Season 4 of our podcast Countless Journeys is all about food and the people who make it.
It was only when she visited Chinese restaurants in small towns that Ann Hui discovered dishes like chop suey, or moo goo gai pan, or sweet and sour chicken balls. Hui had grown up eating “authentic” Chinese food in Vancouver’s Chinatown. What were these dishes, she wondered. Why were they so common in Canadian Chinese restaurants, and what was their origin?
Hui’s search for the answer to these questions, and the surprise discovery of her own family’s history, is the subject of episode 1 of the Museum’s English-language podcast Countless Journeys, now in its food-themed fourth season. The French-language counterpart, D’innombrables voyages features food-themed stories from francophone new Canadians.
As Hui explains, most of the food served in what she calls “chop suey” Chinese restaurants originated in North America at the end of the 19th century in places like San Francisco. The dishes were created by people who were not necessarily cooks, using the ingredients available to them and trying to cater to a North American palate.
Chinese men, who had come to North America initially for the Gold Rush and later as labourers to build the railway, faced prejudicial treatment. Concerns about cheap Chinese labour displacing white workers led to regulations that shut them out of most sectors. Among the few places they could work were laundromats, convenience stores and restaurants.
“They didn't even necessarily know how to cook when they first started a restaurant, and so they had to learn very quickly how to cook food that people in Canada would want to eat. And of course, most of the people coming into the restaurants at the time would not have been Chinese people, so they had to consider the palates of the locals.”
Hui’s interest in Canadianized Chinese restaurants turned into a cross-country road trip, a series of Globe and Mail articles, and ultimately, the book Chop Suey Nation.
In episode 1 of this season’s Countless Journeys podcast, she tells the story of her 18-day journey from Victoria, BC to Fogo Island, Newfoundland to dine in (and write about) Chinese restaurants in small towns. Beyond the food, she tells the stories of the incredibly hard-working individuals and families who run them.
But that’s not the only great episode in this food-themed season. Other stories in this season include:
- How Indian-born Vikram Vij was discovered in a hotel restaurant in Austria and told he should move to Canada to work at the Banff Springs Hotel.
- The daughter of a Holocaust survivor trying to recreate a traditional Shabbat dish her father remembers from his boyhood in Poland.
- The Iranian vodka bar and restaurant on Toronto’s Queen Street West that serves up a side of politics.
Stories from D’Innombrables voyages, our French-language podcast, include:
- The butler to the King of Belgium who moved to New Brunswick and became a cheesemaker.
- The Mexican chef in Montreal with no interest in serving Mexican food during a Quebec winter.
See our podcast page to listen to this and past seasons of Countless Journeys and D’innombrables voyages.
