This Could Be The End Of Cheap Chinese Food...

This could be the end of cheap Chinese food in America. Welcome everybody to the Hot Pot, boys. David and Andrew here. David, there are no more dim sum chefs in America. The people don't want to go through the training. There's less Chinese immigrants coming over. Could this be symbolic of the end of affordable Chinese food in America? And should we be worried? I think definitely some people are worried because why else would this article go that viral? I was not expecting it to be, you know, posted on Reddit and this blog and that blog. People really care. About the disappearance of cheap Chinese food. I didn't know so many people cared about dim sum chefs. Well, let's get to it real quick, Andrew. Why is it happening? Because the article does sort of try to break it down. Yeah, so two main reasons. A lot of young Chinese, whether they're from China or second generation Chinese in America, they don't want to take up these jobs. It's very laborious to learn to be a chef. It takes a lot of training. You're working long hours. You're making meticulous, very artsy little dumplings. And then you're steaming them and you don't get paid a ton of money either. So it's just not like appealing work. Yeah. And especially being a dim sum chef, particularly, it's almost like being a French pastry chef. Super intricate, super detailed. I got to put the pig face on the low sabao or the chashu bao, whatever. And I get like nine bucks an hour. Yeah, but and also maybe dim sum chefs, they don't get glamorized as much as we should. I don't know. I mean, maybe these people should deserve more credit. Anyway, second reason is actually the economics of China, where there's actually less Chinese immigrants coming to America. Now, that's partially because of the policies of the past few years. Right. Of the president before of Trump and kind of like scaring certain Chinese immigrants. But also there's just China's better off. So a lot of people are staying in China for opportunity. Right. It is not 1960 anymore, where like everybody in the village is like jumping over each other to be like, yeah, I want to go to. Well, not even 1960. It's just not like the last 150 years. Yeah, we're just like Chinese. We're like, yo, we got the opportunity to come to America. Golden Mountain, America. We going for the gold rush to make chop suey. Yeah. Our thing is like I definitely think that people are going to miss having like a spot that they could fill up for for like five dollars. And we just were in Boston. There's a Boston institution in Chinatown called Ding Ho. You literally can have a good lunch for five dollars and 45 cents. Ridiculous. Now, here's my thing. It's like I do. I'm glad that people appreciate that. But if that's the only way you want to interface with a Chinese person, essentially like underselling themselves because they got like cheap rent or whatever, you know, immigration situation they're in, then I'm glad you had your fun. Time to either pay up or just eat Subway. Yesterday's price is not today's price. OK, got to have a footlong for lunch now. Yo, listen, I've been saying this for years on the channel because, you know, we eat a lot of Chinese food from different ranges. We've explored it. We've explained it to you, especially cheap Chinese food. Dim sum in particular is super underpriced. Like, do you understand how artistic and meticulous and intricate those dumplings are? And I always said it. It's like crazy because the amount of ingredients, the amount of colors, the different types of skins for the dumplings, everything's steamed. It's very delicate. So I think it's been underpriced for decades, honestly. And I know. But a lot of people don't understand like why it was underpriced to keep it real with you guys. A lot of those people, they're living in subsidized housing, right? And obviously, if you're from the village, you're not a super capitalist. You're not like trying to think about profit margins and P&L statements and all this expense sheet and spreadsheets. You're just thinking, oh, yeah, I just need to make enough to pay my rent. And my rent is subsidized by the government at $300 because this. So yeah, to cut the char siu and do this, I only need to charge like $5 for this box of rice and meat. And I want to let everybody know that especially in Manhattan, a lot of these chefs don't live in Manhattan. They're bussing in and taking the train in from Queens or deep Brooklyn, where they actually live. And they're coming in to make these great dumplings for you. So to be honest, you don't deserve to eat them that cheap. That's it. Like not dim sum at least. I'm saying there are other cheap Chinese food that I don't think is going away. I think dollar dumplings are going to stay there because it's more just like easier to make. It's probably cheaper. But especially the northern style of dumplings is not that. Not not the beautiful siu mai with the with the little roe on top. No, or the crystal dumplings. Come on, Hakao. It's like artwork. Yeah, no, no, no, no, no, no. I mean, listen, guys, I am glad that we went through that era. And it's not like it wasn't like particularly our family, but we went to a church with a lot of people. That was their life was basically cooking ultra cheap Chinese food, whether it was in Chinatown for other Chinese people or in the hood, even, you know, fried chicken wings and pork fried rice or in the white neighborhood. They really like a lot of cabbage or like in the even we knew people who opened up Chinese spots in the Mexican neighborhoods with the gigantic like empanada like they are like. Let me tell you this. Chinese food can take all different types with the lime on it. We went to a Jewish deli in Brooklyn and they were already serving like a type of Chinese food on the menu. Anyways, got leaves. Yeah, got leaves. Shout out to them, guys. David, is this the natural evolution for immigrants, though? Like this is just how it goes, right? You come to this country. Hold on. You got it. You got to do backbreaking work to be accepted to make a living. And of course, all that backbreaking work provided a lot for a lot of people. But so be it if that's not where you need to be anymore, because there's so many other opportunities now. You can stock trade. You can go into finance. You can all your kids want to do all these other things. But for some reason, it does feel like and, you know, it is what it is. But like, I feel like Chinese got stuck in that phase a little bit longer than like Irish or Italian people. You know, Irish people got the pubs. Italian people got, you know, like $25 bolognese in 2022. But it's like we got stuck cutting the ducks for $4 for like about maybe 40 years too long. And more longer than we could have. And you know, it's the funniest thing to me is like the dollar pizza. Most of those are not even owned or ran by Italian people. Yeah. So but I don't think you'd ever see a Chinese spot that was super serving cheap Chinese food that wasn't ran by a Chinese person of some type. Right. Yeah, because I mean, because it is more complicated, to be honest, guys, than just sticking something. But I also want to use that as a testament to how backbreaking and passionate you have to be about that work to even do it. It's not as easy as, you know, I'm not saying pizza is not artistic, but at least a dollar pizza is a lot easier to make. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, all in all, guys, like I said, I'm glad that we're just like finally lifting up the floor of our experience in this country, whether that's Asian-Americans or just Chinese-Americans in particular, because I guess Chinese-Americans were here the longest and have the just got stuck at a certain level for a while. At least the bottom, the lower class did. And I'm happy for him. Yeah. You know what I mean? I'm happy for us. But we made it. No longer making it for five. You'll still have cheap Chinese food for a decade. I mean, listen, guys, if you really miss the cheap Chinese food, it's just not going to be on every block. Yeah. Like you will be able to find it. People are going to find out how to use robotics, cut corners here, cut corners there, but not from a taste perspective. Maybe they just take this high labor thing off the menu or whatever, and they keep most of the things that people like. David, I want to echo a lot of people's feelings out there. I will miss it. You will miss the five dollar Chinese food. I will. It's not going away tomorrow, but I I'm going to miss like the experience of dim sum and how affordable it was and how, you know, you just feel like you're supporting, you know, immigrants that are hardworking, you know, all the even the cart ladies who are who are singing the dim sum. And you got to kind of banter with them like that's going to go away. And it has been for the past few years. If you just extrapolate the trend, it will be. I think to be honest, man, like Asian-Americans, sometimes we're so tied to that. And they went through that same development in Asia. They haven't had cart dim sum in Hong Kong for like 20 years. So why are you still some? Some people are like, oh, I ain't going if it's not a cart. Bro, just listen. Everything changes. Like just because we're immigrants, not everything has to be the same as 30 years ago, 20 years ago. Like people got to develop and have better lives. Like people don't exist in a theme park, you know? And I'm not saying everybody views it that way, but sometimes I think even Asian-Americans, we view ourselves that way if we're from like a different class. I think there's something there for sure, man. I'm tired of this. I'm tired of the whole like just servant thing. You know, I'm not saying it wasn't a good game plan. It didn't work. You got us somewhere. We're serving you here. What do you want? Oh, you'd like that ingredients. I've run to the store. I put it in. Y'all, thank you very much. I hope you like it. Have a good day, sir. But like I'm it's cool. I'm cool off that. Are we going to keep chopping duck for 80 more years? Because we've been doing it for about 60. Yeah. How many more decades do we need to do this? The duck is delicious, but whoever's cutting the duck just got to get paid a few more bucks. Guys, we're serving roast duck for like $7. Do you understand if you got roast duck in any other culture or cuisine, that stuff would be at least three times. You know who else serves duck? It's the French. And they serve Guagua. It's just duck. Like if it's going to be, you know, if I'm going to cut the duck and it's Pierre or Francois, then maybe I charge you like four or five times. Guys, I like some French bakeries out here, but a croissant can easily be $5 and that's dough and butter. But it was made by Pierre, not Ping. Right. Anyways, guys, that wraps it up here. You guys let us know how you feel in the comments down below, because this is something that we've talked about on the channel before. A lot of second generation doesn't want to do the backbreaking work. Should it be this cheap? Should Chinese food just evolve and should the price go up? Maybe it's actually just makes sense. I will say this. I think the actual girl who is Asian or Chinese who wrote this article that went really viral, actually I think is kind of glad that the floor is finally being raised in the community. But she just couldn't say it that way. She had to sell it like more like, oh my gosh, who's going to make the dumplings? Are you guys worried or are you happy about this? Because you can look at it from two different perspectives. Let us know in the comments section below, what was your favorite stupid, dumb, unbelievably cheap Chinese meal? Because I know every city got one, not just every major city, like every city period in America got one. It's not going away tomorrow, but it might go away in 10 years. All right, everybody. Thank you so much for watching. We are the Hot Pop Boys. And until next time we out. Peace.