Service of Chinese Restaurants + Singapore Food Stalls

choi

(1) Chinese Puzzle; Nicholas Lander examines why service in Chinese restaurants sometimes fails match the food. Financial Times, Jan 28, 2012.
("Since 1976, when I was first introduced to the most authentic Chinese food in Taipei, I have always had the impression that there are as many differing approaches to service in Chinese restaurants as there are dim sum dishes in their menus. It is also almost impossible to predict how one will be treated [as a customer]")

My comment:
(a) It is perhaps the handful of times that a foreigner sings praise of Chinese food of Taiwan.
(b) Perhaps there is no need to read this article, which says service in Chinese restaurants sometimes are poor and whose focus is Chinese restaurants abroad (outside mainland China, that is). His theories are as follows.
(i) Paulo  Pong, a wine-merchant-turned restauranteur in Hong Kong "offered one explanation. Until recently, he said, the waiting profession has not been highly respected in China, prompting Chinese waiters, in turn, not to respect their diners. And although a service charge wil be added, it may end up with the restauranteur" in China.
(c) "For Michael Peng, of the excellent restaurant in Pimlico, part of the problem is that Chinese is a far more direct lanuage than English. He is constantly reminding his staff to add a thank you, and to smile or make eye contact, to ensure directness is never misintepreted as rudeness."

He also says Chinese restaurants "want to hire Chinese staff" who "must have residence permits. Their only option, in many cases, is to hire overseas Chinese students, most of whom are young and inexperienced and have no real desire to be working in restaurants other than to pay the rent.

(2) Gisela Williams, New Homes for Singapore Hawker Stalls. New York Times, Jan 22, 2012c (Sunday's Travel section).
http://travel.nytimes.com/2012/0 ... s-in-singapore.html

Note:
(a) For candlenut, see Aleurites moluccana
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleurites_moluccana
(The nut is round, 4–6 cm (1.6–2.4 in) in diameter; the seed inside has a very hard seed coat and a high oil content, which allows its use as a candle, hence its name; section 1 Uses [in  Indonesian and Malaysian cuisine])

Taiwan does not have it.
(b)
(A) Peranakan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peranakan
(descendants of late 15th and 16th-century Chinese immigrants; section 1 Terminology: Both Malay and Indonesian use the word Peranakan to mean "descendant" - with no connotation of the ethnicity of descent; Most Peranakans are of Hoklo (Hokkien) ancestry, although a sizable number are of Teochew or Cantonese descent; section 5.3 Food)
(B) Peranakan (n; Javanese): "an old established Chinese immigrant of West Java"
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/peranakan
(c) Singapore Flyer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singapore_Flyer
(d) Singapore Food Trail
http://www.singaporeflyer.com/food-trail/

Go to
(A) About Singapore Food Trail
and
(B) Stall Profiles
(which includes two food stalls "Lau Di Fang" and "Ng Ah Sio’s Bak Kut Teh."

* For scissor cut curry rice, see Cher, Beach Road Scissor-Cut Curry Rice. Jan 21, 2007 (in her blog called She Bakes and She Cooks)        
http://thebakerwhocooks.blogspot ... cut-curry-rice.html
("I've heard that they named their stall Scissors-Cut Curry Rice because they used to use scissors to cut the pork chops. I think it's an ingenious name and catches one's attention"; see aklso store-front photos of Lau Di Fang and Beach Road Scissor-Cut Curry Rice)
  
(e) Happy Days
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Happy_Days
(an American television sitcom that originally aired from 1974 to 1984, on ABC; presented an idealized vision of life in mid-1950s to mid-1960s America; Set in the Midwestern city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin)
(f) The article said, "Mr Lee [a chef] and I did a lap to get our bearings."

bearing (n): "plural : comprehension of one's position, environment, or situation"
(g) The food bak kut teh, rojak, Hokkien noodle (the article failed to capitalize the "h" in Hokkien), popiah are all mentioned in (d)(B) above, with a photograph for each.

The "bak kut teh" sounds like Hoklo pronunciation for "rib soup"--with "bak kut" for "rib" and "teh" for "soup."

(A) rojak
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rojak
(The term "rojak" is Malay for mixture)
(B)
* popiah
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popiah
(In the Teochew (Chaozhou) dialect, popiah is pronounced as "Bo-BEE-a"(薄餅仔), which means "thin wafer")

In Taiwan, we refers to this food with Hoklo/Hokkien pronunciation of pinyin "runbing." See also
lumpia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lumpia
(h)
(A) Sky on 57, at Marina Bay Sands.
http://www.marinabaysands.com/Si ... e-Dining/Sky-on-57/
(B) Marina Bay Sands
http://www.marinabaysands.com/
(c) Rasapura Masters, at Marina Bay Sands
http://www.marinabaysands.com/Si ... g/Rasapura-Masters/
(includes two food stass called "Lao Di Fang" and "Ng Ah Sio Bak Kut Teh")

(i) The article stated, "Surprisingly, restaurants from the celebrity chefs Mario Batali and Daniel Boulud on the floors above were not" mobbed.
(A) Mario Batali
http://www.mariobatali.com/

Click "restaurants" inthe top horizontal bar and find his "Osteria Mozza" and "Pizzeria Mozza" brands in Singapore.
(B) Daniel Boulud
http://www.danielnyc.com

Click "Restaurants" at the top horizontal bar to find, amog others, "Beijing" (brand: Maison Boulud) and "Singapore" (brand: DB Bistro Moderne).
(j) Yong Tau Foo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yong_Tau_Foo
(Essentially the dish originated in the early 1960s in a restaurant called "Chew Kuan" as tofu stuffed with a meat paste of fish and pork, thereby earning the dish its name "Yong Tau Foo," which means "stuffed bean curd.")
(k) Lao Zhong Zhong Fine Spice
does not seem to have its own website. But here are several photos of the stall, included the store front.

audrey (also known as levityy), lao zhong zhong fine spice stall. June 10, 2009 (blog).
http://levityy.livejournal.com/124495.html
(l) Finally the photo caption of the NY Times article showed a hand-pulled noodle in the making, ans called it "ramen." It should be "la mien."

Compare
ramen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramen
(section 1 History)