In the back kitchen of a restaurant chain in Japan, the chef skillfully flips and stir-fry, and a tempting "mapo tofu" is about to be completed.
"There is still the most important step left." With that, he added frozen strawberries to the pot...
Many customers said that "strawberry mapo tofu" was "unexpectedly delicious." ”
Screenshot of the Nippon News Network video.
In Japan, sweet mapo tofu and rice made with soy sauce and salt are all centuries-old "Chinese cuisine", which has transformed generations of Japanese people into a deep impression of Chinese food, even if the taste and practice of these dishes are far from the real Chinese food.
However, in recent years, many century-old "Chinese restaurants" have closed, and the market for authentic Chinese food such as boiled fish, spicy hot pot, and hot pot has expanded rapidly, and the term "authentic Chinese food" has become a popular new word in Japan.
The Japanese people finally discovered that what they had been eating was "fake Chinese food".
Text | Ding Guizi Observer of Lookout Think Tank Fu Lijun (Intern)
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1 If you want to know the taste of China, you must eat "real China"
Aka, a Japanese netizen who is full of letters about eating, never thought that he would one day stand outside the gourmet restaurant and hesitate.
In Yokohama's Chinatown, Japan, tourists watch the introduction of Chinese cuisine. Photo| Xinhua News Agency
In recent years, she has found that a number of new Chinese restaurants "only selling spicy hot" near her home are booming. Aka, who had never eaten before, summoned up the courage to enter the restaurant, but did not find the menu commonly found in traditional restaurants, and only a variety of meatballs and vegetables in front of him. She had to follow the example of other customers, pick up the dinner bowl and clamps, choose randomly according to her feelings, check out in the clouds, and sit and wait for the meal.
"I thought it would be a failed 'visit'", but after only a few bites, Aka was deeply impressed by the rich bone broth and the "unknown balls" soaked in soup, "It turns out that there is this kind of Chinese food." ”
After returning home, the more Aka thought about it, the more regretful he became, "It's time to get ready to go again, this time I don't know how to order, I must have missed a lot of delicious dishes." In order to plan a perfect spicy food trip, she searched for strategies on social platforms and found that "how to look skillfully ordering a bowl of spicy hot" has been thoroughly pondered by Japanese netizens.
Someone summed up the whole process of "calmly eating spicy hot": from greeting the clerk naturally, to skillfully choosing dishes with tongs, to which dishes and which flavors are the most delicious to match. Many people call it novel after reading it, and carefully match their own exclusive spicy hot according to the name of the dish marked in the tutorial.
Screenshot of the "Spicy Hot Dining Guide" compiled by netizens.
As the spicy hot has set off a wave of discussion on the Internet in Japan, more and more people are looking for authentic Chinese tastes, which they call "real Chinese" or "authentic Chinese food". Soon, someone published books dedicated to authentic Chinese food, spicy hot, Sichuan-Chongqing hot pot, skewers of incense, boiled fish... 145 dishes have refreshed the perception of Japanese people.
So, what kind of Chinese food can be called "real China"? Following the pace of "shop visits" by Japanese media and vloggers, people have summarized several criteria for judgment.
In Chinatown in Yokohama, Japan, people watch a lion dance in front of a Chinese restaurant.
The first is the dining environment.
The decoration of the store should add Chinese elements, such as Peking Opera Facebook, paper fan Xiangyun, Chinese dragon, giant panda, and even directly "moved" the Northeast farmhouse to the streets of Japan.
Tableware should use blue and white porcelain bowls, wine cups, walls should be plastered with Chinese Internet buzzwords, background music should be selected Chinese pop music, and it is best to invite a few more Chinese to sing live.
Of course, the most important point is the plain-pronounced "Welcome" that guests hear as soon as they enter the door.
Then there are the service features.
The menu is full of Chinese, and the waiters don't know much Japanese. When you enter a store like this, Japanese people always breathe a sigh of relief, "This is authentic enough." ”
In the face of food, language is not a problem. Japanese customers will not only consciously open the mobile translation software, but also prepare in advance the "bilingual version of the common dialogue in authentic Chinese restaurants".
Screenshot of "Common Chinese in Spicy Hot Shops" compiled by netizens.
Finally, there is the way to eat and taste.
A small food court, gathering special snacks from all over China, even the internal layout is the same as the domestic food city. The chefs and raw materials are sourced from China, guaranteeing absolute authenticity, and guests can taste representative cuisines from all over the world on one floor.
In the rotary hot pot restaurant, you can take what you want to eat directly, count the money and sign directly, and the ceremony is full of feeling. If any store has pudding-shaped duck blood, it is like mastering the "traffic password" of the restaurant industry, and you no longer have to worry about not having customers.
If you can put on another panda-shaped spicy oil, it will be the icing on the cake.
In addition, authentic Chinese food also has a lot of "soul-infused" operations. For example: boiled fish should be purchased from China, meat dumpling shops sell braised duck neck by the way, fritters and soy milk are the perfect match, and so on.
After a full meal, the Japanese who had not yet recovered from their composure were surprised by the short video looping in the store, "It turns out that you can still advertise like this!" ”
Relying on social media short videos to promote gourmet restaurants, a common publicity method in China, is still a new thing in Japan. After a Sichuan chain hot pot brand opened a store in Japan, it used short videos to make a signboard, attracting 70,000 views in a short period of time. Many people go there with their mobile phones to enjoy the authentic Chinese flavor.
Nowadays, there are more and more Japanese customers in authentic Chinese restaurants.
Whether you're on the streets of Tokyo with skyscrapers, the alleys of Yokohama, or the hustle and bustle of Osaka, you can feel that authentic Chinese cuisine is slowly conquering the stomach of the Japanese.
Li Yang, a restaurant operator, said that although it was his original intention to open a restaurant for Chinese in Japan, Japanese customers now account for 40%-50% of the total customer flow.
When they curiously walk into a Chinese restaurant, their impressions of Chinese food will be rewritten:
"This is really different from the Chinese restaurant that has been open on the street for 100 years!"
2 A street, recording the "magic history" of Chinese food in Japan
What does "a Chinese restaurant that has been open on the street for 100 years" look like?
From Motomachi Chinatown Station on the Yokohama Seafront, it's about a 5-minute walk to a narrow street. Lin Ji, the head of the "Century-old Chinese Restaurant" Wanzhen Building, was standing on the street, raising his hand and pointing lightly, "The names of these streets are still my name." ”
This is the largest Chinatown in Asia, Yokohama Chinatown. The Japanese people's perception of Chinese food begins here.
More than 160 years ago, Yokohama was just an ordinary small village, but it was forced to open its port after the conclusion of the Japan-US Treaty of Amity and Commerce (1858), and it became an important window for Japan to open up to the outside world. A large influx of foreign businessmen, translators and compradors, including many Chinese, gathered and took root here.
In 1868, the prototype of Yokohama's Chinatown appeared. It took another 10 years for the Qing government to open consulates in places such as Nagasaki and Yokohama, and the local overseas Chinese actually obtained the right of residence. At the same time, the Chinese Association and the Hometown Association also connect people, and the scale of Chinatown continues to expand.
After the Sino-Japanese War, the status and strength of China and Japan reversed, the Japanese government began to restrict Chinese from going to Japan as laborers, and the commercial activities of Chinatown were also suppressed, and people had to rely on service industries such as catering to make a living. The famous Wanzhen Building and Pingzhen Building were founded in this context. Since then, it has gone through half a century of war and turmoil before ushering in a relatively stable development environment.
In the 50s of the 20th century, Japan was short of materials and food. The people of Yokohama's Chinatown set up humble stalls to feed themselves and earn a living. As the economy recovered after the war, the sporadic stalls were transformed into elaborate restaurants, known as Chinese restaurants. Every festival, there are Chinese and overseas Chinese who take their whole families to eat Chinese New Year's Eve to relieve homesickness.
Many Japanese literary heroes are also frequent customers of Chinese restaurants: Junichiro Tanizaki wants to come here to relax after "putting everything in order" on the night of the first moon; Atsushi Nakajima recited 14 short songs about Zhenlou cuisine, and dishes such as roast duck in the open oven, sweet and sour tenderloin, and corn soup can still be ordered.
After the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, close exchanges between the two countries have further promoted the prosperity of Chinatown. In the 80s of the 20th century, more than 50,000 tourists visited here every day, driving the rise of the surrounding service industry, and the operating income jumped to the top of all scenic spots in Kanagawa Prefecture.
Japan's pursuit of Chinese cuisine has also jumped out of Chinatown and spread to the whole society. Various TV shows are open to Chinese chefs, and a variety of Chinese cuisine has provided creative inspiration for cartoonists and documentary filmmakers.
Even at the height of Japan's bubble economy in the late 80s, Pingzhen had to make a reservation a week in advance, and the daily turnover could reach more than 5 million yen.
With the increase in the number of Chinese restaurants and the intensification of competition, the audience is no longer limited to the Chinese diaspora. In order to attract more Japanese customers, merchants have made localized changes based on their light taste and eating habits, reducing the amount of oil and spices. It can be said that Japanese Chinese cuisine is actually quite different from real Chinese food.
For example, egg fried rice. This home-cooked food is considered typical of Chinese cuisine in Japan. Chinese fried rice pursues the Q elastic taste, puts more oil, and the rice grains are moderately moisture. Japanese people like a crispy texture with less oil and moisture, and often eat it with a bowl of miso soup. Or add crab meat and crab yellow and chopped green onion to the stir-fried egg liquid, cover the rice whole, and pour the sauce.
For example, gyoza and yakiniku are not staple foods in Japan, but meat dishes. Raw pork dumplings are fried straight to golden brown and crispy, plated upside down and served with rice, miso soup or ramen.
There is a view that the above high-calorie eating methods provided people with sufficient energy in the post-war barren years and have been passed down to this day.
Another example is mapo tofu. Chinese mapo tofu requires hemp, spicy, hot, crispy, tender and whole, while Japanese mapo tofu uses chili peppers instead of peppercorns and badding miso instead of bean paste to reduce the spicy taste; Some even add sweet noodle sauce and Japanese soybean paste to get a plate of salty and sweet mapo tofu. The word "mapo" has also become a sign of whether it is authentic or not, so there are magical dishes such as mapo eggplant, mapo spring rain, strawberry mapo tofu and so on.
It was not until after the reform and opening up that another group of overseas Chinese opened Chinese restaurants in Chinatown, which is different from traditional Chinese restaurants, generally run by Chinese in Japan, overseas Chinese or professionally trained people with formal chef qualifications, and the taste is more similar to authentic Chinese food.
However, the long-established mindset of the Japanese is difficult to break, when it comes to Chinese food, the first thing that comes to mind is all kinds of buns, thick rice, non-spicy mapo tofu, and so on.
Screenshot of Yokohama Chinatown Street Guide. Source: Yokohama Chinatown official website
In the 21st century, Chinatown continues to prosper as Japan's tourism industry continues to develop. Today, when you get off JR Ishikawacho Station, you can feel the smell of Chinese cuisine. There are more than 100 restaurants on 100-meter long street, and about 20 million tourists stroll here every year in search of Chinese delicacies.
3 The withering of a century-old brand
Everything came to an abrupt end at the turn of spring and winter 2020.
After the outbreak of the new crown pneumonia epidemic, Japan's catering and tourism industries have been hit hard, and the busy Yokohama Chinatown has also become empty, and the number of tourists in March is only about 10% of the same period in previous years.
Local businesses said that the current depression was the first time they had encountered it, and they had to calculate rent, water and electricity costs. In order to save themselves, some stores have also introduced a "drive-thru" method in which customers can take away pre-ordered meals without getting out of the car.
But there are still many shops that have not been able to hold on.
In March 2022, the Yokohama Main Store announced that it was about to close, completely disappearing into this century-old street with the prototype of Chinese cuisine remembered by the older generation of Japanese. Later, its operating company, "Pingzhenlou" (Naka-ku, Yokohama), was forced to go bankrupt due to poor management.
Notice of closure of the Yokohama main store of Pingzhenlou.
Many local residents came to take photos in front of the building and left messages on social platforms:
"Since I was a 19-year-old girl, the first time I visited, it was a restaurant that I always loved. Thank you very much, I like the taste and atmosphere of the main store. ”
"The Pingzhen building is closed, it used to attract many customers, and I personally have a lot of memories."
In addition to the direct impact of the epidemic, the disconnect between the development path and reality has also laid the groundwork for the decline of Pingzhen Building.
According to Nobumasa Takahashi, chairman of the Yokohama Chinatown Development Association, the core of people visiting Chinatown has changed significantly.
In the past, guests in Chinatown mainly ordered meals from alumni associations, enterprises and other groups. Some netizens who have lived near Chinatown for nearly 15 years said that except for company dinners and wine banquets, he has basically never eaten at a Chinese restaurant here.
Today, in terms of consumption structure, the middle and low-income classes account for 80% of Japan's total population. There are more and more individual customers around 20 years old on Chinatown, and they are not too much for the rich and gorgeous food, but are more willing to use relatively little money, eat a little of everything, and then take photos and post them online.
Pingzhenlou has long been focusing on family gatherings and business negotiations, and the customers are of high age and the price is expensive, with an average of about 500-1000 yuan. Aside from the well-known mapo tofu and shredded green pepper meat, there are not many dishes that attract young people.
Japanese Chinese food with a single taste does not meet the needs of emerging consumers, brand marketing cannot keep up with the pace of the times, in addition, there are drawbacks such as "Laozi passing on sons" and clear internal hierarchies, which put layers of shackles on the development of Pingzhenlou. As early as 2017, due to the significant increase in rental burden and the deterioration of the income situation, it decided to initiate a special liquidation.
The decline of a century-old brand also confirms the development dilemma of traditional Japanese Chinese food.
Video blogger "Takahashi TK" once introduced his real experience of visiting Yokohama Chinatown.
The first is that there are many people, and like many popular tourist attractions, walking without walking is the norm.
Secondly, although Cantonese, Shanghai, Suzhou and Sichuan have a variety of dishes, the cuisine and region are often misaligned.
Next to the signboard in Chinatown is a Beijing restaurant, which sells meat buns outside the store, including shredded meat with Beijing sauce, diced Kung Pao chicken, and shredded fish-flavored meat. The Wangfujing Hotel, diagonally opposite the Beijing Hotel, also sells steamed buns. Further on, a Sichuan restaurant with mapo tofu as the main focus, named Jingdezhen, will also sell xiaolongbao at the door.
Screenshot of the Yokohama Chinatown street guide, the icon "four" means "Sichuan restaurant". Source: Yokohama Chinatown official website
Finally, the Main Street shops are on the high side.
Chongqing tea house, a dish is about 1,000 yen, the amount of dishes is about half of the domestic home-cooked restaurant; Peking duck 250 yen a roll... In Yokohama's Chinatown, a meal costs around RMB 300-400 per person, which is comparable to Chinese food in a high-end hotel in Tokyo.
On major social media, many people complained about the dining problems in some shops in Chinatown, which were highlighted by poor service attitude, unreasonable prices or no advance notice, unauthentic taste or fresh ingredients, and some even pre-made dishes that were heated and ready to eat.
It can be seen that the commercialization atmosphere quietly covers people's pursuit of taste, innovation and authenticity, and many stores gradually lose customer trust and word of mouth declines. The sudden epidemic has accelerated the role reshuffle, and the century-old street has ushered in a wave of renewal.
4 Chinatown welcomes a new owner
According to Kiyomi Yamashita, professor emeritus at the University of Tsukuba, the closure of the Yokohama main store is symbolic, and there is a replacement of old and new people who are responsible for Yokohama's Chinatown.
Distribution of the number of stores in Yokohama's Chinatown in 2022. Screenshot of the official website of Yokohama Chinatown
Affected by the epidemic, there has been a large-scale "wave of closures" in Japan. According to a survey by the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, as of October 2021, more than 45,000 restaurants in Japan have closed, equivalent to more than 10% of Japanese restaurants. The number of Chinese restaurants in Yokohama's Chinatown has also decreased from more than 200 to 166.
With the increase in vacant shops and the reduction of shop rents, many Chinese operators saw business opportunities and entered the catering market with sauerkraut fish, spicy hot, spicy fragrant pot, and pickled vegetables, becoming the "new owner" of Yokohama's Chinatown. These Chinese foods are no longer adapted to the habits of the Japanese, but specially imported seasoning materials from China, introduced chefs, and completely inherited the Chinese taste.
A Chinese restaurant in Chinatown, Yokohama, Japan. Figure | Visual China
At the same time, young Japanese consumers learn about and expect to experience real Chinese cuisine through the Internet. Some consumers praised while eating: "After living for 30 years, it is the first time to discover that there is such a delicacy in the world!" ”
Travel has been restricted during the pandemic, and these restaurants have allowed Japanese to enjoy authentic Chinese cuisine without leaving home. In addition, it is different from the "sitting at a big table" style of Japanese Chinese cuisine, which is cheap, fast and cost-effective, and it is easier to meet the working meal needs of Japanese working class. Although there is no longer a sense of ritual sitting in a fine dining restaurant, people are no longer willing to pay for this added value in the face of Japan's overall economic downturn.
In addition, according to a survey by Japan's HOT PEPPER website "General Research Institute of Takeaway", in the past three years, the level of spicy addiction among Japanese who have always had a light taste has increased significantly, and 1 in 5 people say that they like spicy food very much. When eating spicy, the body secretes a large amount of endorphins, which makes people feel pleasant and euphoric, thereby relieving stress. The analysis believes that the impact of the epidemic on economic development and the pressure on the lives of the Japanese people are the reasons for the significant increase in their spicy craving level.
All this has contributed to the popularity of authentic Chinese restaurants in Japan, which is why we can observe the scene mentioned at the beginning of the article where "Japanese people study how to eat spicy hot".
This is not unique to Yokohama's Chinatown. In Tokyo, there are even three sacred places for authentic Chinese cuisine: Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, and Koiwa and Shin-Koiwa, with a large number of Chinese shops lined up and a variety of cuisines.
Taste is important to food. Although the famous Chinese dishes in Japan, such as "Tianjin rice" and "Chinese rice", are in line with the eating habits of the locals, the taste is relatively simple, which is far from the real Chinese food. Many merchants blindly pursue commercial benefits and do not know much about the history and cultural origins behind Chinese cuisine, resulting in Chinese cuisine that has only color and shape, but not rhyme.
Nowadays, authentic Chinese food is no longer catered to it, but shows its own characteristics; Not only does it refresh the perception of Japanese people with taste, but it also skillfully integrates regional customs related to food to create a truly authentic Chinese taste. Some traditional Chinese restaurants have also begun to add authentic Chinese food to their recipes to find new opportunities for development.
The efforts of generations have brought Japan one step closer to fully understanding the real Chinese cuisine.
Resources:
1. (US) Wang Baohua, (US) Chen Zhiming, ed., translated by Zhang Beiyu, "Chinatown", East China Normal University Press, 2019;
2. "New Japanese Customs: Yokohama Chinatown", NHK documentary, March 16, 2018;
3. Ichieda, "Japan launched strawberry mapo tofu, can this table be lifted?" "Naturalist", January 2020;
4. "Japan's oldest Chinese restaurant closes, Yokohama Chinatown changes," Nikkei Chinese Net, July 30, 2022;
5. Si Ping, "Japan's oldest Chinese cuisine "Pingzhenlou Yokohama Main Store" declared bankruptcy", Japan Oriental Shinobun, June 7, 2022;
6. "Japanese Media Attention: Japan's 'Oldest' Chinese Restaurant Closes", Reference News, July 31, 2022;
7. Zhang Xinran, "Changes in Japanese Chinese Society from Yokohama Chinatown", WeChat public account "National History of China", May 23, 2022.
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