they love it. Also a lot of Chinese cooking is now being umbrella termed 'asian' instead of giving fair due.
I will forever and always preach the gospel that regional chinese cuisine is just as varied and complex and worthy of all the same respect and reverence that we give to italian and french cuisine in western culture, and everything you two do on this channel has been on the front lines of that fight and I wanna thank you guys for that and say keep up the good fight and cheers to at least another 6 years of dope content ahead!
100% agree, but I'd like to point out that when I was a kid, Italian food had no more respect than Chinese food. It was considered cheap and tasty and lowbrow. Fancy food was French, period. People have learned that there is more to it. Let's hope the same can be said for Chinese food in a few years, not to mention Mexican, and many other cuisines.
@@DragonbIaze052 At the risk of offending people I'll provide some analysis: In favour of Chinese: - Throughout most of history China has had a higher population than Europe and thus more opportunity for innovation and development. - The Chinese imperial court was much wealthier than any European royals, thus allowing very fancy techniques and recipes to develop. - China imported a lot of ingredients through the Silk Road and from Southeast Asia. - Chopsticks forces the cook to cut ingredients into smaller pieces, which then favours combining more ingredients and flavours. In favour of European: - Europeans imported a lot of ingredients from their colonies in the last couple centuries. - A lot of Chinese heritage were destroyed in the Cultural Revolution. - Eating with fork and knife allows western cook to focus on the original flavour of the ingredients. - Cheese.
They both have their Strengths and weaknesses. Obviously western europeans are masters of dairy and they have a very impressive Cured meat culture... Whereas China and Asian Cuisine in general excel excel in creating umami rich pastes that have gone Through Fermentation whether it be soy or seafood or chiles or meat. Can't really speak about mongolian cuisine and their use of dairy
"In a Western context... people tend to eat beef not completely cooked." Congratulations, you channeled the energy of every traditional Asian mother, including mine.
Some information to add about the marinade ingredients: Table salt, baking soda, and soy sauce all help tenderize the meat. The underlying chemistry is the same as brining: the dissolved salt ions allow some proteins to relax their structure. Papain (papaya enzyme) and sometimes bromelain (pineapple enzyme) are proteases. They cut the protein in your meat into smaller peptides, thus improving texture and flavour. There are some Chinese soups that use papaya or pineapple in them, supposedly for the same purpose, although I suspect most of the enzyme are denatured by heat before they can do anything. Cornstarch and egg white basically make the marinade stick to the meat, thus improving flavour and protecting the ingredients.
Underrated comment. I'm sure they'd love to see it as they've expressed a lot of interest in the science of food in the past. Hopefully this reaches them.
Originally I had salt under 'flavor and texture' for similar reasons, but Steph disagreed. She pointed out that often at restaurants the meat is marinated and then gets tossed in oil reasonably quickly (sometimes even 30-60 seconds later), which wouldn't be long enough for the salt to 'work'. Then again, the meat is quite thinly sliced. So I'm not completely sure either way.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified I don't think Steph's example disproves the explanation. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Even if some restaurants don't allow enough time for salt to affect the protein, others might. I'm no biochemist but I did a lab in biochemistry in college. My impression is that these sort of reactions happen at a time scale comparable to dissolving salt in water. 30-60 seconds might be enough for a portion of the protein to relax.
wow i learnt all of my beef marinating recipe from my mom (& grandma) and i only add salt, ginger, garlic, oyster sauce, oil & pepper (salt & ginger are essential, the rest are optional and have decreasing importance) with buffalo, the content is the same, just with garlic instead of ginger
I agree with Steph’s take and see the same phenomenon with Mexican food, which is (mainly in the US) seen as lesser or un elevated which comes from the same ignorance and condescension. Examples like the “better than Chinese stir fry takeout” movement take a dish and isolates it from it’s origin, traditions and culture, simplifying it to the lowest common denominator that people enjoy. All these RUclipsrs that call themselves chefs forget that studying cuisine goes hand in hand with an anthropological and cultural understanding of the food, not just the ingredients on the recipe.
You guys are using a bad faith argument and closing your eyes to a whole lot of factors, for the sake of giving a feeble lecture... Some food is meant for home cooking and some food is meant for takeout.... Better than take-out for pizza, tacos, burgers, donuts, fish'n chips, sandwiches and coffee is ABSOLUTELY a thing that is not restricted to chinese food. Chinese people are just very culturally industrious and tended to open restaurants that produce take-out/fastfood versions of the simplest food from home, whereas other culture tend to cook at home first (sometimes for generations) without selling, and then slowly consider opening vans and eateries with their simple foods, in take out version. Meanwhile, I've never seen a Peking duck, a salmon carbonara pasta, or a wedding cake in take out form. Improving on fast-food is not condescension: It's youtube algorithm pleasing. (those things you know and love but at home, and better!!!)
@@AnimatedStoriesWorldwide Adding- There is a world of difference between the best Chinese food and whatever I find in a strip-mall. Better than takeout for the latter can be as simple as seasoning properly and not being kept under a heat lamp. This is the reason why hole-in-the-wall places that kill it are so valued. No one is comparing their home cooking to them (and actually try to replicate it). I could make the same comparison to Domino's "take-out" spaghetti vs. what you would get in some grandma's kitchen. Better than take-out is absolutely the case, but for lasagna, it's just easier to go to a more reputable establishment.
Part of the problem in the US is that most mexican food IS garbage; if you don't live in Cali, Texas, NM, etc there's a good chance when you think mexican you think either Taco Bell (ugh) or one of the slightly better but still crap chains like Qdoba, Chipotle, or Del Taco. Compared these offerings? It is trivial and absolutely 100% achievable for a home cook to do better than takeout. And yeah, agree wih Al that there's plenty of other western favorites that are very easy to do better at home than you get from most takeout places. The fancy pasta argument is both very specific and disingenuous. The main reason people look down on Chinese in the US is more about racism than anything else, but it also still doesn't mean that you can't beat PF Chang's or Pasta Express with very little actual effort.
"take a dish and isolates it from it’s origin, traditions and culture, simplifying it to the lowest common denominator that people enjoy" The problem is that that is what many takeout places are actually doing themselves here. "Better than takeout" does apply to all cuisines around here, even traditional local cuisine, not just asian or south american, because most takeout places and many cheaper and some not so cheap "real restaurants" mostly just peddle convenience products, as in factory-made puzzle pieces that just need to be combined and heated up. Which are formulated to be "agreeable" to the lowest common denominator. There are better restaurants representing most nationalities, but those aren't considered standard "takeout" even if they do offer takeout service. Because they are not standard, they are the few that stand out. And while the city i am currently in is blessed with more "real" chinese restaurants than i can count on one hand, for many years when i lived other places, there wasn't a single one, while there were "real" italian places etc.
Broccoli cooking: so my dad taught me this technique he learned from a Chinese cook in the 1960s in a Bahamas hotel kitchen: ripping hot peanut oil and salt. Then throw in broccoli for a few seconds to char. Pour in a small glass of water that contains chopped garlic. Cover immediately and let steam to doneness. The texture is awesome in ni time and the garlic flavour is infused in the broccoli, which gets evenly seasoned. No idea if it’s a Chinese technique or a kitchen hack, but it has never failed me and it’s the reason why I love broccoli.
Interesting … I’ve never heard of salt straight into oil, probably because it … doesn’t dissolve? At least I think it doesn’t 😬 I’m honestly already so confused by that one little detail 😅
I do this when I fry up some wedges or something that wants a crust in a cast iron skillet. In my understanding at least it gets things crispier by binding surface water, but I can't proof that :D
@@ChicaneryBear Yeah, peanut is a common oil for Chinese cooking but any oil that tastes good and has high heat usage works. I personally recommend sunflower oil as it's very similar.
Sis is SPITTING! I will never give up the relationship I have with my local Chinese delivery guy who tells me the stuff on the menu to order the following Tuesday.
We do really really appreciate it. We also try to pay it forward and support the creators we enjoy - having people support your work directly (together with living a reasonably low cost lifestyle) is so huge in being able to not have economic pressures from the algorithm (which is highly random, highly variable). Knowing that we could still eat and have a roof over our head, even if RUclips for some reason completely demonitized and stopped recommending our channel tomorrow... is a luxury that many creators don't have :)
1) I love that you provided a non sauced version of this dish. So many recipes I see online, are so sauced. And growing up, my family has always made it with minimal external ingredients. I love being able to taste the broccoli and beef without being inundated with excessive soy sauce and oyster sauce and whatever else you put in to “Bump up the flavor”. Sometimes it’s good to just savor the simple ingredients and appreciate it! 2) Steph’s “better than takeout” exposition at the end was lovely. I think more people need to hear it. 3) I’ve always wondered why everyone’s definition of “wok hei”, which always differed from how my dad taught me, has always confused me. And your explanation really nailed it. Great vid! I love a good broccoli beef, and a wonderful video.
Agreed. My beef and broccoli is never very saucy, as that is how I prefer it. Saucy beef and broccoli with usually overcooked broccoli is such a sad thing to see on a plate.
This is the BEST and most useful video about Chinese Beef available to human kind. So many many many useful information. Especially the marinade. Can't believe this took 6years to publish. When I'm making any Chinese dish I come to this channel to see how it's been done traditionally. Thank you guys for your existence, that's all I can say.
Oh man, Steph's rant at end articulates everything I've ever wanted to say about why people trying to 'improve' Chinese food has always rubbed me the wrong way. I get that there's probably no ill intent behind it, but man does it feel patronising.
@Ezekiel Barrett i think people kinda look down on 'elevated' burgers as snooty or not worth the squeeze, certainly not the same way as 'better than takeout' dishes
There's usually no ill intent behind racism. It's just something you grow up with: stepping on other people is normal and natural and not worth the time or effort of questioning when there's so much else you have to be worried about. The boys throw stones at frogs in jest, but the frogs die in earnest.
I found you guys after the kenji shout-out ages back and I’m so fucking happy I did. I LOVE how in depth and down to earth the cooking is. You cover the fancy and the normal, but most importantly you explain WHY. it’s the same reason I loved kenjis stuff. I don’t want to just know how to cook, I want to understand how. And be able to apply that knowledge elsewhere. This episode what PACKED with knowledge
You geeks are so lovable. It's obvious how you love and take your craft very seriously. Your honesty in the face of trends is a testament to that. Also, thanks you for all the help you provided me in my ongoing journey into chinese cuisine. As a french guy, it is as humbling as it is exciting. Well... Thx for your sharing your passion with such love, care and precision, you're great !
The funny thing about the pasta example is that it is really easy to make better than 90% of what you'll get in an ordinary restaurant outside of Italy by using high quality pasta and emulsifying your sauces correctly.
True, though I think this strengthens the point of the 'rant' at the end of the video. The pasta we get at restaurants is often phoned in and of middling quality that you can do as well or better with a small bit of care, so the question of why we tend to apply 'better than takeout' type sentiments to certain foods and food cultures even when that might be so far from true as to be laughable (like the melt-in-your-mouth beef and broccoli) is important.
@@royeckhardt9016 I think it’s because many Americans just have no experience with Chinese cooking. So most of the time they can’t produce something close to the takeout they can get, where that isn’t true for diner food, or other cuisines they are more familiar with.
Cause when you make pasta for yourself, you’re making a good with your likes in mind. Restaurants don’t care if you like their pasta a lot, they just want you to like it enough that you won’t cause problems for them. Their goal is to please a lot of people whcih runs the risk of simplifying their food. Adding complexity to food runs the risk of running people away. Same mindset applies to take out places. Difference is that you’ll find a lot more restaurants for pasta then straight up take out places. There is no reason to make any rant, it’s just how the food culture developed in the us. If you were to go to China, I’m sure there are plenty of simplified western chains that page in comparison to something you could make at home. The cantonese chicken wing recipe on this very channel is a good example of this. Also typing in a vague good term such as “pasta” with another vague term such as “restaurant” that can mean a lot of things. “Fried rice” in the us refers to one specefic type of food really that you only ever find in certain spots that are owned by people without a lot of income. The argument is bad faith and the implications are worse.
@@royeckhardt9016 depends on the restaurant. If you're talking about pasta from Olive Garden, 100% yes definitely phoned in. But I've eaten at restaurants where I _know_ they prepared their carbonara right. Even the one shortcut they did -- use streaky belly bacon instead of guanciale -- worked because they used extremely smoky bacon.
Man, that "Magic School Bus to Flavourville" line was a punch of nostalgia I didn't know I had in me about learning about taste buds and the tongue. It's amazing how educational that cartoon was. And I'm not even from an english speaking country. Edit: BTW, loved the casually thrown in memes in this episode. Edit 2: That rant was spot fucking on!
TBF to the "better than takeout" crew. A lot of takeout places are not great. Just because someone works hard (and they do, restaurant work is very hard) doesn't mean they are a particularly great chef. I only have experience with respect to Indian style food and the reaction to takeout curry from the indians that I know is that often it just isn't very good, and they are usually capable of making something better themselves. In fact I would argue this is true of most "cheap" style restaurants, a dedicated and careful amateur can make a "better" meal at home because they are not working under the same constraints as someone in a commercial kitchen with a full restaurant and limited time to deliver. And now fully reading your comment i realise you have expressed the above far more eloquently yourselves. You guys are great! :-)
Likewise agreed. In fact, all this time I went out and eat at the restaurants, is to (literally) bring them back home and try to replicate the taste and efforts put into these food.
Because of this video, I cooked my first proper stir fry! It certainly wasn’t perfect, but eating the finished dish I was blown away that I made something that actually tasted like take out beef and broccoli, instead of just tasting like soya sauce. Thank you!
I actually just did the same thing today. I know it's on the simpler side of things, but I still feel happy that I'm finally cooking instead of just watching videos about cooking, lol.
I view the “Better Than Takeout” phenomenon as just copywriting hyperbole to get home cooks excited to make dishes they perceive to be out of their reach (in terms of skills needed to actually make the dish). Same thing with exercise routines (Get RIPPED! Beach Bod! etc.) People emotionally respond to colorful and exaggerated language. Speaking from the perspective of a creator and as someone who has previously worked in kitchens as a cook and done copywriting, most of those uses of the “Better Than Takeout” uses you showed can almost certainly be traced back to people just modeling what works (ie Mandy’s Better Than Takeout series) because they know people are responding to that on RUclips. “Home-cooked” or “Different but Similar” or “Basically the Same” as Takeout doesn’t have the rhetorical flair or linguistic punch of “Better Than.” People want to feel like they’re improving. Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant. If people are offended by the “Better Than” claims, it’s probably a matter of how they’re choosing to frame it. One way to frame it is: “It’s disrespectful to hard-working immigrants and small business owners. It’s insensitive to their traditions and has overtones of racial or ethnic bias.” Another way to frame it is: “Wow, people love this cuisine so much they want to try and learn its techniques and share this incredible food with their family and friends.” Personally, I choose to view it in the latter fashion. My best friends growing up owned a Chinese restaurant and this is the food I grew up with. It’s just as much a part of my life and history as anything my grandmother made for me. I loved the video though. And I sincerely appreciate addressing the misconceptions about restaurant wok cooking vs. home cooking techniques. It gets tiring hearing in the comment section every single day: “It’s impossible to make this style of food at home. Don’t even attempt it.” And the pointless Wok Hei arguments are borderline cliche at this point. So, thanks for that. Also, I’m honored you used one of my clips in your video. Even if it was in a (moderately) disparaging way. Just knowing that you’ve even seen my video is humbling because I love your channel and I’ve learned a lot from you both.
Sending you much love from Texas! Keep up the great work!
> Even if it was in a (moderately) disparaging way. Sent you a message over on Discord, hope you don't interpret the inclusion in the compilation as 'disparaging' :) Simply wanted to give people a sense of the ubiquity. You do a nice job with your videos. I wanted to respond to this though, but I wanted to preface this all by saying that *it’s ok to disagree about stuff*. A lot of people on the internet seem to have this weird Messianic sense of purpose and a Manichaen sense of good/evil when talking about this sort of thing. At its core, we just wanted to get people thinking about this - show that it *was* a phenomenon. Maybe people end up settling down on a different opinion, and that’s fine. So while I disagree with a couple ideas that you’ve presented here, think of this more as a couple people debating while chit chatting over a beer :) > Same thing with exercise routines (Get RIPPED! Beach Bod! etc.) People emotionally respond to colorful and exaggerated language. I think that's fair. But let's just say... copywriting as a field isn't exactly known for its subtle, nuanced, and progressive use of language. You're absolutely correct that it's all directed at that sort of emotional 'collective Id' of the society - which is also why it's helpful to think critically *about* that language, and what it potentially says about the society as a whole. The fitness industry is an odd example to choose, given how incredibly predatory the advertising in that industry is - how it quite obviously indulges in people's worst insecurities in order to turn a buck. Like, just... take a moment to think about the term "Beach Bod!" that you just mentioned. Implied in this terminology is that unless you're ripped, unless you conform to the ideal, that you should be ashamed of going to the beach and wearing a bathing suit. So much so that if you go to the beach in America in the summer, there's overweight people so insecure that they're literally wearing their T-shirts into the ocean to swim. Meanwhile, the middle aged pot-bellied dude in the hutongs proudly curls his T-shirt into a Beijing bikini without anyone (save for a few tourists) blinking an eye.... People do respond emotionally to certain language. But I guess the question that’s useful to ask is… what emotion is that language evoking? The fitness industry is *all about* the shame. Luckily, food’s generally a lot more positive of a space. > “Home-cooked” or “Different but Similar” or “Basically the Same” as Takeout doesn’t have the rhetorical flair or linguistic punch of “Better Than.” People want to feel like they’re improving. Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant. “People want to feel like they’re improving”. Improving... [what]? “Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant.” Moving [what] forward, instead of [what] being stagnant? I’m going to be charitable and assume that the [what] that should be inserted in those statements is “themselves/their own cooking” and not “takeout style Chinese food” :) Although in that case, I’m not sure if it all logically follows? If the ‘what’ that we should strive to improve is our previous selves, wouldn’t better-fitting cliches be something like “[You] can Stir fry LIKE A MASTER” or “LEVEL UP [your] Chinese cooking”? Even still, I guess I don’t completely agree with your underlying premise? Your videos got a ton of traction, I think, because they framed things as “takeout secrets revealed!” (also, your introductions were absolute bangers that fed nicely into the title/thumbnail combination) The underlying emotion that the video was indulging in was that there was this secret knowledge that you were uncovering for your audience. It’s not an emotion we like to indulge in *too* much (I - Chris - am already probably a borderline cringey Marco Polo for some folks lol), but it’s definitely something that people respond to. That ‘better than takeout’ bit in your introduction? To me actually felt completely unnecessary to the video! And given how tight your VO was, I was actually slightly surprised that the cliché slipped in. > Another way to frame it is: “Wow, people love this cuisine so much they want to try and learn its techniques and share this incredible food with their family and friends.” There’s definitely a certain slice of the internet that gets a little up in arms any time that a WASP presents a recipe that’s from a culture that’s any farther from England than, say, Normandy. Given how much success your recent videos’ve gotten, I’m sure you’ve also gotten a taste of them too, haha. We think it’s cool that you love the cuisine so much that you want to learn the techniques and share the food. We’re the same! We *only* find it cringey that people *then* are so quick to thoughtlessly claim afterwards that theirs is ‘better’. There’s nuance here, there’s a bunch of people that’ll disagree with us, and certainly nobody’s a bad person just because they’ve uttered the words. “Better than takeout” is an OLD turn of the phrase, at least as old as the La Choy dragon (I *think* La Choy might’ve actually coined the phrase in the 50s, but I’m no historian). We just wanted to direct people’s attention to a tired copywriting cliché, and maybe try to think a little critically about a phrase that they’ve unthinkingly seen used probably their entire life :)
I live in a college town with a large Chinese student base, so the local chinese takeout is honestly incredible. Ive also had really bad takeout in "middle-of-nowhere" towns that was barely edible. Sometimes making home cooked chinese food that is better than takeout means making it actually taste good.
Good point. I had dan dan noodles once that were just soy sauce and chili flakes on overcooked spaghetti, so yes quite literally anything I could make in the kitchen would be "better" than that pile of sadness that I actually paid money for.
@@RenegadeY I think personally it's more an indication of how bad the local Chinese takeout places are (and yet still survive). Also personally, if I go to a restaurant and eat a meal I know I can cook better at home, I won't hesitate to mention it (and also probably never go back to said restaurant).
French chef dousing an omelet with 50 sticks of butter and slow cooking a duck leg confit in a swimming pool of duck fat for 48 hours Some people: that's true mastery of cuisine right there Chinese chef passing a few lean pork strips through a wok of oil The same people: Damn it smells good but that's too much fat for my healthy lifestyle
I wanted to make a documentary called ‘Supersize Moi’, where the backers would pay for me to eat nothing but food from the absolute pinnacle of French restaurants for a month, and I would not be able to turn down any suggested wine pairing. I doubt there would be any difference in outcome from Supersize Me.
This is such a weird thing to me because, I generally consider home cooked food to be better than takeout food, especially pasta. I genuinely dislike most restaurant pasta in the place I live because it’s usually cooked not to my taste and Italian food is all about cooking with few ingredients to taste. The one exception I have is Asian food in general and Chinese food in particular, which I never seam to be able to cook to the quality of Chinese restaurants. The techniques the chefs in those restaurants use are often too complicated for me and my version ends up subpar. The only reason I’d home cook Chinese food is to try a recipe that’s just not available in a takeout. Anyway, the point is that Steph is right and you should respect all the hard work going into restaurant food preparation. If you don’t like it, you don’t, but that’s you.
Love you guys. Very well put, Steph. I'm a chef of over 15 years and I can confidently say that cooking at a restaurant and at home are two very different things and similar results shouldn't be expected. Unless you've got a massively kitted out kitchen and a fleet of cooks to do your mise en place for every single meal. Haha.
Asian foods of many different countries are my absolute favorite. My cooking has greatly improved in some of the dishes thanks to you guys as well as some other channels that I have watched many hours of, I can come somewhat close to some of my favorite restaurants but only a time or two have I ever been close enough to enjoy it as much as a good restaurant. I respect you and Asian cuisines greatly.
5:15 I suppose an allegory here I can think of is with pasta. Sure you could just combine cooked-to-package pasta with your sauce when serving, but finishing the pasta in the sauce is almost always better from a texture/final seasoning perspective.
You tell them steph!!! In the early days of the internet and food TV I tried many "better" than take out stir fry recipes, only to be disappointed in the terrible textures, flavors and aromas of these recipes. It took lots of independent reading and experimentation before I discovered the secrets to and realized how nuanced/ technically challenging the recipes and their developments have been to deliver this great cuisine. Love your videos!
I'm just learning how to cook and I love the approach to this channel. It's very unpretentious. You aren't trying to impress people with your flashy bullshit, you're just earnestly trying to educate people on how to prepare stuff well. You're accommodating people of varying skill levels who may not have the same available tools. I like it a lot.
I have to say, ive massive respect for you and your wife. You both have taught meany recipes over the last 3 years of watching your channel, as well as introducing me to a cooking culture i would've never been exposed to otherwise. Im limited by language and my phone haha but again i want to give a genuine thank you. Go raibh maith agat, James from Ireland
Excellent points. For the record, my goal is rarely "better than takeout". It's about making food as I like, occasionally tweaking things more to my taste. So knowing the reasons for the techniques, is my favorite kind of lessons. Well done.
Chinese takeout is my only frame of reference for American Chinese food... if I want to learn how to make something and the title says it's BETTER than take out, well HOLY HELL, I'm gonna click on that one, because it must be amazing.
One thing that greatly annoys me about basically ALL non western cooking info on the internet is that it's always about mimicking restaurant/take-out food, doesn't matter if it's indian, chinese, mexican, persian, etc. I don't care about that, I want to know what a normal chinese person in china would make on like a wednesday. That's a lot more relevant for me.
I watched the entire video all the way through for the dude who broke everything down so well, but then subscribed at the end for the extremely wise lady making us think about what we’re truly saying. Well done! You both have made us better in unexpected ways
Steph - i completely appreciate your point, but would note that perhaps - just perhaps - in many places the U.S. the “better than takeout” moniker reflects the quality of American chinese food. The quality is a reflection of the local demand for inexpensive, and often sweeter foods,, much like the fast food flavor profile. So is my beef and broccoli better than Panda Express? Yes. But it’s certainly not better than take-out from an authentic chinese restaurant. We need to support and celebrate high quality restaurants.
Steph's working out right now (maybe she can get back to you directly in a bit :) ), but when we went to our local takeout joint in the USA... I think she was actually surprised at how solid the quality was. She'd heard so many people dragging the fare, that she had really low expectations. But all the dishes were cooked properly - IIRC her overall impression was that it was "about street food level quality" Like, it might not be dim-sum-chef-nailing-the-13th-pleat-of-their-Har-Gow level good (and it's *incredible* - and maybe unsustainable? - that there are also quality immigrant-run Chinese restaurants in the west that do actually pump out that sort of quality for a reasonable price)... but it's still proper Chinese cooking. And there's definitely a lot of online recipes that don't meet that bar.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified The quality of Chinese food or takeout I've had in the US has run from about a 3/10 to like a 9.5/10, the latter being from a chinese exchange student my family was hosting's dad, who was the chef at a local place that made authentic Sichuan food (to the best of my knowledge, having never visited Sichuan) I think that I and a lot of other americans would draw a distinction between "takeout" and "restaurant" food, with takeout being lower quality by definition. I've worked in kitchens for nearly 10 years now, but I would never presume to be able to replicate the upper bounds of quality I've gotten from the really good restaurants I've been to without having meaningful experience cooking that kind of food, but I do think I've made better lo mein than the stuff my wife likes to get sometimes from whatever the nearest open restaurant is. I know that there's a lot of ignorance (to put it politely) around Chinese food and culture in the US, but I think that the specific "better than takeout" line isn't necessarily emblematic of an overall lack of respect, at least not in most cases. As a side note, one of the only other kinds of online recipe I've seen that says the better than takeout line semi-frequently is Pizza, at least in my kind of bad memory. Similarly, I've had pizza ranging from straight up terrible to really excellent, but I think most of the time, people are really trying to say that they'll beat the pants off of domino's. Which, as a relentless hater of chain pizza, I would hope they achieve.
@@ChineseCookingDemystifiedIf you are saying that Steph put in the same level an American franchise which received hundreds of thousands dollars in investment and training and a chinese Guy/Gal with a chinese mother and his/her own skills, you more or less proved the original commenter point. As others pointed in the commentaries, nobody is comparing with the 5 star chinese Restaurant, but with a simplified version of what the chinese food may look. In Brazil (where I live), is worse, and even Very good restaurants aren't autenthic. It's a recent phenomena things like lo mein and char siu is inexistent in big cities.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Absolutely agree that there are legit, amazing chinese restaurants in many places that are waaay better than any of the on-line recipes. But there’s also a lot of pretty awful stuff on offer, at least where I live. And chinese cooking technique is in a league of its own, and something to venerate. If there was a legit restaurant near me, I wouldn’t be tackling it at home.
I have had my share of bland gristly takeout to understand the online recipes. It shouldn't be seen as a disrespect to the chefs, who have to deal with small budgets and kitchens and an undemanding clientele that just wants cheap eats
The chefs, techniques and traditions do deserve to be respected. Thank you both for all your years of very informative and fun videos. You have definitely have made me a better home cook!
Right on Steph!! Loved the ending with the little dragon too. Be as sassy as you want guys. We love you to bits! 😁 I have never had anything "better" than takeout. Chinese take out is made by people who are amazingly talented and who perform alchemy in their kitchens. One of my dreams is to actually be able to have the innate knowledge and skill to magically whip up some authentic Chinese cuisines or even westernized options. I have been watching videos from many of the people all around China, for years, just to understand and learn the essence of culture and cooking combined. I know that there is a rhythm, pattern, etc to how it all comes together and it takes years of passing on that knowledge for a person to have this gift. I hope to someday figure it out in my heart. Even then, I don't think I could give up my Chinese take out!! Canadians are very dedicated to their love of Chinese food. When I was little, my siblings and I would do all kinds of chores for neighbors, just so we could pool our money and go down to the local place to devour as many egg rolls as we could afford. The people that ran the place are like family. I went to school with the kids and it was always a treat to go into their home and hear stories and eat "real" food from back home. I am a very lucky person. ☺
Man I've been on discord for 12 years and I remember you guys coming onto the subreddit cooking scene. I hope you guys are so proud about how far you've come. You guys were an amazing resource back then and continue to be.
...When you throw away the stalk you have tossed out the best part.....Simply put a paring knife blade under the skin and pull off the tough hide and slice the stalk diagonally......The results have a far better texture and taste than the flowerets.
I love this channel so much, so many great tips and real techniques! You convey real respect for both other chefs and the history of these dishes. I've learned so much and I think you've certainly helped unlearn some western biases. Thank you both so much!
I really think (american) classic chinese takeout needs some serious love and appreciation, which I think is finally starting to get. It's down right delicious, and a testament to thousands of hardworking immigrants trying to make it in a foreign country. The history behind chinese takeout is super interesting, and really worth some reading. The mix of cantonese, fuijanese, taiwanese, and american has become super interesting for me.
I hear the "better than take-out" line a lot in my family and I disagree with your position that it comes from disrespect or negative stereotypes. I'm Malaysian-Chinese and someone whose parents and grandparents grew up in traditional settings and experienced poverty and/or village life before subsequently elevating to relative affluence (not super-rich, just middle-class). The first thing to note is that yes, it really _is_ that easy to make a lot of what take-outs do. It's not a disrespect to them to say that, certainly not coming from people like my grandmother who's been making that exact sort of dishes all her life. The second thing is, when you're someone who's been in our positions, eaten up and down the ladder, in back-streets and Michelins and everything in between, across all regions _and_ learn how to make it at home because that's our standard cuisine, you really do see the difference in quality, the make and the effort. Maybe it's become self-fulfilling prophecy but Western people almost _expect_ Chinese take-out to be a certain way; we have eaten that in many places (my parents studied for years in the UK and USA; I have lived in Australia half my life) including Malaysia and it is _not good_ . But even in Asia where you'd think the bar is higher, it is not difficult to find a take-out whom you'd try and go "I can do better". They use too much starch, for one; there should be some unctuousness to the sauce for sure, but not swimming in a sea of gloop so thick that if you flung it to the ceiling it'd stay there. Very often way too much salt. Too much MSG as well; again, I'm not anti-MSG but when the food tastes _fluorescently_ enhanced it's just bad and always will be. And the quality of the ingredients- the cheap cuts of meat, the cheaper brands of sauce, frozen rather than fresh ingredients, plus general hygiene- cannot be vouched for, but you can readily detect when it's low. And then (obviously our Asian calculativeness comes out) they charge x amount for y amount of food, when you realise you're getting cheap meat, not fresh vegetables, noodles not homemade, when if you bought good quality equivalents and did it yourself you could make it so much better, more cost-effectively. THAT is what they mean by "better than take-out" and, bear in mind, when you actually live in Asia, the bar for what is good take-out is WAY higher. My family, when they cook, they use less salt, less sugar, less starch, less oil and no MSG. This isn't a health kick thing or a recent phenomenon; my Grandma grew up illiterate in a village, she cooks mostly the same way and has never used MSG. We steam, stir- or light-fry most things and we have soup every dinner. They go to the wet market 2-3 times a week so everything is as fresh as can be. My Mom's catchphrase is always "qing qing tian tian", literally "light and sweet". You don't need to nuke everything with salt, starch and enhancers to make flavour bombs when the _natural_ flavours of _fresh_ ingredients cooked cleanly and with respect will be just as richly flavoured, still traditional and arguably healthier. Obviously we have our indulgent dishes like three-layer belly pork or black vinegar trotters (we're Hakkas from the south so have a lot of long-braise dishes) but those're more feast dishes for special occasions; we don't eat like that on the day-to-day. We're not prejudiced against take-out and will readily eat out, esp as both my parents and my grandma (the only one of my four grandparents remaining) are getting old now and cooking has become harder. We just know it's simply not difficult to be just as good or better.
I've been watching your vids for a while and that last little monologue you had was what got me to subscribe. people, especially amateur home cooks like myself, greatly underestimate the hundreds of little steps you need to get right in order to cook something truly delicious. Cantonese cooking is deceptively technical! I think because it's so easy to buy sauces these days and because, like you said, Chinese takeout is so quick and cheap, that people take it for granted. great job highlighting this. it makes me appreciate all foods even more and I have a new appreciation for the thousands of years of collective cooking knowledge went into making a "simple" stirfry.
I grew up in the SF bay area and there has always been very good quality Chinese food. However, I think that Chinese restaurants in parts of the US where there isn't a significant Chinese population generally range from mediocre to bad. So, if you're not in San Francisco, LA, Seattle or New York, the Chinese food you make at home (with the help of Steph and Chris) is generally "better than Chinese take out". Thanks for the inspiration and instruction. I love your channel.
Yeah, I did to, and lived in SF proper most of my life and went to SFSU. Gives you a weird perspective. I vividly remember my Chinese American friends and classmates complaining about the food quality from various take out places... From that point of view, "better than take out" makes a lot more sense.
That's a myth. I've eaten authentic Chinese food in plenty of college towns and suburban strip malls in middle America. Even around SF Bay, restaurants run by mom-and-pop immigrants offer amazing regional Chinese cuisine in storefronts crowding next to 99 Ranch supermarkets. Compare that the restaurant in old SF Chinatown mentioned most often by multitudes of online travel sites. The food there was so horrid that I saw the kitchen staff eating Happy Meals.
I've had some great food in small-town Chinese restaurants made by chefs with a lot of passion for what they do. Chinese-American (or Chinese-Canadian in my case) cuisine is just as good as "authentic" Chinese food but it's made for a different palette. It doesn't mean it's made with any less skill or care.
I’m a Northern Californian, so even the differences between Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, and the East Bay varies! Interestingly though one of the best Chinese restaurants I’ve been to (in terms of takeout) was in Winnemucca, Nevada. Middle. Of. Nowhere.
The opposite is true. It is always -- without exception, ALWAYS -- some coastal food blogger who is harping on the "better than takeout" thing. The rest of the country doesn't put such an emphasis on "returning" to home cooking because we never stopped cooking at home.
YES!!!! This is easily one of your best videos, for so many reasons! And that's no small feat considering basically every single one of your videos is pure gold!! Don't apologize for shining a light on the undeserved negativity and condescending attitude towards Chinese take-out.
I hear you Steph 100%, I’m in the gourmet burger space and while the majority of the time people appreciate the work, we do end up getting the comparison to fast food places regardless of the time and effort put in. Not so much online admittedly, mostly in person, but it happens nonetheless. I actually started watching your channel to see more interior Chinese foods/cooking methods but have since gained an even greater appreciation for my local Chinese food places. There’s a lot of sourcing, prep, and skill that go into it and I’m glad to have a window through yall to get an idea of how it’s done.
I agree with your take on this issue and thank you for using an annoying, click-baity phrase to start a deeper discussion on Asian cuisine. You're right, Asian cuisines don't tend to be respected the way other cuisines are. Thank you for pointing out that "better than takeout" often translates to "without a bunch of traditional ingredients and techniques that the food police deem unhealthy!" I hadn't really thought about the condescending and subtley racist undercurrent there. However, I will add that because many of us don't have any decent Chinese takeout restaurants in our areas, it may not be unreasonable for us to say we can make Chinese food that's genuinely better than takeout. Our local takeout is just that lackluster 😂
I like the sassieness! The rant on "Better Than Takeout" is a deserved kick in the butt of TV & Internet, for its thoughtlessly and massively cloned slogans, which don't hold any water. You *can* get it better by cooking at home. But only subjectively: by adding less or more of something you like/dislike, by adding or omitting an ingredient or by using more quality meat/veg/brands. What you *can't* get better is availability, taste, speed, stability, cost to quality ratio, etc., etc., etc. - all those things which restaurants and trained chefs can and do.
I am of the opinion that Chinese food should be worth more than what we are typically paying. The amount of gung fu (skill) required just to meet the standard quality level of these dishes takes years of practice and learning from many generations of accumulated knowledge. Almost anybody can smash up an avocado and smear it onto a piece of charred bread - yet many are happy to pay the same or higher price. Its unfortunate and saddens me to know many faceless hard working chefs do not get acknowledgements. So your opinion regarding the whole "better than take out" schtick, i completely agree.
I really liked the rant. I can't stand disrespecting and stomping on food culture. That's why I'm a fan of your channel- you're not only keeping things authentic but also help us westerners mimic or replace stuff we can't get, making all that wonderful food more accessible. Thank you for your hard wok, I mean work!
I've been following you guys for a number of years, and I loved every video I've watched. I think this one is my favourite so far. The way you two weave together the history, culture, etymology, culinary technique, food science, and commentary all within an approachable (and fantastically produced!) recipe video is brilliant. Keep the 'rants' and 'novellas' coming. I know that any mention of cultural appropriation in the world of food raises some feathers. But to me, it's at its worst when, on top of due credit not being given to the cultures and origins of certain dishes, the creators also disparage the traditions, techniques, and quality of them. This air of superiority is unnecessary and damaging. Like you hinted at: when people try to make recipes for a something like a Neapolitan Pizza for example, the aim is rarely to make a 'healthier'/'better' version. Instead, they appreciate it for what it is, and attempt to make something similarly delicious at home. Thanks for the thought provoking video and post, once again! I loved your nuanced thoughts, and I LOVE Beef and Broccoli. I'll be making it tonight ;)
Appropriation's an awkward topic, because it means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Because like, if we look at a Hong Kong Chachaanteng or a Thailand Cook shop or Japanese Yoshoku, are they 'appropriating' western food? In some ways, sure, but they're also a fantastically fun category of cuisine. The difference, I think, is that in spite of the alterations and some misunderstandings here or there, you can tell that there's this actually really deep *respect* for the cuisine in question (the reverberations of centuries of a global imperialist super-structure tends to engender that). Like, a lot of Japanese, Hong Kong, or Taiwan bakeries take as much or more care than American ones... I've been mulling over penning some an essay entitled something like "Let the Weebs Cook Japanese". The young, stereotypical anime geek might slightly exoticize or have some (at times cringey) misunderstandings about Japan, but I think we could all agree that there *is* that fundamental respect. I think that it's in *that* space where there might be the opportunity for some fun inventions/dishes, even though it might tick the textbook definition of appropriation? I don't know. I've got a lot of half formed opinions on the topic.
This is exactly the sort of video I like. Thought, explanation, reasoning. Why are we doing these things, what do we want to achieve with this dish, how do we get as close as possible to that goal using the equipment we have available. I've learned a great deal from your channel and I am sure I will continue to do so.
You mentioned 'passing through' and how most of us would'nt do it. As the cook of our household I have dabbled it deep/shallow frying but mostly avoid doing it soley as I just am not sure how to store it/clean the oil/how long to use it etc. It would be highly useful to have a video dedicated to understanding what oils to use/storeage etc. Thanks if you take this on board... or not :)
Ever since I watched the Adam Ragusea video about deep frying, I still don't understand the fuzz about deep frying at home. We have always deep fried at home. True, I don't live in the US, but the reason of the issue eludes me. I understand the objections about the smell, since all residential construction in the US has to be as hermetically shut as possible in order for the HVAC system to work properly. Regarding your other questions, storing for us is simple. Just cover the pot with its lid, or if the pot doesn't have a lid or the lid is not very tight-fitting, transfer the oil to another pot with a tight-fitting lid once it has cooled. To clean it, use a very fine mesh skimmer. If you fried something that was coated with dry flour or starch, passing it through a cloth is the best option and we don't bother with the last bits of oil that's saturated with flour. We discard it by tossing it outside on the soil. Finally, how many times to use it. For vegetables like when making French fries, we use it like 4 or five times. For meats like fried chicken, 2 or 3 times maximum. Fish, we use it just once. At home, we have found that frying meats make the oil go bad quickly for some reason.
Thank you for taking the time to address the underlying prejudices. I've loved your video and your effort to help make me more talented in the kitchen.
God damn right!!! The rant at the end had me pumping my fist and shouting "yeah!!! Hell yeah!!!" at the screen. The disrespect in the US for extremely talented, hard working asian american chefs is just sad. There is exactly as much, if not more blood sweat and tears in every little chinese takeout place as fancy italian joints and shiny pizza places. Good on you guys for speaking up about it!
This is spoken like a person privileged enough to grow up in a place that had good food. I don't think the place I grew up in even had "chefs", just people who reheated pre-packaged bags of Chinese buffet fare.
I really enjoy your videos, this one too, ranting and being "sassy" like that is important, I heard "better than takeout" a thousand times and never questionned it but now I see it through a new lens and understand something I didn't before
Take out is fantastic! The fact I can get so much variety of great food cooked consistently well in such a short amount of time is amazing! I could never hope to cook the same amount of food that quickly, and I certainly couldn't do it for the same price. All these RUclips chefs saying they're making a certain dish with better ingredients for less money are lying - you can't buy $1 worth of beef, $0.15 worth of green beans, $0.25 worth of rice at the store. Maybe you can make *a serving* cost a little less, but the actual amount of money you need to invest in ingredients and the amount of time in prep work isn't necessarily worth the extra you pay to get some great take out. I love cooking, I love learning new techniques, and I love sharing all of that with my family and friends, but sometimes I also just want good food without the effort of cooking and cleaning. Take out is fantastic.
The real difference in cost that nobody bothers to calculate is time. If I were to "pay myself" for the time I spent cooking, there's no way it would come out cheaper than a restaurant.
The question of costs of buying one meal versus all the ingredients necessary to make that meal at home is a little interesting, but irrelevant unless you're only eating one meal per month. The real question is whether you can save money by preparing your own meals, compared to buying food that's already prepared. And the answer is yes, obviously. By the way, you can buy things like rice, by the pound, in the bulk food section at a grocery store. Beef can be bought by the pound in most grocery stores, as well (or a butcher shop). Just go to the meat counter and ask for a dollar's worth of beef. Green beans by the pound will be in the fresh fruit/vegetable section. Grab a plastic bag and put some in, then weigh it at the scale right in front of you. I think the reason you don't know this, is that you think buying takeout is cheaper than cooking at home? I don't know what math they teach in school these days...
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 most grocery stores (near me) no longer have bulk sections - so no, I'm subject to buying a package of something. And yes, while I could buy a few green beans, by the time I've driven to the store, the gas wasted for an ounce of green beans and a couple ounces of beef would easily make up for it. What you missed in my comment was getting the variety of food for the cost, in the time that you do, without having to prep and cook all day. Do I cook? Yes, very often. Do I get take out? Occasionally, when I'm too burned out to cook - I don't always have the time or energy. As for your math, go back to school. It has generally now become cheaper to get take out - the variety of food available and portion sizes are such that one take out order of about $20 gets me about 3-4 meals, most of which I couldn't make for that price.
I gotta say, I love the focus you have on the audience, and it shows in multiple different ways in your videos. Firstly, here, the obvious one is the focus on cooking methods that are more home friendly than "passing through oil" but there are smaller things like posting marinade recipes for a second that people can pause on instead of hearing them listed every time. It's what makes this channel great, honestly, I feel like I'm actually being taught from someone who understands my perspective instead of just presented awesome Chinese food that isn't totally attainable (or comfortable to attain as a westerner). thank you.
Also the point at the end is really well made. You would never see "better than takeout Duck Confit" or even "better than takeout BBQ" (which is not even seen as high class cuisine!). There are definitely racist elements here though I suspect you avoided using that word as it becomes too easy for idiots to wave your argument away saying "everything is racist nowadays.. grow up". Anyway, great video, great channel, thanks again.
Having family who ran a Chinese resturant when I cook at home I am trying for almost as good as I remember there food to have been. Thank you for bringing this up.
I used to work at a Chinese restaurant and the Sichuanese chef there was crazy good. He's really what I aim for in my own cooking, or at least close enough to lol.
Hey, I'm here for the rant..😀 I don't think many creators thought about it that much... FWIW I can cook pasta better than most Italian restaurants because, among other reasons, my grandfather was an Italian chef and taught me to cook....
I’ve been learning how to make Chinese takeout recipes because it’s good not because “I can do it healthier (better)”. I’m American from the southern US and we have are own cooking traditions and techniques. It irritates me when someone denigrates southern cuisine by wanting to make it healthier as if southern recipes are inherently unhealthful. I’m happy to learn the history, techniques, and intricacies of dishes that have a favor palette that I can’t master without a good teacher.
I think a particular issue with the Chinese takeaways is that (at least here in America) the food that the cooks make doesn’t suit their tastes, so they don't eat it. For the past 60 years or so, Asian immigrants (not just Chinese) have started these restaurants and make the same menu items since they were told that's all the Americans will eat. So you have a lot of cooks that can't really gauge the quality what they're giving to the customer. Which sucks, because I really like the style of food and I really appreciate their efforts, but (at least in my experience) I've probably eaten at 3 crummy takeaway joints before finding a really good one. So about the success rate for your typical American fast food joint
I was fortunate enough to work at a Chinese restaurant years ago that fed staff lunch and dinner. Staff included owners and family. I always looked forward to my free meals. Rarely was anything put in front of me that was actually on the menu. It was generally quick, simple, and filling. Bean sprouts were grown in-house so were essentially free and figured prominently in staff meals. Cook's 80-something mom generally fixed our lunch, and it was always an adventure. The best thing that I remember was a soup that she made somewhat often. Dunno what all was in it, but the chicken feet and seaweed were obvious. Apparently was family Comfort Food. I can PROMISE that one wasn't on the Service Menu...
@@kevincrosby1760same...staff could make anything they wanted and when i recommended this restaurant to others, i forgot that they would never get to try the "good stuff" like i did
Thank you so much for your effort showing us how the fantastic dishes we all love are made. And thank you for your honest words! I am a biiiig fan of the Chinese culinary world. I have only been to Hongkong but last year I spent 6 month in New York City and people ask me what I miss the most and my immediate answer is: the food in china town. Because it was the best tasting food for a reasonable price. I had it almost every day. My all time favorite: steamed rice rolls with dried shrimps. But I literally love everything!! A lot of people think I am joking mentioning the Chinese food in New York City, but I am dead serious. I love all sorts of Chinese food and admire the dedication and techniques chefs using doing those dishes. ❤
I love this video. I’ve always felt the same way seeing recipe videos claim you can make it “better than takeout.” Like honey no, I don’t have a jet engine stove, surgical knife skills, and 30 years of wok cooking experience. The one channel I’ve never seen make this claim (besides yours) is Made With Lau and that’s cause he WAS the takeout guy. The add on to this conversation: you want authentic unapologetic Sichuan flavors imported directly from Chengdu? Stop asking these restaurants to make orange chicken. You want them to elevate the cuisine to something date worthy? Stop refusing to pay only dirt cheap prices. You want a chance to make it better than takeout? Well get used to the idea that MSG isn’t actually that bad for you. Lastly when it comes to pasta, it’s amazing to me how Americans don’t distinguish Italian American to Italian food. I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia and yet the restaurants that produce these two different cuisines are held in the same regard.
No one thinks Olive Garden is authentic. It's Italian Applebee's. But it's what people can afford and is available. Authentic is always harder and far more expensive to come by.
> I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia Isn't this the reverse take on the same issue? Pasta alla gricia is /*real Italian*/ so it's regarded more highly by foodies than spaghetti & meatballs, which is /*just*/ Italian American folk cooking. A *good* spaghetti and meatballs is on par with a *good* pasta alla gricia, but you've already had lots of *bad* spaghetti & meatballs, whereas nobody bothers to make a school cafeteria version of pasta alla gricia.
Made with Lau is so good. I gotta say though: "Lastly when it comes to pasta, it’s amazing to me how Americans don’t distinguish Italian American to Italian food. I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia and yet the restaurants that produce these two different cuisines are held in the same regard." This smacks of the same mindset that would denigrate Chinese-American takeout food and come up with a "better" version because it's "inauthentic" or "less-than". Italian-American is a legitimate cuisine that followed the same basic path as Chinese-American food: people transporting ideas across the ocean but with access to different ingredients. It's a very common concept when you look at foodways around the world! Pasta alla gricia isn't *better* than spaghetti and meatballs (for that matter, neither is spaghetti e polpette, the "original" spaghetti and meatballs). It's just different.
I do think it's a little complicated, though :) There's also a certain class element I think, and there's *also* an element where people genuinely want to share the depth and complexity of Chinese cuisine (and the takeout menu is certainly reductive)
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Definitely! I just have a bone to pick with Westerners making videos or opening restaurants where they "elevate" Chinese takeout food ;)
I'll say this: I've cooked a lot of Souped Up Recipes dishes and to be honest, Mandy's recipes often *are* better than takeout! At least where I live...
I'm also a big fan of hers. I don't recall her arguing in the videos why her versions are better than restaurant food. It's just "here's how I make beef and broccoli", and then slapping whatever title on it gets clicks (because that's how RUclips works). I've had takeout that's just as good as that, but I've also had a lot that wasn't. Even in a city, it can be hard to find a restaurant that takes the necessary care.
Wow! This was not the video I expected. I can not admire you both enough, not just for your incredibly down to earth and empathetic delivery of recipes that have changed my life, but of this incredibly preceptive response to exactly WHY the coverage of East and Southeat Asian food is the way it is.
Its kind of ironic, whenever us asians see the title "better than takeout" we automatically know to avoid that recipe...or we completely ignore the technique that recipe gives and use what we were taught
I watch those "better than take out" videos. By the end of the video it comes down to "oh, you added 1 tsp more soy sauce" than I normally would or something silly, like that. Is it better? nope, just clickbait
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 Taco Bell? Mexican? That's like comparing a Rolls Royce to a Ford Focus because they both have 4 wheels... I'm unsure how you can get more American than Taco Bell.
Thank you, thank you for the rant at the end. My father's side of the family is from Hong Kong and my mother's side is from northern Mexico. Growing up in California, it has always irked me that people have seen both Mexican and Chinese cuisines as cheap, unhealthy, and just a single type of cuisine, disrespecting the complexity of techniques and layering of flavors in dishes along with large diversity of flavors across both countries. I have the upmost respect for the chef at the taqueria who can churn out hundreds of delicious tacos an hour or the chefs at our favorite Cantonese restaurants who are able to prepare such a wide variety of dishes at a moments notice , and I wish the Western world would treat them with the same respect they have for European chefs. Additionally, I just wanted to thank you for so much of your videos over the years. Growing up, my Chinese father never cooked, and considering the rest of my family on that side is still in Hong Kong, the only memories I have of Cantonese cuisine were through our visits to SF's Chinatown and my father sharing with us his favorite dishes there. Several of your videos focusing on Cantonese dishes have allowed for me to connect, understand, and appreciate aspects of my culture that have been quite literally lost in translation. Thank you so much for what you do.
Steph is 100% correct, and the rant is warranted. I feel like there are a lot of dishes from Asian, and Mexican, and other cultures that get looped into the same category as drive through American fast food chains, and I think that's ridiculously condescending and dismissive. Thanks to this channel, and others like Kenji's, I can make some pretty darn tasty stir fry's, and other Asian dishes at home. I've never been able to even duplicate let alone improve upon my favorite dishes from my favorite local Chinese places, and that's ok. I still can, and do go and get their food when I want it. And the same is true about A LOT of the food I cook. I'm not a professional. I can make a decent burger, or steak, or mashed potatoes or whatever, but it's never as good as the best restaurants can do, but you don't see that "better than" label being thrown around about good steakhouses. Everyone aspires to that level, but pretty much no recipes claim to be "better" than those places. I think Asian and Mexican chefs and restaurants deserve the same level of respect. I aspire to that level, but know that getting there took them years of training, and practice to perfect and I don't realistically expect to be able to make a "better than takeout" version of their food at home without similar training, and practice... Not to mention the understanding of the ingredients, culture, and the methods that I do not have. Thank you for the work you guys do. You've greatly improved my home cooking, and my appreciation and knowledge of the culture that brings about these wonderful foods.
I appreciate your guys’ discussion of the topic. I don’t think that “rants” are such a bad thing when what’s being outlined is a criticism of discrimination and racism
i'm with you 100% on that whole "better than takeout". I think people do mainly say that because, its so fast and cheap that they can only assume that a lot of shortcuts were taken to make it. So if you make everything from scratch, its instantly "better". Plus you know, the casual social media clickbait. Side note, when i order take out, i always watch the kitchen because you could just see the amount of multitasking and skill that goes on there.
This is just a great video. Truly nailed it. Example: Explaining the marinade we have seen in multiple videos as to the hows and whys. And the sassy parts are the icing on the cake. Keep up the great work.
I think there's a less *directly* racist reason (emphasis is deliberate, read to the end) for Chinese recipes being offered up as "better than takeout." Takeout is often eaten without the trappings of a nice meal. You dump it out of a box onto, often, a disposable plate. That primes your brain not to respect the food as much. But many takeout places also let you sit down, plate your food with at least a little care, and better yet serve it piping hot rather than getting cold in the back of your air-conditioned car on the way there. That's a vibe much more like what you'll have if you make the same dish at home. You made an approximation of a restaurant preparation, and it's better than eating something from that restaurant that's halfway to being leftovers - but they'll be happy to serve you their version the way it was actually meant to be eaten. More of your American viewers should give dining in at their local inexpensive Chinese place a try sometime. You compare it to home cooks trying to match restaurant pasta. The pasta that has in mind is made by places where you'll eat it under romantic lighting, plated with extreme care - conditions you probably only approximate at home if you're throwing a fancy dinner party, which prime you to enjoy the meal to the fullest. Even if you made their recipes flawlessly, you won't ever end up taking it in just right like you do there. And I'll note that if you go to one of the Japanese steakhouses that perform as they cook, you'll get basically the same food as your local Japanese takeout, but you'll enjoy the atmosphere enough to pay several times more money. That atmosphere is often only on the level of an Applebee's, but for a lot of us outside a few very big cities it's the fanciest Asian dining experience available to us - whereas non-pizza Italian probably has Olive Garden as the floor. But why is it that European cuisines, with the exception of pizza (plenty of people claim their home pizza recipe is better than delivery; if you don't have a specialized pizza oven, it's not - same as "better than takeout" Chinese) get that treatment, while Chinese food in the US gets served in cheap brightly-lit with takeout as most of their business? *That* part is where our lack of respect for Asian culinary traditions and the cultures that made them really comes into play. America mostly isn't willing to support a fine-dining Chinese regional cuisine place, mostly because far too few of us are willing to accept that China has fine dining on offer. That's insulting, and it's keeping us away from some amazing food.
I absolutely love this video, and this is why I support y'all on patreon. I have been on a lifelong mission to make "as good as takeout" at home, and as far as I'm concerned, I've never gotten there but I've been close a few times. I love and respect the mastery that goes in to Chinese American and authentic Chinese dishes alike, whether from the mom and pop restaurant on the corner to the fancy up-scale Din Tai Fun or whatever. Thanks for helping bring awareness to me something that I uncritically accepted, and didn't think much about, from so many other youtube creators.
I think it's worth questioning the phrase "better than takeout" in another way. To me, homemade is commonly and easily better than take out. Homemade is made with love for people you love. Typically, recipes have their origins from some Mama cooking at home, meaning that homemade brings it back to the spirit of a mom just trying to feed her family after a long day. That's beautiful, too. Thank you so much for bending over backwards to help me, in my home kitchen, learn about new ways to feed my own family after a long day.
Not sure why you think that constitutes "questioning", but if you want to take that angle, I'd suggest interrogating why we think expensive food should be as expensive as it is.
@@Duiker36 It's expensive because a whole brigade of cooks in the kitchen prodded each item on your plate with their fingers and they need to be paid. That's why dim sum in Germany is expensive, because the cooks are paid accordingly.
Always love your culinary perspective; very no bullshit. I've always seen restaurant vs. home cooked just different styles. You're dealing with entirely different equipment and capabilities. And the point at the end of the day is to make food you enjoy eating. This basic concept doesn't get harped on enough, and that's why I love your channel and Adam Ragusea.
I will say as an ethnic person that's grown up in the tri-state area, the term better than take-out was popularized because of a not so small proportion of Chinese restaurants essentially mass producing Chinese cuisine (as other cultures also do in America). As a middle eastern man I can't even stomach half these quick and dirty kebab/falafel platter restaurants, and I know my own cooking is better than takeout. In many places American Chinese food is to authentic Chinese cooking as McDonald's is to freshly minced homemade burger. I've been to higher end Cantonese and szechuan restaurants and the difference is night and day. Everybody has their favorite takeout spots that are vastly better than the others, and in my opinion those tend to be the places that choose not to get swept away by the American food culture. Heck, just traveling from state to state the differing levels of quality are apparent. IMO you can even predict the outcome if no one of that culture eats there. I've had authentic Chinese food in Chinatown that I still crave to this day, meanwhile in all of Virginia I have had maybe a single good experience and not for a lack of trying as many places as possible. If I had to guess why I'd say the average Chinese store in NOVA is appealing to people that are not familiar with real Chinese cuisine. I'm not sure if it stems from racism imo. This happens with all food in America, even American food a la golden coral or McDonald's. You have to cut corners when producing a cost friendly meal that needs to be ready in less than 20 minutes. Love you guys
I somewhat agree, but I live in an area that's 25% Chinese and even here the authentic, very good Chinese restaurants sit at a 3.6 star rating mostly from people rating 1 star because it doesn't taste anything like Mall Chinese food (not me guessing, this is what they write in their reviews). Many people in the US have an expectation of what Chinese food is and some are not willing to let go of that idea.
"Better" is a matter of personal taste and preference. There's an Asian fusion restaurant here I frequent, but I know I prefer my own homecooked fried noodles over what I get there. But they're barely comparable because what I make is a combo of what I learn on channels like this, and what the restaurant makes is a combo of their tradition and appealing to Western palates (also whatever techniques change from homecooking to restaurant).
@@StealingCookiez better is a matter of opinion only when it comes to taste, while quality is not subjective. Someone might think McDonald's tastes better than fresh burger, but no one can argue that the quality is better. And frankly most of the time if you compare two dishes with all things being equal, better quality food ends up also tasting better.
@@exoxultrum4131 quality is also subjective, however we have a concept of it based on collective culture, preferences, and food wisdom passed on. Same thing with art. We have a collevtive understanding what makes good art, but there are still going to be varying opinions across all sorts of people. I think a lot of the "better than takeout" argument is rooted in the quality that can get sacrificed in fast food culture.
@@StealingCookiez we'll agree to disagree on quality is subjective. I've had falafel in parts of Egypt where the vegetables were almost rotten, and you could certainly see and taste it. Whereas I've also had falafel or kofta where without ever knowing about the history of the ingredients you could tell that everything was better, fresher, and made recently.
Apropos of takeout standards: note how it’s all western chefs who try to do better than takeout, but who then rave about street food in Asia. In North America, there are plenty of bad Chinese takeout restaurants, especially chains. But in the end it’s just a bad restaurant/chain, not a bad cuisine. I can make pizza that’s better than takeout because most takeout pizza is crap. But I have also had good, tasty takeout that I still cherish, and could never top, and that deserves respect. Sure, I’ve had amazing sushi in NY that cost me a month of rent, but never at the price of takeout, unlike real good Chinese takeout which is affordable.
> note how it’s all western chefs who try to do better than takeout, but who then rave about street food in Asia Right. Takeout in the west isn't as bad - or the street in Asia as good! - as many of these people seem to imagine. Don't get me wrong - I adore street food and all - but generally speaking the street is more this wild, fun incubator of cuisine than it is the place to get the 'best' cuisine. It helps drive cuisine forward because there's very little barrier to entry, and almost anyone can try their hand at something (sort of like the internet, but for food)... but then usually the people that're really good end up saving up enough/having enough of a following to open up a physical shop.
Go off Steph!!! You guys are so right though. Anytime someone says they can cook better than a restaurant, should probably be setting off alarm bells in your mind.
I agree with her take also, but in all honesty sometimes restaurants of any food type can just be plain average or mediocre here in the US. I grew up Italian-American, and a lot of times I tend to really prefer the version of an Italian dish that me or my mom has made at home versus what a restaurant offers up. But that isn't the case always, and I do think Chinese and other Asian takeout joints unfairly have a bad reputation for the reasons Steph listed in her rant.
Really appreciate this nuanced take and the opportunity to reconsider the little ways in which commonly-used phrases can contribute to subtle disrespect of foods we want to appreciate. Thank you!
Agree 100% with Steph on this. I have the same complaint about people looking down their noses at suburban, Anglosized Chinese restaurants for not being "Authentic", despite the ones that have been around for a long time always make incredible dishes that I'll never tire of.
To me, better than take out is because some food is just better before it has been in a take out container, steaming itself while you get it home. E.g., I cook steak far better than delivery, even from a resto that cooks a better steak than me, when I get to eat it at the resto.
I had never thought of that before. I did the search myself and 99% of the results were for Chinese food. No pizza, no souvlaki, no Indian cuisine at all, no döner kebab, no fish & chips...
because most people want to eat stir fry but don't want it to be as oily as your local take out place, so you can adjust it at home. Nobody is sitting there and thinking that they are going to spend 5 hours to make a neapolitan pizza dough that is actually going to be better than their local pizza place.
@@10010x0x0x01101XX0X1 That's the thing though, Italian food is always better at home. My pizza dough happens to be very good, so I'm not sure what you're talking about
@@DizzyBusy unless you have a legit pizza oven in your house that can get up to 900 degrees and you only live in a town with dominos there is 0 chance that is true
I love you guys so much for doing what you do. I love the comparison between restaurant and home cooking techniques and results. I've learned so much here that it's almost like I'm "stir frying" so much of what I eat because I love the result of meat and veggies in my wok!
Bon Appetit has a series where they call in a take out order, then try to cook their version of the dish before the takeout arrives. Is the Bon Appetit version better from a taste perspective? I think most would agree so. But, to Steph's point, Bon Appetit had all of their ingredients on hand, a trained chef prepared the food as fast as possible, sometimes "ideal" technique shortcuts were made, and there was always a messy kitchen to deal with after. So, that should be taken into account when messaging "better than takeout" of any ethnic variety.
is the Bon Appetit version REALLY better though? some of their recipes are legit terrible; some are good. takeout Chinese from a good restaurant is ALWAYS good. also, Bon Appetit was called out a few years ago for their disgustingly obvious racism and sexism. you might not want to die on their hill. :-) so to speak.
R Kelly’s grooming has nothing to do with his music Hitler’s life has nothing to do with his art The KKK’s racism has nothing to do with its uhh… statues or whatever.
Thank you for the “4 minute rant”. It’s really an important topic that isn’t looked at, as a symptom of a greater problem of prejudices. And thank you for the always good content!!
there's something very funny to me about how this video points out some specific western chefs that helped me with western cooking and how their advice doesn't apply at all to chinese cooking. and there's something even funnier about the 'better than takeout' folks talking about health... chinese takeaway was a staple of my childhood because it was far healthier than any fast food option, but you never see people saying they want to make a healthier burger better than fast food, just a tastier one.
Not true. I see people saying they want to make a burger better and (barely) healthier than fastfood all the time. That said I think being better than TAKE-OUT Chinese is a reasonable goal. First, it's take-out so it's being transported and not being served immediately. This means it's going to be very easy to be better just on the simple reality of eating it sooner after being prepared. Second, there has been a race to the bottom on these cheap Chinese restaurants that are all the same. 30+ years ago there were some variation in Chinese restaurant quality around the city I live in, but now with the exception of a few restaurants mostly in the very small Chinatown area they are all the same and all mediocre. The Thai, Vietnamese, Korean, etc places have pushed out everything else.
@@dolphycj Didn't you hear? The race to the bottom was actually won! Panda Express now holds the trophy. Best Pho around here (in my opinion) is still a little Vietnamese Grocery/Restaurant tucked back off the main drag. The first time I ever went there, The Dad was on the register, Mom was in the kitchen, and daughter was serving. Typical family-run Vietnamese place. Dads now passed on, Mom is on the Register, Daughter is in the kitchen, and grand-daughter is waiting tables. STILL the best Pho around, and I get the satisfaction of knowing that what I paid for groceries/lunch benefits a local family rather than some corporate bank account somewhere.
I mean, whether it's healthy really depends on what you order. General Tso's chicken is definitely not healthy, and I when I was younger the restaurants I ordered from didn't have a lot of vegetable heavy dishes, or sides like Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce.
I have never, ever heard the argument that Chinese food is the unhealthy option when it comes to fast food. I didn't grow up in America though, so I don't have that kind of hang up about Chinese food
@@DizzyBusy There are American "Weight Loss" diets that state that carbohydrates are the root of all evil. Other diets say that anything containing fat or oils or cooked in same will make you obese, but feel free to eat all of the carbs that you want. Some say that you and your obesity with burn in Hell for eternity if you eat anything that isn't a plant. Then you have the folks that say you can eat anything you want and lose weight, as long as it was available to our caveman ancestors as well. Personally, I've found that simply not heaping your plate with half of the buffet line works about the best. Unfortunately, Americans are not known for using common sense when choosing portion sizes. DISCLAIMER: None of the above applies to Medium-Rare Prime Rib or a good steak. These can be consumed in large quantities at any time. They are exempt from all dietary restrictions... :)
Honestly guys, I have enjoyed your videos for a few years. This one totally destroys everything that has come before it. It's simple to understand not just the process, but WHY xxxxx is / should be done.
@@lucapeyrefitte6899 Haha I addressed this (indirectly) in my pinned note. Until I was cutting the video/finding clips for the outro, I had no idea just how much Mandy DOMINATES that tag. But honestly? Really, good for her. She's a great cook and if anyone's going to be owning it, it should be her.
Honestly, you made me confront some biases I had with what you said at the end. Great video, and I appreciate the thorough breakdown of technique and ingredients.
I’ve had the same conversation about the better than takeout attitude with my husband (who agrees with Steph btw). I have found while learning Chinese cooking that it is one of the most Interesting and varied cuisines that takes serious skills and knowledge to pull off the huge range of dishes! I think the idea that it’s “cheap food” that needs to be elevated is a veiled internalize racist sentiment that people should really think more about before expressing. Thank you for your rant Steph it’s sorely needed in the cooking RUclips community!
You got a very legitimate point about something i never really thought to analyze before you mentioned it here, I admit to not even thinking twice about the whole "better than takeout" mantra, and you're right, its quite a pointless mantra. Also congrats on the 6 years, you guys are fun to watch and very educational, I hope you keep going as long as you are willing
Hey guys, I know that this video got a little… sassy… in parts. Wasn’t our intention, but it is what it is. *Please* don’t interpret this video as directed at any individual creators or anything:
1. The quick cuts of everyone saying ‘better than takeout’ were *only* to illustrate the ubiquity of the term. I also included the La Choy dragon in there to show it’s got a really deep history - I even remember seeing old recipes from the 70s and 80s also claiming stuff as ‘better than takeout’ (couldn’t seem to be able to dig them up from a quick google though). Again, all we want to do is get people to think twice before using the quip. I’m also aware that some creators’ livelihoods depend on owning that term for SEO purposes - I wouldn’t expect (or even want) them to make some kind of change just because we’re a little miffed.
2. “Better than takeout” also certainly isn’t *solely* a Chinese phenomenon. Other Asian cuisines - and Mexican! - also seem quite popular to categorize under the label. And yes, you *can* definitely also find ‘better than takeout pizza’ and ‘better than takeout burgers’, but the quantity definitely seems to pale in comparison.
3. Anyway, I know this is definitely another video that could be put in the bucket of “Chris and Steph tilt at the people-obsessing-about-restaurant-stove windmill” (maybe one day we’ll make a playlist, lol). I’m definitely aware that our position runs contradictory to a lot of people in the space.
4. In my personal view, the biggest advantage that that people don’t talk about re those restaurant stoves is *speed*. Like, take a look at the video of that dude whipping up some stir-fried Horfun: www.bilibili.com/video/BV1EV4y137ad/ He’s able to pump that thing out in basically two minutes flat. If it was us, working on a home stove, that whole thing might take… 6 minutes? 8 minutes? Now imagine a dinner rush… the chef that knows how to work that burner would be able to get three to four times the sales! It’d be stupid not to opt for it, provided you had the ability.
5. Are there some advantages, flavor wise, that those stoves provide? I’d grant that they do seem to provide *something*, but if we control for everything else (restaurant techniques like guoyou, restaurant approaches to seasoning, the skill of the chef, the fact that a restaurant stir-fry is served hot from the wok instead of needing to wait at the table) we believe that that something is… subtle. Much of what the flavors that people attribute to ‘wok hei’, we believe, is actually just the flavor of chefs being good at their jobs.
6. Generally speaking though, if you look online in English, people talking about wok hei will begin to extol the ‘char’ that the stoves provide. But next time you’re getting Cantonese food at a restaurant, I want you to ask yourself - how “charred” is the food that you’re eating, really? In Cantonese, ‘breath of the wok’ and ‘char’ are two separate concepts - the former, “wok hei” (镬气); the latter, “nong” (燶). In the Cantonese cooking system, wok hei is something that’s valued; nong is something to be avoided. American barbecue would be an example of something that would be very ‘nong’, which is likely why American-style BBQ joints seem to struggle in Guangdong. Those ‘nong’ bits are, in a TCM context, super ‘shanghuo’ (i.e. 上火, “warming” in a bad way) - like, Steph’s mom will obsessively snip off any charred bits from her food. Hell, some of Steph’s friends even avoid the crispy rice at the bottom of claypot rice for the same reason…
7. In sum, char is a quality that *American* cuisine values, not Cantonese. THAT SAID, if you personally enjoy your stir fries charred? Do it! Char your beef! Adjust to your tastes! International adaptation is fun. We just think there’s a certain level of oddness using a Cantonese term to justify something that is a very non-Cantonese end result.
8. The elephant in the room, however, is that online some of the proponents of actively charring stir fried ingredients are actually Americans with Cantonese ancestral backgrounds. So I do think we have to be open to the idea that wok hei might actually mean something *different* to Cantonese-Americans than it does to Cantonese in Guangdong. But like, maybe that’s to be expected? I mean, Chinese communities in America’ve been around just as long or longer than Italian communities, right? It makes sense that many people’s tastes would be more ‘American’ in nature, because I mean, they’re… Americans. So while something like Tim Chin’s ‘Torch Hei’ might cause Steph’s mom to recoil in horror, it’s probably correct for him in his kitchen according to his tastes.
9. In a similar sense, there’s another sort of category of video out there that earnestly tries to make a ‘superior’ homestyle version of [insert takeout dish here] - usually using some sort of variation of one of Kenji’s classic SE recipes. But if I remember correctly, in those articles Kenji’s very upfront that he’s uses a sort of ‘Korean Fried Chicken’ approach in order to add crunch. And if you like that sort of crunch like Kenji does, that’s cool! Cook it! Enjoy it! Kenji’s one of the best recipe writers of our time for a reason. But then, it’s not fair to compare the ‘crunch’ of your homemade version vs takeout, because the takeout version isn’t going for ‘crunch’.
10. A few years back Priya Krishna coined the term “Crispy Gone Soggy”, and went on an offensive of sorts to try to convince people that many of the best deep fried dishes aren’t necessarily ‘crispy’ anymore. For example, everyone loves Chicken Parm, but the deep fried coating there’s less for crunch, and more for absorbing the flavors of the sauce. It’s something that I deeply deeply agree with, BUT I think a Chinese culinary term - ‘pao’ (泡), i.e. ‘puffy with sauce’ - could also be used to describe the phenomenon (and might be a little more appetizing-sounding in English haha).
11. Because quite often (but certainly not always!), the point of certain coatings in saucy stir fries is in order to *absorb the sauce*. Because if you want something crunch + saucy, a question that’s worth asking, I think, is… why not just dip? Like, for me personally, if I’m getting something quite crunchy like Korean Fried Chicken, I personally actually prefer the plain sort and to dip in the sauce. The chicken stays crunchier, I can control the sauce quantity, and it’s less messy to eat.
12. But if YOU like your stuff crunchy, that’s cool! You’re allowed to adjust to your tastes, whether cultural or otherwise - that’s part of the fun! I just think it’s a little silly to then claim that these adjustments then are somehow intrinsically superior. Like, there’s this book on Cantonese cuisine (that we otherwise really enjoy), that in one part discusses the history of Cantonese chefs going abroad and spreading the cuisine. In the 1970s, they mention, that Cantonese chefs went to Singapore and Thailand and - his words - “significantly elevated the local cuisine”. Recently, living here in Bangkok, we’ve been enjoying whipping up a bit of Thai food, but sometimes I find that I can’t help but cut back a bit on the sugar, marinate my meat, etc etc. Sometimes I’ll joke around with Steph “here, try some of my Pad Krapow, but SIGNIFICANTLY ELEVATED”. The joke is that I’m not actually elevating anything, I’m just tweaking Thai cuisine based off of my own tastes and a few techniques employed by the cooking system I’m most familiar with (probably Cantonese, by this point). Want to do the same thing with Cantonese food and American techniques/tastes? Awesome! Even on this channel I’ll find myself doing so for a bit of Cha Chaan Teng fare. Just know that you *are* adjusting, and (given the popularity of Chinese food worldwide), your adjustment probably won’t be intrinsically ‘better’, though they’ll probably be better for your own tastes.
13. Quick aside that for the ‘not saucy’ seasoning at 8:02, the correct water quantity is the second (yellow, highlighted) one - i.e. 1 tbsp. Sorry about that - forgot to correct the first textbox. And of course, the recipe in the description box is the correct :)
Oof. Apologies for the novella there. We’ve obviously got… a lot of stuff to say lol. Again, HUGE thank you to everyone that’s watched over these six years; and an especially huge thank you to everyone that’s supported us on Patreon. Being able to have ‘freedom from the algorithm’ has been huge in being able to create the sort of content that we’re passionate about :)
Request for recipe: wuhan doupi. Please and thank you
The sass is warranted! There can be some very dismissive attitudes towards takeout cuisine that really belittles the history and reasons behind why food is prepared a certain way, and it sucks even more when it's weaponised to dismiss the quality of any food.
It's fine, but also kind of silly to imagine some kind of insult (feigning insult is merely a manipulative way of controlling other people).
People say 'better than takeout', because takeout is their only experience eating particular styles of food. And let's be honest -- places like P. X. Press are the T. Belle of """Chinese""" takeout (both likely to cause food poisoning).
Anyway, people sit around at home wondering how to make their favorite takeout meal at home, and titles like 'Better than takeout' get more clicks than 'Let's appreciate the thousands of years it took for Chinese to invent broccoli mixed with beef'.
'Takeout' is the only common frame of reference that we have.
This video was awesome. Don't worry about the haters. Keep up the good work.
Please please, sass away. I won't get into it, but I've noticed the disparagement of Chinese cooking in particular as well. They love it, but they hate that they love it. Also a lot of Chinese cooking is now being umbrella termed 'asian' instead of giving fair due.
I will forever and always preach the gospel that regional chinese cuisine is just as varied and complex and worthy of all the same respect and reverence that we give to italian and french cuisine in western culture, and everything you two do on this channel has been on the front lines of that fight and I wanna thank you guys for that and say keep up the good fight and cheers to at least another 6 years of dope content ahead!
100% agree, but I'd like to point out that when I was a kid, Italian food had no more respect than Chinese food. It was considered cheap and tasty and lowbrow. Fancy food was French, period. People have learned that there is more to it. Let's hope the same can be said for Chinese food in a few years, not to mention Mexican, and many other cuisines.
I'd argue it's significantly better than either of those.
@@DragonbIaze052 At the risk of offending people I'll provide some analysis:
In favour of Chinese:
- Throughout most of history China has had a higher population than Europe and thus more opportunity for innovation and development.
- The Chinese imperial court was much wealthier than any European royals, thus allowing very fancy techniques and recipes to develop.
- China imported a lot of ingredients through the Silk Road and from Southeast Asia.
- Chopsticks forces the cook to cut ingredients into smaller pieces, which then favours combining more ingredients and flavours.
In favour of European:
- Europeans imported a lot of ingredients from their colonies in the last couple centuries.
- A lot of Chinese heritage were destroyed in the Cultural Revolution.
- Eating with fork and knife allows western cook to focus on the original flavour of the ingredients.
- Cheese.
This.
They both have their Strengths and weaknesses. Obviously western europeans are masters of dairy and they have a very impressive Cured meat culture... Whereas China and Asian Cuisine in general excel excel in creating umami rich pastes that have gone Through Fermentation whether it be soy or seafood or chiles or meat.
Can't really speak about mongolian cuisine and their use of dairy
"In a Western context... people tend to eat beef not completely cooked." Congratulations, you channeled the energy of every traditional Asian mother, including mine.
Some information to add about the marinade ingredients:
Table salt, baking soda, and soy sauce all help tenderize the meat. The underlying chemistry is the same as brining: the dissolved salt ions allow some proteins to relax their structure.
Papain (papaya enzyme) and sometimes bromelain (pineapple enzyme) are proteases. They cut the protein in your meat into smaller peptides, thus improving texture and flavour. There are some Chinese soups that use papaya or pineapple in them, supposedly for the same purpose, although I suspect most of the enzyme are denatured by heat before they can do anything.
Cornstarch and egg white basically make the marinade stick to the meat, thus improving flavour and protecting the ingredients.
Underrated comment. I'm sure they'd love to see it as they've expressed a lot of interest in the science of food in the past. Hopefully this reaches them.
Originally I had salt under 'flavor and texture' for similar reasons, but Steph disagreed. She pointed out that often at restaurants the meat is marinated and then gets tossed in oil reasonably quickly (sometimes even 30-60 seconds later), which wouldn't be long enough for the salt to 'work'.
Then again, the meat is quite thinly sliced. So I'm not completely sure either way.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified I don't think Steph's example disproves the explanation. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Even if some restaurants don't allow enough time for salt to affect the protein, others might.
I'm no biochemist but I did a lab in biochemistry in college. My impression is that these sort of reactions happen at a time scale comparable to dissolving salt in water. 30-60 seconds might be enough for a portion of the protein to relax.
wow
i learnt all of my beef marinating recipe from my mom (& grandma)
and i only add salt, ginger, garlic, oyster sauce, oil & pepper (salt & ginger are essential, the rest are optional and have decreasing importance)
with buffalo, the content is the same, just with garlic instead of ginger
I agree with Steph’s take and see the same phenomenon with Mexican food, which is (mainly in the US) seen as lesser or un elevated which comes from the same ignorance and condescension.
Examples like the “better than Chinese stir fry takeout” movement take a dish and isolates it from it’s origin, traditions and culture, simplifying it to the lowest common denominator that people enjoy.
All these RUclipsrs that call themselves chefs forget that studying cuisine goes hand in hand with an anthropological and cultural understanding of the food, not just the ingredients on the recipe.
You guys are using a bad faith argument and closing your eyes to a whole lot of factors, for the sake of giving a feeble lecture...
Some food is meant for home cooking and some food is meant for takeout.... Better than take-out for pizza, tacos, burgers, donuts, fish'n chips, sandwiches and coffee is ABSOLUTELY a thing that is not restricted to chinese food.
Chinese people are just very culturally industrious and tended to open restaurants that produce take-out/fastfood versions of the simplest food from home, whereas other culture tend to cook at home first (sometimes for generations) without selling, and then slowly consider opening vans and eateries with their simple foods, in take out version.
Meanwhile, I've never seen a Peking duck, a salmon carbonara pasta, or a wedding cake in take out form.
Improving on fast-food is not condescension: It's youtube algorithm pleasing. (those things you know and love but at home, and better!!!)
@@AnimatedStoriesWorldwide Adding-
There is a world of difference between the best Chinese food and whatever I find in a strip-mall. Better than takeout for the latter can be as simple as seasoning properly and not being kept under a heat lamp. This is the reason why hole-in-the-wall places that kill it are so valued. No one is comparing their home cooking to them (and actually try to replicate it).
I could make the same comparison to Domino's "take-out" spaghetti vs. what you would get in some grandma's kitchen. Better than take-out is absolutely the case, but for lasagna, it's just easier to go to a more reputable establishment.
Part of the problem in the US is that most mexican food IS garbage; if you don't live in Cali, Texas, NM, etc there's a good chance when you think mexican you think either Taco Bell (ugh) or one of the slightly better but still crap chains like Qdoba, Chipotle, or Del Taco.
Compared these offerings? It is trivial and absolutely 100% achievable for a home cook to do better than takeout.
And yeah, agree wih Al that there's plenty of other western favorites that are very easy to do better at home than you get from most takeout places. The fancy pasta argument is both very specific and disingenuous.
The main reason people look down on Chinese in the US is more about racism than anything else, but it also still doesn't mean that you can't beat PF Chang's or Pasta Express with very little actual effort.
"take a dish and isolates it from it’s origin, traditions and culture, simplifying it to the lowest common denominator that people enjoy"
The problem is that that is what many takeout places are actually doing themselves here. "Better than takeout" does apply to all cuisines around here, even traditional local cuisine, not just asian or south american, because most takeout places and many cheaper and some not so cheap "real restaurants" mostly just peddle convenience products, as in factory-made puzzle pieces that just need to be combined and heated up. Which are formulated to be "agreeable" to the lowest common denominator. There are better restaurants representing most nationalities, but those aren't considered standard "takeout" even if they do offer takeout service. Because they are not standard, they are the few that stand out.
And while the city i am currently in is blessed with more "real" chinese restaurants than i can count on one hand, for many years when i lived other places, there wasn't a single one, while there were "real" italian places etc.
Very well said.
Broccoli cooking: so my dad taught me this technique he learned from a Chinese cook in the 1960s in a Bahamas hotel kitchen: ripping hot peanut oil and salt. Then throw in broccoli for a few seconds to char. Pour in a small glass of water that contains chopped garlic. Cover immediately and let steam to doneness. The texture is awesome in ni time and the garlic flavour is infused in the broccoli, which gets evenly seasoned. No idea if it’s a Chinese technique or a kitchen hack, but it has never failed me and it’s the reason why I love broccoli.
Interesting … I’ve never heard of salt straight into oil, probably because it … doesn’t dissolve? At least I think it doesn’t 😬
I’m honestly already so confused by that one little detail 😅
@@corpsefoot758 Yeah, it doesn't. Like physically if you throw salt into oil it just won't get into the oil or on the food, it isn't possible.
I do this when I fry up some wedges or something that wants a crust in a cast iron skillet. In my understanding at least it gets things crispier by binding surface water, but I can't proof that :D
Does another oil work? I'm allergic to peanuts.
@@ChicaneryBear Yeah, peanut is a common oil for Chinese cooking but any oil that tastes good and has high heat usage works. I personally recommend sunflower oil as it's very similar.
Sis is SPITTING! I will never give up the relationship I have with my local Chinese delivery guy who tells me the stuff on the menu to order the following Tuesday.
Literally, upping my Patreon monthly membership because of this video. Especially the end. ICONIC! Love y’all so much and congratulations on 6 years!
We do really really appreciate it. We also try to pay it forward and support the creators we enjoy - having people support your work directly (together with living a reasonably low cost lifestyle) is so huge in being able to not have economic pressures from the algorithm (which is highly random, highly variable). Knowing that we could still eat and have a roof over our head, even if RUclips for some reason completely demonitized and stopped recommending our channel tomorrow... is a luxury that many creators don't have :)
1) I love that you provided a non sauced version of this dish. So many recipes I see online, are so sauced. And growing up, my family has always made it with minimal external ingredients. I love being able to taste the broccoli and beef without being inundated with excessive soy sauce and oyster sauce and whatever else you put in to “Bump up the flavor”. Sometimes it’s good to just savor the simple ingredients and appreciate it! 2) Steph’s “better than takeout” exposition at the end was lovely. I think more people need to hear it. 3) I’ve always wondered why everyone’s definition of “wok hei”, which always differed from how my dad taught me, has always confused me. And your explanation really nailed it.
Great vid! I love a good broccoli beef, and a wonderful video.
Agreed. My beef and broccoli is never very saucy, as that is how I prefer it. Saucy beef and broccoli with usually overcooked broccoli is such a sad thing to see on a plate.
This is the BEST and most useful video about Chinese Beef available to human kind. So many many many useful information. Especially the marinade. Can't believe this took 6years to publish.
When I'm making any Chinese dish I come to this channel to see how it's been done traditionally. Thank you guys for your existence, that's all I can say.
Oh man, Steph's rant at end articulates everything I've ever wanted to say about why people trying to 'improve' Chinese food has always rubbed me the wrong way.
I get that there's probably no ill intent behind it, but man does it feel patronising.
Especially when white cooks do it.
Don't we do the same thing with greasy spoon burgers and sandwiches?
I don't think people use it for dim sum or Peking duck, usually just for cheap and greasy eats
@Ezekiel Barrett i think people kinda look down on 'elevated' burgers as snooty or not worth the squeeze, certainly not the same way as 'better than takeout' dishes
There's usually no ill intent behind racism. It's just something you grow up with: stepping on other people is normal and natural and not worth the time or effort of questioning when there's so much else you have to be worried about. The boys throw stones at frogs in jest, but the frogs die in earnest.
I found you guys after the kenji shout-out ages back and I’m so fucking happy I did. I LOVE how in depth and down to earth the cooking is. You cover the fancy and the normal, but most importantly you explain WHY. it’s the same reason I loved kenjis stuff. I don’t want to just know how to cook, I want to understand how. And be able to apply that knowledge elsewhere. This episode what PACKED with knowledge
You geeks are so lovable. It's obvious how you love and take your craft very seriously. Your honesty in the face of trends is a testament to that.
Also, thanks you for all the help you provided me in my ongoing journey into chinese cuisine. As a french guy, it is as humbling as it is exciting.
Well... Thx for your sharing your passion with such love, care and precision, you're great !
The funny thing about the pasta example is that it is really easy to make better than 90% of what you'll get in an ordinary restaurant outside of Italy by using high quality pasta and emulsifying your sauces correctly.
True, though I think this strengthens the point of the 'rant' at the end of the video. The pasta we get at restaurants is often phoned in and of middling quality that you can do as well or better with a small bit of care, so the question of why we tend to apply 'better than takeout' type sentiments to certain foods and food cultures even when that might be so far from true as to be laughable (like the melt-in-your-mouth beef and broccoli) is important.
@@royeckhardt9016 I think it’s because many Americans just have no experience with Chinese cooking. So most of the time they can’t produce something close to the takeout they can get, where that isn’t true for diner food, or other cuisines they are more familiar with.
hahah exactly. Unless you go to a very good pasta restaurant, your home pasta will be better
Cause when you make pasta for yourself, you’re making a good with your likes in mind. Restaurants don’t care if you like their pasta a lot, they just want you to like it enough that you won’t cause problems for them. Their goal is to please a lot of people whcih runs the risk of simplifying their food.
Adding complexity to food runs the risk of running people away.
Same mindset applies to take out places.
Difference is that you’ll find a lot more restaurants for pasta then straight up take out places.
There is no reason to make any rant, it’s just how the food culture developed in the us. If you were to go to China, I’m sure there are plenty of simplified western chains that page in comparison to something you could make at home.
The cantonese chicken wing recipe on this very channel is a good example of this.
Also typing in a vague good term such as “pasta” with another vague term such as “restaurant” that can mean a lot of things. “Fried rice” in the us refers to one specefic type of food really that you only ever find in certain spots that are owned by people without a lot of income.
The argument is bad faith and the implications are worse.
@@royeckhardt9016 depends on the restaurant. If you're talking about pasta from Olive Garden, 100% yes definitely phoned in. But I've eaten at restaurants where I _know_ they prepared their carbonara right. Even the one shortcut they did -- use streaky belly bacon instead of guanciale -- worked because they used extremely smoky bacon.
Man, that "Magic School Bus to Flavourville" line was a punch of nostalgia I didn't know I had in me about learning about taste buds and the tongue. It's amazing how educational that cartoon was. And I'm not even from an english speaking country.
Edit: BTW, loved the casually thrown in memes in this episode.
Edit 2: That rant was spot fucking on!
TBF to the "better than takeout" crew. A lot of takeout places are not great. Just because someone works hard (and they do, restaurant work is very hard) doesn't mean they are a particularly great chef. I only have experience with respect to Indian style food and the reaction to takeout curry from the indians that I know is that often it just isn't very good, and they are usually capable of making something better themselves. In fact I would argue this is true of most "cheap" style restaurants, a dedicated and careful amateur can make a "better" meal at home because they are not working under the same constraints as someone in a commercial kitchen with a full restaurant and limited time to deliver.
And now fully reading your comment i realise you have expressed the above far more eloquently yourselves. You guys are great! :-)
In regards to the "better than take-out", I usually ignore those recipes.... CAUSE I WANT THE RECIPE TO BE LIKE TAKEOUT!
Preach!
exactly, that's always my gold standard.
Likewise agreed. In fact, all this time I went out and eat at the restaurants, is to (literally) bring them back home and try to replicate the taste and efforts put into these food.
that was a triple thumbs up!
i disagree. i want the flavors from takeout but i want to use high quality chicken / beef, which is usually lacking in the local take out places.
Because of this video, I cooked my first proper stir fry! It certainly wasn’t perfect, but eating the finished dish I was blown away that I made something that actually tasted like take out beef and broccoli, instead of just tasting like soya sauce. Thank you!
I actually just did the same thing today. I know it's on the simpler side of things, but I still feel happy that I'm finally cooking instead of just watching videos about cooking, lol.
I view the “Better Than Takeout” phenomenon as just copywriting hyperbole to get home cooks excited to make dishes they perceive to be out of their reach (in terms of skills needed to actually make the dish).
Same thing with exercise routines (Get RIPPED! Beach Bod! etc.) People emotionally respond to colorful and exaggerated language.
Speaking from the perspective of a creator and as someone who has previously worked in kitchens as a cook and done copywriting, most of those uses of the “Better Than Takeout” uses you showed can almost certainly be traced back to people just modeling what works (ie Mandy’s Better Than Takeout series) because they know people are responding to that on RUclips.
“Home-cooked” or “Different but Similar” or “Basically the Same” as Takeout doesn’t have the rhetorical flair or linguistic punch of “Better Than.” People want to feel like they’re improving. Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant.
If people are offended by the “Better Than” claims, it’s probably a matter of how they’re choosing to frame it. One way to frame it is: “It’s disrespectful to hard-working immigrants and small business owners. It’s insensitive to their traditions and has overtones of racial or ethnic bias.”
Another way to frame it is: “Wow, people love this cuisine so much they want to try and learn its techniques and share this incredible food with their family and friends.”
Personally, I choose to view it in the latter fashion.
My best friends growing up owned a Chinese restaurant and this is the food I grew up with. It’s just as much a part of my life and history as anything my grandmother made for me.
I loved the video though. And I sincerely appreciate addressing the misconceptions about restaurant wok cooking vs. home cooking techniques. It gets tiring hearing in the comment section every single day: “It’s impossible to make this style of food at home. Don’t even attempt it.” And the pointless Wok Hei arguments are borderline cliche at this point. So, thanks for that.
Also, I’m honored you used one of my clips in your video. Even if it was in a (moderately) disparaging way. Just knowing that you’ve even seen my video is humbling because I love your channel and I’ve learned a lot from you both.
Sending you much love from Texas!
Keep up the great work!
> Even if it was in a (moderately) disparaging way.
Sent you a message over on Discord, hope you don't interpret the inclusion in the compilation as 'disparaging' :) Simply wanted to give people a sense of the ubiquity. You do a nice job with your videos.
I wanted to respond to this though, but I wanted to preface this all by saying that *it’s ok to disagree about stuff*. A lot of people on the internet seem to have this weird Messianic sense of purpose and a Manichaen sense of good/evil when talking about this sort of thing.
At its core, we just wanted to get people thinking about this - show that it *was* a phenomenon. Maybe people end up settling down on a different opinion, and that’s fine.
So while I disagree with a couple ideas that you’ve presented here, think of this more as a couple people debating while chit chatting over a beer :)
> Same thing with exercise routines (Get RIPPED! Beach Bod! etc.) People emotionally respond to colorful and exaggerated language.
I think that's fair. But let's just say... copywriting as a field isn't exactly known for its subtle, nuanced, and progressive use of language. You're absolutely correct that it's all directed at that sort of emotional 'collective Id' of the society - which is also why it's helpful to think critically *about* that language, and what it potentially says about the society as a whole.
The fitness industry is an odd example to choose, given how incredibly predatory the advertising in that industry is - how it quite obviously indulges in people's worst insecurities in order to turn a buck. Like, just... take a moment to think about the term "Beach Bod!" that you just mentioned. Implied in this terminology is that unless you're ripped, unless you conform to the ideal, that you should be ashamed of going to the beach and wearing a bathing suit. So much so that if you go to the beach in America in the summer, there's overweight people so insecure that they're literally wearing their T-shirts into the ocean to swim. Meanwhile, the middle aged pot-bellied dude in the hutongs proudly curls his T-shirt into a Beijing bikini without anyone (save for a few tourists) blinking an eye....
People do respond emotionally to certain language. But I guess the question that’s useful to ask is… what emotion is that language evoking? The fitness industry is *all about* the shame. Luckily, food’s generally a lot more positive of a space.
> “Home-cooked” or “Different but Similar” or “Basically the Same” as Takeout doesn’t have the rhetorical flair or linguistic punch of “Better Than.” People want to feel like they’re improving. Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant.
“People want to feel like they’re improving”.
Improving... [what]?
“Like they’re moving forward instead of being stagnant.”
Moving [what] forward, instead of [what] being stagnant?
I’m going to be charitable and assume that the [what] that should be inserted in those statements is “themselves/their own cooking” and not “takeout style Chinese food” :) Although in that case, I’m not sure if it all logically follows? If the ‘what’ that we should strive to improve is our previous selves, wouldn’t better-fitting cliches be something like “[You] can Stir fry LIKE A MASTER” or “LEVEL UP [your] Chinese cooking”?
Even still, I guess I don’t completely agree with your underlying premise? Your videos got a ton of traction, I think, because they framed things as “takeout secrets revealed!” (also, your introductions were absolute bangers that fed nicely into the title/thumbnail combination) The underlying emotion that the video was indulging in was that there was this secret knowledge that you were uncovering for your audience. It’s not an emotion we like to indulge in *too* much (I - Chris - am already probably a borderline cringey Marco Polo for some folks lol), but it’s definitely something that people respond to. That ‘better than takeout’ bit in your introduction? To me actually felt completely unnecessary to the video! And given how tight your VO was, I was actually slightly surprised that the cliché slipped in.
> Another way to frame it is: “Wow, people love this cuisine so much they want to try and learn its techniques and share this incredible food with their family and friends.”
There’s definitely a certain slice of the internet that gets a little up in arms any time that a WASP presents a recipe that’s from a culture that’s any farther from England than, say, Normandy. Given how much success your recent videos’ve gotten, I’m sure you’ve also gotten a taste of them too, haha.
We think it’s cool that you love the cuisine so much that you want to learn the techniques and share the food. We’re the same! We *only* find it cringey that people *then* are so quick to thoughtlessly claim afterwards that theirs is ‘better’.
There’s nuance here, there’s a bunch of people that’ll disagree with us, and certainly nobody’s a bad person just because they’ve uttered the words. “Better than takeout” is an OLD turn of the phrase, at least as old as the La Choy dragon (I *think* La Choy might’ve actually coined the phrase in the 50s, but I’m no historian). We just wanted to direct people’s attention to a tired copywriting cliché, and maybe try to think a little critically about a phrase that they’ve unthinkingly seen used probably their entire life :)
I live in a college town with a large Chinese student base, so the local chinese takeout is honestly incredible.
Ive also had really bad takeout in "middle-of-nowhere" towns that was barely edible.
Sometimes making home cooked chinese food that is better than takeout means making it actually taste good.
Good point. I had dan dan noodles once that were just soy sauce and chili flakes on overcooked spaghetti, so yes quite literally anything I could make in the kitchen would be "better" than that pile of sadness that I actually paid money for.
@@daniellejordan4551 Good god, where did you find a Chinese restaurant using spaghetti? Lol.
@@SatchmoBronson The suburbs, lol.
You could say that about any restaurant, yet only certain cuisines get the better than takeout label
@@RenegadeY I think personally it's more an indication of how bad the local Chinese takeout places are (and yet still survive).
Also personally, if I go to a restaurant and eat a meal I know I can cook better at home, I won't hesitate to mention it (and also probably never go back to said restaurant).
French chef dousing an omelet with 50 sticks of butter and slow cooking a duck leg confit in a swimming pool of duck fat for 48 hours
Some people: that's true mastery of cuisine right there
Chinese chef passing a few lean pork strips through a wok of oil
The same people: Damn it smells good but that's too much fat for my healthy lifestyle
I wanted to make a documentary called ‘Supersize Moi’, where the backers would pay for me to eat nothing but food from the absolute pinnacle of French restaurants for a month, and I would not be able to turn down any suggested wine pairing.
I doubt there would be any difference in outcome from Supersize Me.
Ain't nobody saying French food is healthy, just tasty
@@bruh1322the problem is the double standard
@@King-Kazma you’d be drunker!
This is such a weird thing to me because, I generally consider home cooked food to be better than takeout food, especially pasta. I genuinely dislike most restaurant pasta in the place I live because it’s usually cooked not to my taste and Italian food is all about cooking with few ingredients to taste. The one exception I have is Asian food in general and Chinese food in particular, which I never seam to be able to cook to the quality of Chinese restaurants. The techniques the chefs in those restaurants use are often too complicated for me and my version ends up subpar. The only reason I’d home cook Chinese food is to try a recipe that’s just not available in a takeout.
Anyway, the point is that Steph is right and you should respect all the hard work going into restaurant food preparation. If you don’t like it, you don’t, but that’s you.
Love you guys. Very well put, Steph.
I'm a chef of over 15 years and I can confidently say that cooking at a restaurant and at home are two very different things and similar results shouldn't be expected. Unless you've got a massively kitted out kitchen and a fleet of cooks to do your mise en place for every single meal. Haha.
Asian foods of many different countries are my absolute favorite. My cooking has greatly improved in some of the dishes thanks to you guys as well as some other channels that I have watched many hours of, I can come somewhat close to some of my favorite restaurants but only a time or two have I ever been close enough to enjoy it as much as a good restaurant. I respect you and Asian cuisines greatly.
5:15 I suppose an allegory here I can think of is with pasta. Sure you could just combine cooked-to-package pasta with your sauce when serving, but finishing the pasta in the sauce is almost always better from a texture/final seasoning perspective.
You tell them steph!!! In the early days of the internet and food TV I tried many "better" than take out stir fry recipes, only to be disappointed in the terrible textures, flavors and aromas of these recipes. It took lots of independent reading and experimentation before I discovered the secrets to and realized how nuanced/ technically challenging the recipes and their developments have been to deliver this great cuisine. Love your videos!
I'm just learning how to cook and I love the approach to this channel. It's very unpretentious. You aren't trying to impress people with your flashy bullshit, you're just earnestly trying to educate people on how to prepare stuff well. You're accommodating people of varying skill levels who may not have the same available tools. I like it a lot.
This is why I love you guys, spitting truth while staying respectful to the masters. This is a really respectful, insightful video, much appreciated.
I have to say, ive massive respect for you and your wife.
You both have taught meany recipes over the last 3 years of watching your channel, as well as introducing me to a cooking culture i would've never been exposed to otherwise.
Im limited by language and my phone haha but again i want to give a genuine thank you.
Go raibh maith agat,
James from Ireland
Excellent points.
For the record, my goal is rarely "better than takeout". It's about making food as I like, occasionally tweaking things more to my taste.
So knowing the reasons for the techniques, is my favorite kind of lessons.
Well done.
Chinese takeout is my only frame of reference for American Chinese food... if I want to learn how to make something and the title says it's BETTER than take out, well HOLY HELL, I'm gonna click on that one, because it must be amazing.
One thing that greatly annoys me about basically ALL non western cooking info on the internet is that it's always about mimicking restaurant/take-out food, doesn't matter if it's indian, chinese, mexican, persian, etc. I don't care about that, I want to know what a normal chinese person in china would make on like a wednesday. That's a lot more relevant for me.
I watched the entire video all the way through for the dude who broke everything down so well, but then subscribed at the end for the extremely wise lady making us think about what we’re truly saying. Well done! You both have made us better in unexpected ways
Steph - i completely appreciate your point, but would note that perhaps - just perhaps - in many places the U.S. the “better than takeout” moniker reflects the quality of American chinese food. The quality is a reflection of the local demand for inexpensive, and often sweeter foods,, much like the fast food flavor profile. So is my beef and broccoli better than Panda Express? Yes. But it’s certainly not better than take-out from an authentic chinese restaurant. We need to support and celebrate high quality restaurants.
Steph's working out right now (maybe she can get back to you directly in a bit :) ), but when we went to our local takeout joint in the USA... I think she was actually surprised at how solid the quality was. She'd heard so many people dragging the fare, that she had really low expectations. But all the dishes were cooked properly - IIRC her overall impression was that it was "about street food level quality"
Like, it might not be dim-sum-chef-nailing-the-13th-pleat-of-their-Har-Gow level good (and it's *incredible* - and maybe unsustainable? - that there are also quality immigrant-run Chinese restaurants in the west that do actually pump out that sort of quality for a reasonable price)... but it's still proper Chinese cooking. And there's definitely a lot of online recipes that don't meet that bar.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified The quality of Chinese food or takeout I've had in the US has run from about a 3/10 to like a 9.5/10, the latter being from a chinese exchange student my family was hosting's dad, who was the chef at a local place that made authentic Sichuan food (to the best of my knowledge, having never visited Sichuan)
I think that I and a lot of other americans would draw a distinction between "takeout" and "restaurant" food, with takeout being lower quality by definition. I've worked in kitchens for nearly 10 years now, but I would never presume to be able to replicate the upper bounds of quality I've gotten from the really good restaurants I've been to without having meaningful experience cooking that kind of food, but I do think I've made better lo mein than the stuff my wife likes to get sometimes from whatever the nearest open restaurant is. I know that there's a lot of ignorance (to put it politely) around Chinese food and culture in the US, but I think that the specific "better than takeout" line isn't necessarily emblematic of an overall lack of respect, at least not in most cases.
As a side note, one of the only other kinds of online recipe I've seen that says the better than takeout line semi-frequently is Pizza, at least in my kind of bad memory. Similarly, I've had pizza ranging from straight up terrible to really excellent, but I think most of the time, people are really trying to say that they'll beat the pants off of domino's. Which, as a relentless hater of chain pizza, I would hope they achieve.
@@ChineseCookingDemystifiedIf you are saying that Steph put in the same level an American franchise which received hundreds of thousands dollars in investment and training and a chinese Guy/Gal with a chinese mother and his/her own skills, you more or less proved the original commenter point.
As others pointed in the commentaries, nobody is comparing with the 5 star chinese Restaurant, but with a simplified version of what the chinese food may look. In Brazil (where I live), is worse, and even Very good restaurants aren't autenthic. It's a recent phenomena things like lo mein and char siu is inexistent in big cities.
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Absolutely agree that there are legit, amazing chinese restaurants in many places that are waaay better than any of the on-line recipes. But there’s also a lot of pretty awful stuff on offer, at least where I live. And chinese cooking technique is in a league of its own, and something to venerate. If there was a legit restaurant near me, I wouldn’t be tackling it at home.
I have had my share of bland gristly takeout to understand the online recipes. It shouldn't be seen as a disrespect to the chefs, who have to deal with small budgets and kitchens and an undemanding clientele that just wants cheap eats
The chefs, techniques and traditions do deserve to be respected. Thank you both for all your years of very informative and fun videos. You have definitely have made me a better home cook!
Right on Steph!! Loved the ending with the little dragon too. Be as sassy as you want guys. We love you to bits! 😁
I have never had anything "better" than takeout. Chinese take out is made by people who are amazingly talented and who perform alchemy in their kitchens.
One of my dreams is to actually be able to have the innate knowledge and skill to magically whip up some authentic Chinese cuisines or even westernized options. I have been watching videos from many of the people all around China, for years, just to understand and learn the essence of culture and cooking combined. I know that there is a rhythm, pattern, etc to how it all comes together and it takes years of passing on that knowledge for a person to have this gift. I hope to someday figure it out in my heart.
Even then, I don't think I could give up my Chinese take out!! Canadians are very dedicated to their love of Chinese food. When I was little, my siblings and I would do all kinds of chores for neighbors, just so we could pool our money and go down to the local place to devour as many egg rolls as we could afford. The people that ran the place are like family. I went to school with the kids and it was always a treat to go into their home and hear stories and eat "real" food from back home.
I am a very lucky person. ☺
Sassy Steph is best kind of Steph
Man I've been on discord for 12 years and I remember you guys coming onto the subreddit cooking scene. I hope you guys are so proud about how far you've come. You guys were an amazing resource back then and continue to be.
...When you throw away the stalk you have tossed out the best part.....Simply put a paring knife blade under the skin and pull off the tough hide and slice the stalk diagonally......The results have a far better texture and taste than the flowerets.
I love this channel so much, so many great tips and real techniques! You convey real respect for both other chefs and the history of these dishes. I've learned so much and I think you've certainly helped unlearn some western biases. Thank you both so much!
I really think (american) classic chinese takeout needs some serious love and appreciation, which I think is finally starting to get. It's down right delicious, and a testament to thousands of hardworking immigrants trying to make it in a foreign country. The history behind chinese takeout is super interesting, and really worth some reading. The mix of cantonese, fuijanese, taiwanese, and american has become super interesting for me.
I hear the "better than take-out" line a lot in my family and I disagree with your position that it comes from disrespect or negative stereotypes. I'm Malaysian-Chinese and someone whose parents and grandparents grew up in traditional settings and experienced poverty and/or village life before subsequently elevating to relative affluence (not super-rich, just middle-class). The first thing to note is that yes, it really _is_ that easy to make a lot of what take-outs do. It's not a disrespect to them to say that, certainly not coming from people like my grandmother who's been making that exact sort of dishes all her life.
The second thing is, when you're someone who's been in our positions, eaten up and down the ladder, in back-streets and Michelins and everything in between, across all regions _and_ learn how to make it at home because that's our standard cuisine, you really do see the difference in quality, the make and the effort. Maybe it's become self-fulfilling prophecy but Western people almost _expect_ Chinese take-out to be a certain way; we have eaten that in many places (my parents studied for years in the UK and USA; I have lived in Australia half my life) including Malaysia and it is _not good_ . But even in Asia where you'd think the bar is higher, it is not difficult to find a take-out whom you'd try and go "I can do better".
They use too much starch, for one; there should be some unctuousness to the sauce for sure, but not swimming in a sea of gloop so thick that if you flung it to the ceiling it'd stay there. Very often way too much salt. Too much MSG as well; again, I'm not anti-MSG but when the food tastes _fluorescently_ enhanced it's just bad and always will be. And the quality of the ingredients- the cheap cuts of meat, the cheaper brands of sauce, frozen rather than fresh ingredients, plus general hygiene- cannot be vouched for, but you can readily detect when it's low. And then (obviously our Asian calculativeness comes out) they charge x amount for y amount of food, when you realise you're getting cheap meat, not fresh vegetables, noodles not homemade, when if you bought good quality equivalents and did it yourself you could make it so much better, more cost-effectively.
THAT is what they mean by "better than take-out" and, bear in mind, when you actually live in Asia, the bar for what is good take-out is WAY higher. My family, when they cook, they use less salt, less sugar, less starch, less oil and no MSG. This isn't a health kick thing or a recent phenomenon; my Grandma grew up illiterate in a village, she cooks mostly the same way and has never used MSG. We steam, stir- or light-fry most things and we have soup every dinner. They go to the wet market 2-3 times a week so everything is as fresh as can be.
My Mom's catchphrase is always "qing qing tian tian", literally "light and sweet". You don't need to nuke everything with salt, starch and enhancers to make flavour bombs when the _natural_ flavours of _fresh_ ingredients cooked cleanly and with respect will be just as richly flavoured, still traditional and arguably healthier. Obviously we have our indulgent dishes like three-layer belly pork or black vinegar trotters (we're Hakkas from the south so have a lot of long-braise dishes) but those're more feast dishes for special occasions; we don't eat like that on the day-to-day. We're not prejudiced against take-out and will readily eat out, esp as both my parents and my grandma (the only one of my four grandparents remaining) are getting old now and cooking has become harder. We just know it's simply not difficult to be just as good or better.
I think she's too busy being offended to respond to your careful, and well -thought -out comment.
Finally, someone who has a valid and opposing viewpoint and isn't just giving the "yass sassy queen" bs.
👏
I've been watching your vids for a while and that last little monologue you had was what got me to subscribe. people, especially amateur home cooks like myself, greatly underestimate the hundreds of little steps you need to get right in order to cook something truly delicious. Cantonese cooking is deceptively technical! I think because it's so easy to buy sauces these days and because, like you said, Chinese takeout is so quick and cheap, that people take it for granted. great job highlighting this. it makes me appreciate all foods even more and I have a new appreciation for the thousands of years of collective cooking knowledge went into making a "simple" stirfry.
I grew up in the SF bay area and there has always been very good quality Chinese food. However, I think that Chinese restaurants in parts of the US where there isn't a significant Chinese population generally range from mediocre to bad. So, if you're not in San Francisco, LA, Seattle or New York, the Chinese food you make at home (with the help of Steph and Chris) is generally "better than Chinese take out". Thanks for the inspiration and instruction. I love your channel.
Yeah, I did to, and lived in SF proper most of my life and went to SFSU. Gives you a weird perspective. I vividly remember my Chinese American friends and classmates complaining about the food quality from various take out places... From that point of view, "better than take out" makes a lot more sense.
That's a myth. I've eaten authentic Chinese food in plenty of college towns and suburban strip malls in middle America. Even around SF Bay, restaurants run by mom-and-pop immigrants offer amazing regional Chinese cuisine in storefronts crowding next to 99 Ranch supermarkets. Compare that the restaurant in old SF Chinatown mentioned most often by multitudes of online travel sites. The food there was so horrid that I saw the kitchen staff eating Happy Meals.
I've had some great food in small-town Chinese restaurants made by chefs with a lot of passion for what they do. Chinese-American (or Chinese-Canadian in my case) cuisine is just as good as "authentic" Chinese food but it's made for a different palette. It doesn't mean it's made with any less skill or care.
I’m a Northern Californian, so even the differences between Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, and the East Bay varies! Interestingly though one of the best Chinese restaurants I’ve been to (in terms of takeout) was in Winnemucca, Nevada. Middle. Of. Nowhere.
The opposite is true. It is always -- without exception, ALWAYS -- some coastal food blogger who is harping on the "better than takeout" thing. The rest of the country doesn't put such an emphasis on "returning" to home cooking because we never stopped cooking at home.
YES!!!! This is easily one of your best videos, for so many reasons! And that's no small feat considering basically every single one of your videos is pure gold!!
Don't apologize for shining a light on the undeserved negativity and condescending attitude towards Chinese take-out.
I hear you Steph 100%, I’m in the gourmet burger space and while the majority of the time people appreciate the work, we do end up getting the comparison to fast food places regardless of the time and effort put in. Not so much online admittedly, mostly in person, but it happens nonetheless. I actually started watching your channel to see more interior Chinese foods/cooking methods but have since gained an even greater appreciation for my local Chinese food places. There’s a lot of sourcing, prep, and skill that go into it and I’m glad to have a window through yall to get an idea of how it’s done.
I agree with your take on this issue and thank you for using an annoying, click-baity phrase to start a deeper discussion on Asian cuisine. You're right, Asian cuisines don't tend to be respected the way other cuisines are. Thank you for pointing out that "better than takeout" often translates to "without a bunch of traditional ingredients and techniques that the food police deem unhealthy!" I hadn't really thought about the condescending and subtley racist undercurrent there. However, I will add that because many of us don't have any decent Chinese takeout restaurants in our areas, it may not be unreasonable for us to say we can make Chinese food that's genuinely better than takeout. Our local takeout is just that lackluster 😂
I like the sassieness! The rant on "Better Than Takeout" is a deserved kick in the butt of TV & Internet, for its thoughtlessly and massively cloned slogans, which don't hold any water.
You *can* get it better by cooking at home. But only subjectively: by adding less or more of something you like/dislike, by adding or omitting an ingredient or by using more quality meat/veg/brands.
What you *can't* get better is availability, taste, speed, stability, cost to quality ratio, etc., etc., etc. - all those things which restaurants and trained chefs can and do.
I am of the opinion that Chinese food should be worth more than what we are typically paying. The amount of gung fu (skill) required just to meet the standard quality level of these dishes takes years of practice and learning from many generations of accumulated knowledge. Almost anybody can smash up an avocado and smear it onto a piece of charred bread - yet many are happy to pay the same or higher price. Its unfortunate and saddens me to know many faceless hard working chefs do not get acknowledgements. So your opinion regarding the whole "better than take out" schtick, i completely agree.
I always thought of "passing through oil" to "blanching" as deep frying is to boiling. Please feel free to tell me if / how I'm wrong
We got the general idea.
I really liked the rant. I can't stand disrespecting and stomping on food culture. That's why I'm a fan of your channel- you're not only keeping things authentic but also help us westerners mimic or replace stuff we can't get, making all that wonderful food more accessible. Thank you for your hard wok, I mean work!
I've been following you guys for a number of years, and I loved every video I've watched. I think this one is my favourite so far. The way you two weave together the history, culture, etymology, culinary technique, food science, and commentary all within an approachable (and fantastically produced!) recipe video is brilliant.
Keep the 'rants' and 'novellas' coming. I know that any mention of cultural appropriation in the world of food raises some feathers. But to me, it's at its worst when, on top of due credit not being given to the cultures and origins of certain dishes, the creators also disparage the traditions, techniques, and quality of them. This air of superiority is unnecessary and damaging. Like you hinted at: when people try to make recipes for a something like a Neapolitan Pizza for example, the aim is rarely to make a 'healthier'/'better' version. Instead, they appreciate it for what it is, and attempt to make something similarly delicious at home.
Thanks for the thought provoking video and post, once again! I loved your nuanced thoughts, and I LOVE Beef and Broccoli. I'll be making it tonight ;)
Appropriation's an awkward topic, because it means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Because like, if we look at a Hong Kong Chachaanteng or a Thailand Cook shop or Japanese Yoshoku, are they 'appropriating' western food? In some ways, sure, but they're also a fantastically fun category of cuisine. The difference, I think, is that in spite of the alterations and some misunderstandings here or there, you can tell that there's this actually really deep *respect* for the cuisine in question (the reverberations of centuries of a global imperialist super-structure tends to engender that). Like, a lot of Japanese, Hong Kong, or Taiwan bakeries take as much or more care than American ones...
I've been mulling over penning some an essay entitled something like "Let the Weebs Cook Japanese". The young, stereotypical anime geek might slightly exoticize or have some (at times cringey) misunderstandings about Japan, but I think we could all agree that there *is* that fundamental respect. I think that it's in *that* space where there might be the opportunity for some fun inventions/dishes, even though it might tick the textbook definition of appropriation? I don't know. I've got a lot of half formed opinions on the topic.
This is exactly the sort of video I like. Thought, explanation, reasoning. Why are we doing these things, what do we want to achieve with this dish, how do we get as close as possible to that goal using the equipment we have available. I've learned a great deal from your channel and I am sure I will continue to do so.
You mentioned 'passing through' and how most of us would'nt do it. As the cook of our household I have dabbled it deep/shallow frying but mostly avoid doing it soley as I just am not sure how to store it/clean the oil/how long to use it etc. It would be highly useful to have a video dedicated to understanding what oils to use/storeage etc. Thanks if you take this on board... or not :)
Ever since I watched the Adam Ragusea video about deep frying, I still don't understand the fuzz about deep frying at home. We have always deep fried at home. True, I don't live in the US, but the reason of the issue eludes me. I understand the objections about the smell, since all residential construction in the US has to be as hermetically shut as possible in order for the HVAC system to work properly.
Regarding your other questions, storing for us is simple. Just cover the pot with its lid, or if the pot doesn't have a lid or the lid is not very tight-fitting, transfer the oil to another pot with a tight-fitting lid once it has cooled.
To clean it, use a very fine mesh skimmer. If you fried something that was coated with dry flour or starch, passing it through a cloth is the best option and we don't bother with the last bits of oil that's saturated with flour. We discard it by tossing it outside on the soil.
Finally, how many times to use it. For vegetables like when making French fries, we use it like 4 or five times. For meats like fried chicken, 2 or 3 times maximum. Fish, we use it just once. At home, we have found that frying meats make the oil go bad quickly for some reason.
Thank you for taking the time to address the underlying prejudices. I've loved your video and your effort to help make me more talented in the kitchen.
God damn right!!! The rant at the end had me pumping my fist and shouting "yeah!!! Hell yeah!!!" at the screen. The disrespect in the US for extremely talented, hard working asian american chefs is just sad. There is exactly as much, if not more blood sweat and tears in every little chinese takeout place as fancy italian joints and shiny pizza places. Good on you guys for speaking up about it!
This is spoken like a person privileged enough to grow up in a place that had good food. I don't think the place I grew up in even had "chefs", just people who reheated pre-packaged bags of Chinese buffet fare.
I really enjoy your videos, this one too, ranting and being "sassy" like that is important, I heard "better than takeout" a thousand times and never questionned it but now I see it through a new lens and understand something I didn't before
Take out is fantastic! The fact I can get so much variety of great food cooked consistently well in such a short amount of time is amazing! I could never hope to cook the same amount of food that quickly, and I certainly couldn't do it for the same price.
All these RUclips chefs saying they're making a certain dish with better ingredients for less money are lying - you can't buy $1 worth of beef, $0.15 worth of green beans, $0.25 worth of rice at the store.
Maybe you can make *a serving* cost a little less, but the actual amount of money you need to invest in ingredients and the amount of time in prep work isn't necessarily worth the extra you pay to get some great take out.
I love cooking, I love learning new techniques, and I love sharing all of that with my family and friends, but sometimes I also just want good food without the effort of cooking and cleaning.
Take out is fantastic.
The real difference in cost that nobody bothers to calculate is time. If I were to "pay myself" for the time I spent cooking, there's no way it would come out cheaper than a restaurant.
The question of costs of buying one meal versus all the ingredients necessary to make that meal at home is a little interesting, but irrelevant unless you're only eating one meal per month.
The real question is whether you can save money by preparing your own meals, compared to buying food that's already prepared. And the answer is yes, obviously.
By the way, you can buy things like rice, by the pound, in the bulk food section at a grocery store. Beef can be bought by the pound in most grocery stores, as well (or a butcher shop). Just go to the meat counter and ask for a dollar's worth of beef. Green beans by the pound will be in the fresh fruit/vegetable section. Grab a plastic bag and put some in, then weigh it at the scale right in front of you.
I think the reason you don't know this, is that you think buying takeout is cheaper than cooking at home? I don't know what math they teach in school these days...
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 most grocery stores (near me) no longer have bulk sections - so no, I'm subject to buying a package of something. And yes, while I could buy a few green beans, by the time I've driven to the store, the gas wasted for an ounce of green beans and a couple ounces of beef would easily make up for it.
What you missed in my comment was getting the variety of food for the cost, in the time that you do, without having to prep and cook all day.
Do I cook? Yes, very often. Do I get take out? Occasionally, when I'm too burned out to cook - I don't always have the time or energy.
As for your math, go back to school. It has generally now become cheaper to get take out - the variety of food available and portion sizes are such that one take out order of about $20 gets me about 3-4 meals, most of which I couldn't make for that price.
I gotta say, I love the focus you have on the audience, and it shows in multiple different ways in your videos. Firstly, here, the obvious one is the focus on cooking methods that are more home friendly than "passing through oil" but there are smaller things like posting marinade recipes for a second that people can pause on instead of hearing them listed every time. It's what makes this channel great, honestly, I feel like I'm actually being taught from someone who understands my perspective instead of just presented awesome Chinese food that isn't totally attainable (or comfortable to attain as a westerner).
thank you.
Also the point at the end is really well made. You would never see "better than takeout Duck Confit" or even "better than takeout BBQ" (which is not even seen as high class cuisine!). There are definitely racist elements here though I suspect you avoided using that word as it becomes too easy for idiots to wave your argument away saying "everything is racist nowadays.. grow up". Anyway, great video, great channel, thanks again.
Having family who ran a Chinese resturant when I cook at home I am trying for almost as good as I remember there food to have been. Thank you for bringing this up.
I used to work at a Chinese restaurant and the Sichuanese chef there was crazy good. He's really what I aim for in my own cooking, or at least close enough to lol.
Just the fact that this channel really knows its audience and where out hurdles lay warms my heart
Hey, I'm here for the rant..😀 I don't think many creators thought about it that much... FWIW I can cook pasta better than most Italian restaurants because, among other reasons, my grandfather was an Italian chef and taught me to cook....
I’ve been learning how to make Chinese takeout recipes because it’s good not because
“I can do it healthier (better)”.
I’m American from the southern US and we have are own cooking traditions and techniques.
It irritates me when someone denigrates southern cuisine by wanting to make it healthier as if southern recipes are inherently unhealthful.
I’m happy to learn the history, techniques, and intricacies of dishes that have a favor palette that I can’t master without a good teacher.
I think a particular issue with the Chinese takeaways is that (at least here in America) the food that the cooks make doesn’t suit their tastes, so they don't eat it. For the past 60 years or so, Asian immigrants (not just Chinese) have started these restaurants and make the same menu items since they were told that's all the Americans will eat. So you have a lot of cooks that can't really gauge the quality what they're giving to the customer. Which sucks, because I really like the style of food and I really appreciate their efforts, but (at least in my experience) I've probably eaten at 3 crummy takeaway joints before finding a really good one. So about the success rate for your typical American fast food joint
I was fortunate enough to work at a Chinese restaurant years ago that fed staff lunch and dinner. Staff included owners and family. I always looked forward to my free meals. Rarely was anything put in front of me that was actually on the menu. It was generally quick, simple, and filling. Bean sprouts were grown in-house so were essentially free and figured prominently in staff meals.
Cook's 80-something mom generally fixed our lunch, and it was always an adventure. The best thing that I remember was a soup that she made somewhat often. Dunno what all was in it, but the chicken feet and seaweed were obvious. Apparently was family Comfort Food. I can PROMISE that one wasn't on the Service Menu...
@@kevincrosby1760same...staff could make anything they wanted and when i recommended this restaurant to others, i forgot that they would never get to try the "good stuff" like i did
Thank you so much for your effort showing us how the fantastic dishes we all love are made.
And thank you for your honest words!
I am a biiiig fan of the Chinese culinary world.
I have only been to Hongkong but last year I spent 6 month in New York City and people ask me what I miss the most and my immediate answer is: the food in china town.
Because it was the best tasting food for a reasonable price. I had it almost every day. My all time favorite: steamed rice rolls with dried shrimps. But I literally love everything!!
A lot of people think I am joking mentioning the Chinese food in New York City, but I am dead serious. I love all sorts of Chinese food and admire the dedication and techniques chefs using doing those dishes.
❤
I love this video. I’ve always felt the same way seeing recipe videos claim you can make it “better than takeout.” Like honey no, I don’t have a jet engine stove, surgical knife skills, and 30 years of wok cooking experience. The one channel I’ve never seen make this claim (besides yours) is Made With Lau and that’s cause he WAS the takeout guy.
The add on to this conversation: you want authentic unapologetic Sichuan flavors imported directly from Chengdu? Stop asking these restaurants to make orange chicken. You want them to elevate the cuisine to something date worthy? Stop refusing to pay only dirt cheap prices. You want a chance to make it better than takeout? Well get used to the idea that MSG isn’t actually that bad for you.
Lastly when it comes to pasta, it’s amazing to me how Americans don’t distinguish Italian American to Italian food. I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia and yet the restaurants that produce these two different cuisines are held in the same regard.
No one thinks Olive Garden is authentic. It's Italian Applebee's. But it's what people can afford and is available. Authentic is always harder and far more expensive to come by.
> I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia
Isn't this the reverse take on the same issue? Pasta alla gricia is /*real Italian*/ so it's regarded more highly by foodies than spaghetti & meatballs, which is /*just*/ Italian American folk cooking.
A *good* spaghetti and meatballs is on par with a *good* pasta alla gricia, but you've already had lots of *bad* spaghetti & meatballs, whereas nobody bothers to make a school cafeteria version of pasta alla gricia.
Made with Lau is so good. I gotta say though:
"Lastly when it comes to pasta, it’s amazing to me how Americans don’t distinguish Italian American to Italian food. I like spaghetti and meatballs but it simply is not on the same level as a good pasta alla gricia and yet the restaurants that produce these two different cuisines are held in the same regard."
This smacks of the same mindset that would denigrate Chinese-American takeout food and come up with a "better" version because it's "inauthentic" or "less-than". Italian-American is a legitimate cuisine that followed the same basic path as Chinese-American food: people transporting ideas across the ocean but with access to different ingredients. It's a very common concept when you look at foodways around the world! Pasta alla gricia isn't *better* than spaghetti and meatballs (for that matter, neither is spaghetti e polpette, the "original" spaghetti and meatballs). It's just different.
Outstanding presentation !
Thank you for this educational presentation !
Thank you so much for this video, Steph's "rant" at the end was incredible. Enough of white people dismissing takeout food!
I do think it's a little complicated, though :) There's also a certain class element I think, and there's *also* an element where people genuinely want to share the depth and complexity of Chinese cuisine (and the takeout menu is certainly reductive)
Frankly, takeout from P. X. Press sucks. Who's fault is that? White people?
What the fuck does this have to do with race? Why you gotta throw "white" in there like it's some type of fucking rice grain?
@@ChineseCookingDemystified Definitely! I just have a bone to pick with Westerners making videos or opening restaurants where they "elevate" Chinese takeout food ;)
The last 5 minutes are the most important. Thank you, Steph.
I'll say this: I've cooked a lot of Souped Up Recipes dishes and to be honest, Mandy's recipes often *are* better than takeout! At least where I live...
I'm also a big fan of hers. I don't recall her arguing in the videos why her versions are better than restaurant food. It's just "here's how I make beef and broccoli", and then slapping whatever title on it gets clicks (because that's how RUclips works). I've had takeout that's just as good as that, but I've also had a lot that wasn't. Even in a city, it can be hard to find a restaurant that takes the necessary care.
@@markg.1159 Totally agree. If anyone's going to own that tag, it should be her :)
Wow! This was not the video I expected. I can not admire you both enough, not just for your incredibly down to earth and empathetic delivery of recipes that have changed my life, but of this incredibly preceptive response to exactly WHY the coverage of East and Southeat Asian food is the way it is.
I like your your user name which echoes the topic
Its kind of ironic, whenever us asians see the title "better than takeout" we automatically know to avoid that recipe...or we completely ignore the technique that recipe gives and use what we were taught
I bet Mexicans don't copy Taco Bell, either.
I watch those "better than take out" videos. By the end of the video it comes down to "oh, you added 1 tsp more soy sauce" than I normally would or something silly, like that. Is it better? nope, just clickbait
@@pricklybiscuit Now do Panda Express.
if it's really good faith it just means "home cooked" and you did it yourself to me
@@hxhdfjifzirstc894 Taco Bell? Mexican? That's like comparing a Rolls Royce to a Ford Focus because they both have 4 wheels... I'm unsure how you can get more American than Taco Bell.
Thank you, thank you for the rant at the end. My father's side of the family is from Hong Kong and my mother's side is from northern Mexico. Growing up in California, it has always irked me that people have seen both Mexican and Chinese cuisines as cheap, unhealthy, and just a single type of cuisine, disrespecting the complexity of techniques and layering of flavors in dishes along with large diversity of flavors across both countries. I have the upmost respect for the chef at the taqueria who can churn out hundreds of delicious tacos an hour or the chefs at our favorite Cantonese restaurants who are able to prepare such a wide variety of dishes at a moments notice , and I wish the Western world would treat them with the same respect they have for European chefs.
Additionally, I just wanted to thank you for so much of your videos over the years. Growing up, my Chinese father never cooked, and considering the rest of my family on that side is still in Hong Kong, the only memories I have of Cantonese cuisine were through our visits to SF's Chinatown and my father sharing with us his favorite dishes there. Several of your videos focusing on Cantonese dishes have allowed for me to connect, understand, and appreciate aspects of my culture that have been quite literally lost in translation. Thank you so much for what you do.
Steph is 100% correct, and the rant is warranted. I feel like there are a lot of dishes from Asian, and Mexican, and other cultures that get looped into the same category as drive through American fast food chains, and I think that's ridiculously condescending and dismissive. Thanks to this channel, and others like Kenji's, I can make some pretty darn tasty stir fry's, and other Asian dishes at home. I've never been able to even duplicate let alone improve upon my favorite dishes from my favorite local Chinese places, and that's ok. I still can, and do go and get their food when I want it. And the same is true about A LOT of the food I cook. I'm not a professional. I can make a decent burger, or steak, or mashed potatoes or whatever, but it's never as good as the best restaurants can do, but you don't see that "better than" label being thrown around about good steakhouses. Everyone aspires to that level, but pretty much no recipes claim to be "better" than those places. I think Asian and Mexican chefs and restaurants deserve the same level of respect. I aspire to that level, but know that getting there took them years of training, and practice to perfect and I don't realistically expect to be able to make a "better than takeout" version of their food at home without similar training, and practice...
Not to mention the understanding of the ingredients, culture, and the methods that I do not have. Thank you for the work you guys do. You've greatly improved my home cooking, and my appreciation and knowledge of the culture that brings about these wonderful foods.
This is by far the best recipe I've used so happy to find your channel.
I appreciate your guys’ discussion of the topic. I don’t think that “rants” are such a bad thing when what’s being outlined is a criticism of discrimination and racism
My god, there must be Klan members around ever corner in your world.
i'm with you 100% on that whole "better than takeout". I think people do mainly say that because, its so fast and cheap that they can only assume that a lot of shortcuts were taken to make it. So if you make everything from scratch, its instantly "better". Plus you know, the casual social media clickbait.
Side note, when i order take out, i always watch the kitchen because you could just see the amount of multitasking and skill that goes on there.
Of course it's a Social Media clickbait. All those pretentious youtube "Chefs" have nothing better to do.
This is just a great video. Truly nailed it. Example: Explaining the marinade we have seen in multiple videos as to the hows and whys. And the sassy parts are the icing on the cake. Keep up the great work.
Love the rant at the end. Total mic drop.
China is actually a more racist country than America.
I think there's a less *directly* racist reason (emphasis is deliberate, read to the end) for Chinese recipes being offered up as "better than takeout."
Takeout is often eaten without the trappings of a nice meal. You dump it out of a box onto, often, a disposable plate. That primes your brain not to respect the food as much. But many takeout places also let you sit down, plate your food with at least a little care, and better yet serve it piping hot rather than getting cold in the back of your air-conditioned car on the way there. That's a vibe much more like what you'll have if you make the same dish at home. You made an approximation of a restaurant preparation, and it's better than eating something from that restaurant that's halfway to being leftovers - but they'll be happy to serve you their version the way it was actually meant to be eaten. More of your American viewers should give dining in at their local inexpensive Chinese place a try sometime.
You compare it to home cooks trying to match restaurant pasta. The pasta that has in mind is made by places where you'll eat it under romantic lighting, plated with extreme care - conditions you probably only approximate at home if you're throwing a fancy dinner party, which prime you to enjoy the meal to the fullest. Even if you made their recipes flawlessly, you won't ever end up taking it in just right like you do there.
And I'll note that if you go to one of the Japanese steakhouses that perform as they cook, you'll get basically the same food as your local Japanese takeout, but you'll enjoy the atmosphere enough to pay several times more money. That atmosphere is often only on the level of an Applebee's, but for a lot of us outside a few very big cities it's the fanciest Asian dining experience available to us - whereas non-pizza Italian probably has Olive Garden as the floor.
But why is it that European cuisines, with the exception of pizza (plenty of people claim their home pizza recipe is better than delivery; if you don't have a specialized pizza oven, it's not - same as "better than takeout" Chinese) get that treatment, while Chinese food in the US gets served in cheap brightly-lit with takeout as most of their business? *That* part is where our lack of respect for Asian culinary traditions and the cultures that made them really comes into play. America mostly isn't willing to support a fine-dining Chinese regional cuisine place, mostly because far too few of us are willing to accept that China has fine dining on offer. That's insulting, and it's keeping us away from some amazing food.
I absolutely love this video, and this is why I support y'all on patreon. I have been on a lifelong mission to make "as good as takeout" at home, and as far as I'm concerned, I've never gotten there but I've been close a few times. I love and respect the mastery that goes in to Chinese American and authentic Chinese dishes alike, whether from the mom and pop restaurant on the corner to the fancy up-scale Din Tai Fun or whatever. Thanks for helping bring awareness to me something that I uncritically accepted, and didn't think much about, from so many other youtube creators.
If you want to make better than takeout food than just cook Italian, you’ll get it first try 😂
I think it's worth questioning the phrase "better than takeout" in another way. To me, homemade is commonly and easily better than take out. Homemade is made with love for people you love. Typically, recipes have their origins from some Mama cooking at home, meaning that homemade brings it back to the spirit of a mom just trying to feed her family after a long day. That's beautiful, too. Thank you so much for bending over backwards to help me, in my home kitchen, learn about new ways to feed my own family after a long day.
Not sure why you think that constitutes "questioning", but if you want to take that angle, I'd suggest interrogating why we think expensive food should be as expensive as it is.
@@Duiker36 It's expensive because a whole brigade of cooks in the kitchen prodded each item on your plate with their fingers and they need to be paid. That's why dim sum in Germany is expensive, because the cooks are paid accordingly.
Always love your culinary perspective; very no bullshit. I've always seen restaurant vs. home cooked just different styles. You're dealing with entirely different equipment and capabilities. And the point at the end of the day is to make food you enjoy eating. This basic concept doesn't get harped on enough, and that's why I love your channel and Adam Ragusea.
I will say as an ethnic person that's grown up in the tri-state area, the term better than take-out was popularized because of a not so small proportion of Chinese restaurants essentially mass producing Chinese cuisine (as other cultures also do in America). As a middle eastern man I can't even stomach half these quick and dirty kebab/falafel platter restaurants, and I know my own cooking is better than takeout. In many places American Chinese food is to authentic Chinese cooking as McDonald's is to freshly minced homemade burger. I've been to higher end Cantonese and szechuan restaurants and the difference is night and day. Everybody has their favorite takeout spots that are vastly better than the others, and in my opinion those tend to be the places that choose not to get swept away by the American food culture. Heck, just traveling from state to state the differing levels of quality are apparent. IMO you can even predict the outcome if no one of that culture eats there. I've had authentic Chinese food in Chinatown that I still crave to this day, meanwhile in all of Virginia I have had maybe a single good experience and not for a lack of trying as many places as possible. If I had to guess why I'd say the average Chinese store in NOVA is appealing to people that are not familiar with real Chinese cuisine. I'm not sure if it stems from racism imo. This happens with all food in America, even American food a la golden coral or McDonald's. You have to cut corners when producing a cost friendly meal that needs to be ready in less than 20 minutes. Love you guys
I somewhat agree, but I live in an area that's 25% Chinese and even here the authentic, very good Chinese restaurants sit at a 3.6 star rating mostly from people rating 1 star because it doesn't taste anything like Mall Chinese food (not me guessing, this is what they write in their reviews). Many people in the US have an expectation of what Chinese food is and some are not willing to let go of that idea.
"Better" is a matter of personal taste and preference. There's an Asian fusion restaurant here I frequent, but I know I prefer my own homecooked fried noodles over what I get there. But they're barely comparable because what I make is a combo of what I learn on channels like this, and what the restaurant makes is a combo of their tradition and appealing to Western palates (also whatever techniques change from homecooking to restaurant).
@@StealingCookiez better is a matter of opinion only when it comes to taste, while quality is not subjective. Someone might think McDonald's tastes better than fresh burger, but no one can argue that the quality is better. And frankly most of the time if you compare two dishes with all things being equal, better quality food ends up also tasting better.
@@exoxultrum4131 quality is also subjective, however we have a concept of it based on collective culture, preferences, and food wisdom passed on. Same thing with art. We have a collevtive understanding what makes good art, but there are still going to be varying opinions across all sorts of people. I think a lot of the "better than takeout" argument is rooted in the quality that can get sacrificed in fast food culture.
@@StealingCookiez we'll agree to disagree on quality is subjective. I've had falafel in parts of Egypt where the vegetables were almost rotten, and you could certainly see and taste it. Whereas I've also had falafel or kofta where without ever knowing about the history of the ingredients you could tell that everything was better, fresher, and made recently.
Amazingly thorough, these are exactly the kind of cooking explainations ive always wanted, breaking it all down in the absolute best ways
Apropos of takeout standards: note how it’s all western chefs who try to do better than takeout, but who then rave about street food in Asia. In North America, there are plenty of bad Chinese takeout restaurants, especially chains. But in the end it’s just a bad restaurant/chain, not a bad cuisine. I can make pizza that’s better than takeout because most takeout pizza is crap. But I have also had good, tasty takeout that I still cherish, and could never top, and that deserves respect. Sure, I’ve had amazing sushi in NY that cost me a month of rent, but never at the price of takeout, unlike real good Chinese takeout which is affordable.
> note how it’s all western chefs who try to do better than takeout, but who then rave about street food in Asia
Right. Takeout in the west isn't as bad - or the street in Asia as good! - as many of these people seem to imagine. Don't get me wrong - I adore street food and all - but generally speaking the street is more this wild, fun incubator of cuisine than it is the place to get the 'best' cuisine. It helps drive cuisine forward because there's very little barrier to entry, and almost anyone can try their hand at something (sort of like the internet, but for food)... but then usually the people that're really good end up saving up enough/having enough of a following to open up a physical shop.
This is my new gold standard for cooking vids. Absolutely loved the method. Thanks for such a great instructional vid.
Go off Steph!!!
You guys are so right though. Anytime someone says they can cook better than a restaurant, should probably be setting off alarm bells in your mind.
I agree with her take also, but in all honesty sometimes restaurants of any food type can just be plain average or mediocre here in the US. I grew up Italian-American, and a lot of times I tend to really prefer the version of an Italian dish that me or my mom has made at home versus what a restaurant offers up. But that isn't the case always, and I do think Chinese and other Asian takeout joints unfairly have a bad reputation for the reasons Steph listed in her rant.
Really appreciate this nuanced take and the opportunity to reconsider the little ways in which commonly-used phrases can contribute to subtle disrespect of foods we want to appreciate. Thank you!
Agree 100% with Steph on this.
I have the same complaint about people looking down their noses at suburban, Anglosized Chinese restaurants for not being "Authentic", despite the ones that have been around for a long time always make incredible dishes that I'll never tire of.
To me, better than take out is because some food is just better before it has been in a take out container, steaming itself while you get it home. E.g., I cook steak far better than delivery, even from a resto that cooks a better steak than me, when I get to eat it at the resto.
I had never thought of that before. I did the search myself and 99% of the results were for Chinese food. No pizza, no souvlaki, no Indian cuisine at all, no döner kebab, no fish & chips...
because most people want to eat stir fry but don't want it to be as oily as your local take out place, so you can adjust it at home. Nobody is sitting there and thinking that they are going to spend 5 hours to make a neapolitan pizza dough that is actually going to be better than their local pizza place.
@@10010x0x0x01101XX0X1 That's the thing though, Italian food is always better at home. My pizza dough happens to be very good, so I'm not sure what you're talking about
@@DizzyBusy unless you have a legit pizza oven in your house that can get up to 900 degrees and you only live in a town with dominos there is 0 chance that is true
I love you guys so much for doing what you do. I love the comparison between restaurant and home cooking techniques and results. I've learned so much here that it's almost like I'm "stir frying" so much of what I eat because I love the result of meat and veggies in my wok!
Bon Appetit has a series where they call in a take out order, then try to cook their version of the dish before the takeout arrives. Is the Bon Appetit version better from a taste perspective? I think most would agree so. But, to Steph's point, Bon Appetit had all of their ingredients on hand, a trained chef prepared the food as fast as possible, sometimes "ideal" technique shortcuts were made, and there was always a messy kitchen to deal with after. So, that should be taken into account when messaging "better than takeout" of any ethnic variety.
is the Bon Appetit version REALLY better though? some of their recipes are legit terrible; some are good. takeout Chinese from a good restaurant is ALWAYS good.
also, Bon Appetit was called out a few years ago for their disgustingly obvious racism and sexism. you might not want to die on their hill. :-) so to speak.
@@DianeH2038
Their ethics violations have nothing to do with their food
Michael Jackson’s predation of kids didn’t affect his dancing
R Kelly’s grooming has nothing to do with his music
Hitler’s life has nothing to do with his art
The KKK’s racism has nothing to do with its uhh… statues or whatever.
@@corpsefoot758 Michael Jackson was innocent.
"Is the Bon Appetit version better from a taste perspective?"
I doubt it.
Thank you for the “4 minute rant”. It’s really an important topic that isn’t looked at, as a symptom of a greater problem of prejudices.
And thank you for the always good content!!
there's something very funny to me about how this video points out some specific western chefs that helped me with western cooking and how their advice doesn't apply at all to chinese cooking. and there's something even funnier about the 'better than takeout' folks talking about health... chinese takeaway was a staple of my childhood because it was far healthier than any fast food option, but you never see people saying they want to make a healthier burger better than fast food, just a tastier one.
Not true. I see people saying they want to make a burger better and (barely) healthier than fastfood all the time.
That said I think being better than TAKE-OUT Chinese is a reasonable goal. First, it's take-out so it's being transported and not being served immediately. This means it's going to be very easy to be better just on the simple reality of eating it sooner after being prepared. Second, there has been a race to the bottom on these cheap Chinese restaurants that are all the same. 30+ years ago there were some variation in Chinese restaurant quality around the city I live in, but now with the exception of a few restaurants mostly in the very small Chinatown area they are all the same and all mediocre. The Thai, Vietnamese, Korean, etc places have pushed out everything else.
@@dolphycj Didn't you hear? The race to the bottom was actually won! Panda Express now holds the trophy.
Best Pho around here (in my opinion) is still a little Vietnamese Grocery/Restaurant tucked back off the main drag. The first time I ever went there, The Dad was on the register, Mom was in the kitchen, and daughter was serving. Typical family-run Vietnamese place.
Dads now passed on, Mom is on the Register, Daughter is in the kitchen, and grand-daughter is waiting tables. STILL the best Pho around, and I get the satisfaction of knowing that what I paid for groceries/lunch benefits a local family rather than some corporate bank account somewhere.
I mean, whether it's healthy really depends on what you order. General Tso's chicken is definitely not healthy, and I when I was younger the restaurants I ordered from didn't have a lot of vegetable heavy dishes, or sides like Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce.
I have never, ever heard the argument that Chinese food is the unhealthy option when it comes to fast food. I didn't grow up in America though, so I don't have that kind of hang up about Chinese food
@@DizzyBusy There are American "Weight Loss" diets that state that carbohydrates are the root of all evil.
Other diets say that anything containing fat or oils or cooked in same will make you obese, but feel free to eat all of the carbs that you want.
Some say that you and your obesity with burn in Hell for eternity if you eat anything that isn't a plant.
Then you have the folks that say you can eat anything you want and lose weight, as long as it was available to our caveman ancestors as well.
Personally, I've found that simply not heaping your plate with half of the buffet line works about the best. Unfortunately, Americans are not known for using common sense when choosing portion sizes.
DISCLAIMER:
None of the above applies to Medium-Rare Prime Rib or a good steak. These can be consumed in large quantities at any time. They are exempt from all dietary restrictions... :)
Honestly guys, I have enjoyed your videos for a few years.
This one totally destroys everything that has come before it.
It's simple to understand not just the process, but WHY xxxxx is / should be done.
No bullying Souped Up Recipes! haha you're not wrong about the rant though
Exactly my thoughts, Mandy is too sweet
@@lucapeyrefitte6899 Haha I addressed this (indirectly) in my pinned note. Until I was cutting the video/finding clips for the outro, I had no idea just how much Mandy DOMINATES that tag.
But honestly? Really, good for her. She's a great cook and if anyone's going to be owning it, it should be her.
Honestly, you made me confront some biases I had with what you said at the end. Great video, and I appreciate the thorough breakdown of technique and ingredients.
I’ve had the same conversation about the better than takeout attitude with my husband (who agrees with Steph btw). I have found while learning Chinese cooking that it is one of the most Interesting and varied cuisines that takes serious skills and knowledge to pull off the huge range of dishes! I think the idea that it’s “cheap food” that needs to be elevated is a veiled internalize racist sentiment that people should really think more about before expressing. Thank you for your rant Steph it’s sorely needed in the cooking RUclips community!
i wouldn’t say its racist…but unfortunate
@@chocopieaddict9792 I would as it directly affects people's opinion on an entire ethnic group.
You got a very legitimate point about something i never really thought to analyze before you mentioned it here, I admit to not even thinking twice about the whole "better than takeout" mantra, and you're right, its quite a pointless mantra.
Also congrats on the 6 years, you guys are fun to watch and very educational, I hope you keep going as long as you are willing