台湾炸鸡

choi

Cathy Erway, 在美国，台湾炸鸡正当红. 纽约时报中文网, June 29, 2022
https://cn.nytimes.com/style/202 ... fried-chicken/dual/

, which is translated from

Cathy Erway, Taiwanese Fried Chicken Learns Some New Tricks; Amid a fervor for crispy chicken, Taiwanese American chefs across the United States are reimaging the street-food classic. New York Times, June 29, at page D1 ('Food' section every Wednesday).

Note:
(a) "Growing up, the chef David Kuo and his brothers played video games in a converted garage in the family's backyard [中文网: '在自家后院一个车库改建的房间里打电动'] in West Covina, Calif. Just outside, luffa gourds [丝瓜], garlic chives [韭菜; 'native to the Chinese province of Shanxi': en.wikipedia.org], sweet potato leaves and other crops beloved in Taiwan grew in his grandmother's vegetable garden. * * * fried chicken Mr Kuo encountered at street vendor stalls on family visits to Taiwan: yan su ji [盐酥鸡; developed in Taiwan in '1975' or before: zh.wikipedia.org I never tried it, put off by 盐 in its name, thinking it was very salty], boneless popcorn chicken strewn with fried basil leaves, and da ji pai [大鸡排], butterflied boneless breast cutlets. * * * At Mr. Kuo’s Los Angeles restaurant, Little Fatty, the poultry on the menu feels familiar, yet distinctive. In a nod to his Taiwanese roots, his American childhood and his fine-dining background, Mr Kuo sells small, bone-in pieces of popcorn quail topped with fried basil, with spicy mayo for dipping.")
(i)
(A) West Covina, California
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Covina,_California
(a city in LA County; "West Covina is bordered by Covina to the northeast"_
(B) Covina, California
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covina,_California
("The city of Covina was founded in 1882 by Joseph Swift Phillips * * * The City of Covina was named by a young engineer, Frederick Eaton, who was hired by Phillips to survey the area. Impressed by the way that the valleys of the adjacent San Gabriel Mountains formed a natural cove around the vineyards that had been planted by the region's earlier pioneers, Eaton merged the words 'cove' and 'vine,' and in 1885, created the name Covina for the new township")
(C) cove (n; from Old English):
"1: a small sheltered bay.
        1.1: dialect  a sheltered recess among hills or in the side of a mountain"
https://www.lexico.com/definition/cove
(ii) luffa
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luffa
("the luffa, also spelled loofah, usually refers to the fruits of the species Luffa aegyptiaca ['native to South and Southeast Asia': en.wikipedia.org] and Luffa acutangula"/ section 1 Name)
(iii) 香鸡排
https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-cn/香雞排
("炸鸡排在台湾还算比较年轻的小吃，一般认为大约是在1990年代末才自市面上出现，台湾农委会畜牧处在其2006台湾黄金鸡排嘉年华系列活动的新闻资料中，提到：'经农委会与黄金鸡排特搜小组追根溯源，找到黄金鸡排的开山始祖－郑姑妈鸡排的郑光荣先生' ")

I came to US in 1983, so I was unaware of this dish until yesterday when reading the NYT (English) article.
(iv) popcorn chicken
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popcorn_chicken
("a dish consisting of small, bite-sized pieces of chicken that have been breaded and fried. The idea was originally developed by KFC" in 1992)
(v)  
(A) Info. Little Fatty, undated
https://www.littlefattyla.com
("David Kuo, chef/owner of Little Fatty restaurant started out working a 9-to-5 job after graduating with a degree in political science from UCLA. Quickly frustrated in an office environment, he soon discovered his passion for cooking and food. Kuo went on to attend the California School of Culinary Arts in Pasadena, and found opportunities to work under acclaimed chefs and organizations such as Charlie Palmer, Wolfgang Puck, and Jean-Georges Vongerichten at his eponymous NYC mainstay. * * * The name 'little fatty' is the translation of Kuo’s childhood nickname, 'xiao pang' [小胖] given to him by his family")
(B) The storefront of Little Fatty does not have Chinese; English only.


(b) The top photo in this URL says, "几十年来，五香盐酥鸡一直是台湾备受喜爱的街头小吃。有些厨师在他们的美国店里提供传统版的这种美食，比如亚特兰Java Saga餐馆的Chick Bits。这家餐馆也提供更具创造性的炸鸡套餐。 ANDREW LEE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES/"

The English version is: "five-spice-seasoned popcorn chicken. [same credit]"


(c) "A cultural tentpole, Taiwanese fried chicken is finding a wider audience of diners and selling out at restaurants in the process. The crispy, aromatic chicken, which often can be found popcorn-style at boba shops in the United States, is gaining its foothold in the American culinary landscape amid a fried-chicken fervor * * * At Java Saga [bi Chinese name] in Atlanta, Alvin Sun serves four different Taiwanese fried chicken sandwiches, the most popular of which is the ABC: Southern-style coleslaw, sweet pickles, jalapeño-American cheese and habanero-mango sauce [both jalapeño and habanero are hot chili peppers] atop what he calls his Taiwan No 1 fried chicken cutlet. * * * Java Saga's chicken recipe is well traveled and closely guarded: Mr Sun adapted it from the one his mother and kitchen collaborator, Amy Lee, used to prepare hundreds of pounds of yan su ji for Atlanta’s Lunar New Year festival"
(i) tentpole (n; First Known Use 1987): "a big-budget movie whose earnings are expected to compensate the studio for its less profitable movies"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tentpole

With respect to etymology, Wiktionary says, "An allusion to the manner in which a supporting tentpole holds up the structure of a tent.
(ii) boba (n; "History and Etymology for boba": 波霸): "BUBBLE TEA"
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/boba
(ii) Wendell Brock, Taiwanese Fried Chicken a Game Changer for Java Saga Coffee. Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Apr 27, 2021 (in the column "Atlanta Orders In")
https://www.ajc.com/things-to-do ... r-java-saga-coffee/
("Atlanta is living in a golden age of chicken sandwiches. Few of them are as biographical as Alvin Sun's ABC fried chicken sandwich, which stands for 'American-born Chinese,' and tells his life story between two buns.  Sun was born and raised in Atlanta by Taiwanese immigrant parents. His mom, Amy Lee, always wanted to run a cafe; instead, she became a fixture at the Atlanta Lunar New Year Festival, where she sometimes served her Taiwanese salt and pepper chicken")
(iii) "Java Saga's chicken recipe is well traveled and closely guarded"
(A) 纽约时报中文网 translates "well traveled" as "Java Saga的炸鸡做法颇有来历，而且配方严格保密."
(B) well traveled (adj): "1: (of a person) having been to many different places, especially to many different countries
2: (of a road, route, etc.) used by many people"
https://dictionary.cambridge.org ... glish/well-traveled

I personally believe the use in this NYT article means the same as English adjectives "tried-and-true" or "battle-tested."


(d) "It may be tempting to conclude that Taiwanese fried chicken evolved from Japanese fried chicken styles like karaage and katsu [short from English noun cutlet: meat is usually fried or grilled; most common in Japan is 豚カツ tonkatsu], given Japan’s colonization of Taiwan from 1895 to 1945. But Taiwanese fried chicken's history is quite contemporary, said Katy Hui-wen Hung [纽约时报中文网:洪惠文] , a co-author of 'A Culinary History of Taipei.'  Yan su ji dates back to the night markets of the 1970s, around the time the Taiwanese chain TKK Fried Chicken [纽约时报中文网: 顶呱呱炸鸡], modeled after [US] Southern-style chicken joints, was founded. * * * And signature to the popcorn chicken style are those deeply jade crystalline shards of fried basil that garnish the bite-size pieces."
(i)
(A) Japanese-English dictionary:
* kara-age 唐揚げ 【からあげ】 (n): "deep-fried food (esp chicken)"  (揚げ itself means either frying or fried food. 唐 means China. Why 唐 in 唐揚げ? It is not explained in the Web.)
(B) から揚げ
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/から揚げ
shows what it looks like.
(ii) Taiwanese dishes does not use basil (Ocimum basilicum), but its variant or subspecies 九层塔.


(e) "Eric Sze [纽约时报中文网: 史官通], the chef and an owner of 886 [storefront has neither English nor Chinese] and WenWen [文文; storefront has both Chinese and English names; serves traditional Chinese dish on porcelain plates, not chicken sandwiches] in New York City * * * the Notorious TFC [Taiwan Fried chicken, a wordplay on KFC, where K stands for Kentucky] sandwich at 886 * * * (a hat tip [here tip is a noun, from the verbal phrase 'tip one's hat to' somebody] to a vegetable condiment at the Vietnamese restaurant Madame Vo, in the East Village of Manhattan), and a housemade sea mountain sauce [纽约时报中文网: 海山酱] (a tomato-y [addition of y converts tomato the noun to an adjective; the hyphen is necessary, because this is the author's coinage, not found in any dictionary] condiment served with oyster omelets in Taiwan).  And then there’s the BDSM [which is a wordplay on the BDSM: bondage, discipline, dominance and submission] (brined, deboned, soy milk) fried chicken at WenWen, which opened in Brooklyn's Greenpoint neighborhood in March.
(i) Sze
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sze  
is Cantonese surname  corresponding to 施 and 史.
(ii) 886
https://www.eighteightsix.com
("EIGHT EIGHT SIX IS TAIWAN'S INTERNATIONAL CALLING CODE. New York influenced Taiwanese food with locally sourced ingredients")


(f) "Other chefs are riffing on Taiwanese fried chicken while incorporating influences from beyond the island and the United States. Erik Bruner-Yang [纽约时报中文网: 杨震宇] * * * 'I realize, I’m half-Asian and a military brat' * * * At Maketto -derived from Japanese katakana マーケット for market], his restaurant and cafe in Washington, DC, Mr Bruner-Yang wanted to reflect his background and his wife's Cambodian heritage throughout the menu."
(i) Erik Bruner-Yang grew up moving from country to country, because his stepfather was a US Navy journalist. His biological father is not mentioned anywhere in the Web. Toki Underground (2011- ; serving Taiwanese-style ramen) pushed out Bruner-Yang and in 2016 he sued at Washington DC superior court. His mother died at 68 (1953-2021) in northern Virginia near Washington, DC.
(ii)
(A) A Chef Dishes on Mom and a Taiwanese Fried Chicken Recipe. Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center, May 8, 2015 (according to Google)
https://smithsonianapa.org/picklesandtea/taiwanese-fried-chicken/
("Erik Bruner-Yang, owner of Washington DC's only Taiwanese-inspired ramen shop, Toki Underground and the just-opened Maketto * * * Born in Taipei, Taiwan * * * [photo caption: his mom, En Sheaun Bruner-Yang]")
(B) Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sm ... fic_American_Center
("is a migratory [moving from place to place] museum * * * online and throughout the US")


(g) "Katie Liu-Sung, who has been cooking professionally since she was 16. Her first job was at a Church's Chicken in Taichung, Taiwan, where she lived after spending her early childhood in Southern California. The Texas-born fried chicken chain had locations throughout Taiwan in the 1980s and '90s
(i) Church's Chicken
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church%27s_Chicken
(ii) The last sentence of this article is "Because it reminded her of home."