WHY CANTONESE RESTAURANTS ARE CLOSING! (Good or bad?) Canto ep.1

What do the Cantonese millennial want to eat? What's going on, everybody? Welcome to a very special investigative reporting episode of the Hot Pop Boys. You guys, we have been investigating a lot of a lot lately. Here with us today, we got Nelson Chan from Hoopin' Life. Tony Wright that I'm here, man. Cancel food. Cancel guys. Guys, we are going to be doing a brand new Cantonese food series to show where Cantonese food is at right now in 2020 and where it's headed. By the way, guys, we are doing a giveaway at the end of this video, so wait for the questions, answer them, and the best answer will get a gift card. Before we continue, make sure you hit the subscribe button, turn on your notifications, and please, please, please, for the algorithm, hit that like button. Hot Pop Boys, let's go. Guys, we had to open up on perhaps what is the most Cantonese dish of all time, the bowls I find, a.k.a. claypot rice. So we got the dry salted pork belly and Chinese sausage claypot rice. And then over here now, what do we got? Because this is crazy looking. Here we have the lap yu yuk peng, which is a salted fish and pork patty on rice. Claypot. Wow. Guys, I do got to give a shout out to the toi san because I believe bowls I find originated from toi san. Toi san is a very specific city village in Guangdong province. Bowls I find. Once you get older, you definitely learn to appreciate funkier, more like different angled flavors, more unorthodox flavors. All right, here's the thing about bowls I find, and this is one of the dishes that actually is being served a lot less at a lot of Cantonese restaurants because I've been in a Cantonese restaurant, they're saying, oh, we don't serve the bowls I find anymore because it takes too long to cook. It's too much trouble. You have to have the heat really high. You need to have these claypots. It takes 20 minutes to cook. We got to order this before. So this is one of those dishes that, to be honest, is not really making it through to the future. Toi san cauliflower with pork jowl. This is another dish you can't find at every spot. Only the most authentic spots are going to carry the toi san cauliflower. I didn't eat cauliflower growing up, did you? In Chinese culture, this is our broccoli. Would you guys say that toi san food generally is very, very light in flavor? Because that flavor in that toi san cauliflower dish is very light. Very inoffensive. I could see some people calling it bland, but I would just call it very natural. This is a good lead-in for our conversation real quick about Cantonese food flavors. Sometimes when you're used to eating the stronger flavored Chinese food, such as Sichuan food, you might try Cantonese food and be like, oh, there's not enough flavor here. How do we balance what's a lot of flavor, what's natural tasting, what's clean tasting? Because obviously right now you would say maybe that is one of the reasons why Cantonese food had a decline. It's because other people wanted those flavors that more hit them immediately, right? Cantonese food is the one Chinese cuisine where the flavors are actually more on the more bland side. We like to use a lot of soy sauce and a lot of other stuff. It still tastes really good. More natural. How about this? I would not describe Cantonese food as bland because that word bland has kind of a negative connotation. I would call it subtle. Subtle. Nuanced. Subtle. Nuanced. Subtle Asian flavors. Gai bo. Okay. Gai bo. Put it in my bowl. Doesn't bo mean like bowl? What does gai bo mean? When you say bo zaifan, bo is... Bo is a bowl. Yeah. So do you think it had anything to do with... Oh, bo is pot. Chicken chestnut sizzling pot. Let's go. Mmm, saucy. Oh, I love this one. Very flavorful but in a subtle way. I don't know if that makes sense. You know, like we've been saying Cantonese was very subtle. But this one has a lot of flavor due to the sauce. So, no. The mushroom is really good. This is one of my favorite sizzling pot dishes. I like how saucy it is and I love the mixture with mushroom because I think, to me, chicken and mushroom is one of the best combinations out there. I encourage ABCs who kind of shied away from it to come back and try this stuff, though. Continuing through different aspects of Cantonese food, here we are at the Hong Kong-style brunch section. Not dim sum, but the brunch section. Guys, we are looking at, obviously, your classic bolo yau, which is a pineapple bun with a butter slice in it. But then you've really got to get it up a notch. Can I tell you, I have never seen this before. Here we have the bolo bao chicken steak with the fried egg inside. This is a chicken steak. It's not pork chop. No, no, no. This is a chicken steak. Oh, wow. Now, what is your opinion on using bolo baos, a.k.a. pineapple buns, as buns? They are a little flaky. They're a little dry. They're sweet. Is it more for looks or is there a taste benefit? Oh, it for sure has a taste benefit compared to, like, just a regular bun, you know? This is a new thing. I have the runny egg yolk. That's definitely kind of like a new, kind of hip American thing. What are we at? Like a Chinese egg slip? Ah! That's a joke! Let's go. Pineapple bun chicken thigh sandwich. Got some spicy tomato mayo in there. Wow, I did not expect that. With all the sauces and tomato, it definitely doesn't make the pineapple bun dry. And with the egg yolk, the runny egg yolk. Fun fact about the pineapple bun, there's actually no pineapple flavor. It's a sweet kind of crust on top that looks like a pineapple. Do you think that the future of Cantonese food is that there's going to be less spots, but the quality spots that do it the right way survive? Oh, most definitely, man. They're going to see what the people want, and try to, you know, elevate it in a way where, you know, they can keep themselves. I think that these dishes are more meant for, like, the second generation or the younger generation. It's great to see Cantonese restaurants that have a higher price point, but also higher quality. Higher standards. Higher standards. I think that's really important. In my opinion, that's the only way it's going to survive. Because you're either going to be doing a good version for $9, or you're going to be doing a super quick version for $3. The $6 point is out. A lot of Cantonese businesses are going to have to start thinking about what the second generation Cantonese people want to eat. Who's going out to eat? The millennials. So what do the Cantonese millennials want to eat? What do the Cantonese millennials want to eat? The pastrami pineapple bun sandwich. It was pretty good, too. Wow. You guys, that was pretty good. But it wasn't better than the chicken thigh one. Chicken sting. The Macau pork chop sandwich. You know, aside from it sitting there for a while and it all falling apart, I thought the flavor was pretty good. Do you think using the bolo bao as a sandwich bun is only going to be a more popular trend? I guess what I'm trying to see is every generation always puts their own twist on old classics, right? But it seems like our generation is not putting a twist on this. Pineapple bun with butter slice. That's breakfast. It's like butter and toast. There is something about the classic that still just reminds me of a cheese slice. New York City. The British have the toast. And then the Cantonese have the bolo bao. Wrapping up the Hong Kong breakfast section, we have – these are some breakfast, breakfast foods. If you guys know Cantonese food, there's so many different types of cuisine, from dim sum to the breakfast foods to the brunch foods to the lunch foods to the dinner food. It's like every three, four hours got a shift in menu. This is teng cai chok, a.k.a. the Sam Pan. I recently discovered this, Andrew, in the past, like, three years. It's my favorite chok. That's my opinion. You got squid, peanuts. Growing up as a kid when I was in Macau, they serve this a lot in the street. You know, like in little carts. You know, they make it for you fresh. Right. Macau and Hong Kong. That's probably one of the most unique things you'll see is curry fish balls. Curry anything. Everywhere. Yeah, curry anything. I would say that is spicier than the fish balls you'll get on the streets of Hong Kong. Those are a little bit toned down. This one's – Macau's are pretty spicy. Yeah. You like that? Yeah. Wow, okay. That's one of the best curry fish balls I've ever had. I like that one. Guys, to me, I have one of my beloved cheung fun dishes. This, to me, blew my mind the first time I saw it in Hong Kong. And then I was just like, wait, are those just rice noodles with peanut sauce and hoisin sauce and XO sauce? And then it was like has this sweet peanutty flavor. And it really doesn't really sound like something you would eat for breakfast or that you would really think of. But it's really popular. It's a staple cuisine. Keeps Hong Kong moving. One of my favorite dishes. I like it, man. Simple, sweet, amazing texture. HK breakfast would be cheung fun and a bolo yau and a lai cha and then you're good to go. I have an idea. I think if they stir fry those bits, it would add another layer to it. Like add some wok hay to the chopped up cheung fun. You need innovation to avoid elimination. Okay. Yeah. Okay. That's fair. A lot of people don't want to have this conversation. You're going to listen. By the way, we're all pro-Cantonese food here. But we just got to be real. Let's be critical. Okay. It's a funny Cantonese dish. A funny dish? A funny Cantonese dish. Is this a joke? Is this a Cantonese joke? No, it's joke. It's an inside joke. That's the original joke. Hear what the T-shirt said to the wet pants? Sup, fool? You know how you say flower bridge? Yeah, I was going to say that one. Yo, these jokes have been around since maybe I was like 20 years. You got to give it to Drake. Drake had the most updated Cantonese rap line ever. Let the lights dim some. You know what? This line. How about this line? Because we like rhymes. If you're the originator, it's hard to be the innovator. If being the originator of something makes it difficult to be the innovator, but you need innovation to avoid elimination, just look at the way that algorithm works. If you're the originator, it's hard to be the innovator. You need innovation to avoid elimination. Trying to spell it out for you. We're trying to avoid elimination through innovation, guys. We're trying to spell it out. You guys understand what we're doing. Okay, moving on to round four. We are reaching the Hong Kong Cafe dinner floors. Hong Kong Cafe is typically like a mishmash of different regions, but everything's viewed through sort of like an HK lens. Just to show you guys how diverse Hong Kong Cantonese cuisine has gotten, Andrew, you said that this has a chiu chow dish. These are the basil clams. This is a dish that you've probably had if you've had a seafood dinner at a Chinese restaurant, but it has chiu chow roots. This is a very classic dai pai dong dish. Dai pai dong is basically like a really big family dinner where you have a ton of family-style dishes. Everybody just gets together. But it is cooked on a gigantic, extremely fiery wok. Like this big, you know, the wok. It's almost like a mega-wok. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not the closest thing. That'd not be the new dance, huh? And you gotta have a serious face on. The amount of flavor that this dish has is actually in the upper tier. Like, you would not say this dish is bland. This is hou shui ji. This is originally a Sichuan dish. It's supposed to be very spicy and make your mouth water, like in the name. But this is done in a Cantonese style, so it's probably toned down. I actually really enjoyed that. Sometimes it's nice to have a Sichuan dish that is not so spicy and crazy. Here we have the baked seafood pasta. Whether the Italians took this from the Chinese people or the Chinese people took it from, you know, the British people took it from the Italians, I don't know. But here we have baked seafood pasta. You know Cantonese is more known for, like, the baked pork chop, right? You would get this at any Chinese-Cantonese cafe or restaurant. You know, I thought dishes like this always kind of baffled me growing up because I was like, wait, why in Hong Kong are we eating baked spaghetti with cheese on it and stuff? But, hey man, it's from the European influence. Pork chop is the most popular with the bolognese. No sauce. I'm in the sauce like bolognese. Tory Lanez from Toronto. Honey garlic pork chops. This is probably out of everything that we've had today, the most, like, commonly ordered dish by, I guess, about everybody. We've been in this position where we're Cantonese and we show some of our non-Cantonese or non-Asian friends, you know, Hong Kong cafe food and they're not always impressed, to be honest, because not always does the food have a lot of flavor or maybe it's weird Hong Kong take on Western food. And last but not least, of course, we've got salted egg yolk prawns. This is actually, surprisingly, one of their most popular dishes here at Alice's Kitchen. You guys, in my opinion, in my opinion on this Cantonese food journey through the different, you know, three-hour, four-hour segment menus, that's been my favorite. That was my favorite thing. Of all the things we had, the gums ah high, a.k.a. the salted egg yolk fried shrimp prawns were my favorite. No cap. Cantos got jokes. I'm not saying those were the best jokes. I said we got jokes. We got jokes. Cantos can joke. Another one. I'm killing them. I'm on fire. That was the best version of salted egg yolk shrimp I've personally had. Eggy, it was salty, it was salted egg yolk-y. It was bumpy. I'm just saying that I honestly could give that a five out of five. Come to Alice's Kitchen, and if nothing else, please come get the salted egg yolk shrimp, in my opinion. I give that a six out of five. Alice's Kitchen is such a great representation of Hong Kong food. The quality that they're delivering it at, the amount of dishes that they have, the way they represent the culture, I think this is where it's headed. And places like Alice's Kitchen are going to continue the tradition of Hong Kong food. Not every spot is as well-ran. Not every spot delivers the quality that this spot does. In Hong Kong and Macau, the menus are much more specialized. Like, people are only going to have dim sum. People are only going to have that breakfast cha-cha-tan thing. They're not going to cover everything. The hours are only open for that specific time frame, for that certain food. And let me pose this question, guys. Not all cuisines have this amount of variety to them. Why do Cantonese do that? I'm going to go ahead and say Cantonese-American menus are the biggest on planet Earth. Look at this booklet. This is a book. It's a picture. It's like a science textbook. Oh my god, look. I'm looking at the numbers. We're at 250. 250 items. Now, my question is, I love it when a restaurant does all 250 well or even 100 dishes well. But then, bad sometimes is when, like, quality's not that high, you know? It's like getting, like, 6 bachelor's degrees or something like that. Like, you probably don't know any of them at the same level as a master's or Ph.D. At the end of the day, we may or may not have the right answers to all of these. But, you know, we're investigating and we're doing the best we can. That's what we're here to do, guys. Hot, hot boys, man. This is something that we're going to be diving into for a few videos because it does kind of require some more time to really wrap our heads around this. Because, like we said before, let me reiterate. It is a fact. New Cantonese restaurants are on the decline. A lot of big Cantonese restaurants are closing down. And not as many of the new Chinese restaurants are Cantonese. And I do think a lot of second-generation Cantonese and Cantonese people in general are eating other people's types of food, which there's nothing wrong with. But if we feel like Cantonese cuisine and culture is somewhat decreasing and dwindling in some way and you're worried about it, these are questions you need to wonder. Just don't want Cantonese food to become like, no shade, but Ford Motors because Ford Motors is not popping anymore. And it was the originator. Everybody kind of respects it. But Ford's not taking credit for Tesla. I think if you're a Cantonese man, you've got to really support your own culture. Make your friends try Cantonese food. Like we said, bring them to a good, high-elevated Cantonese restaurant and just let them try it. And at the end of the day, if they still don't like it, something's probably wrong with them. But you guys, we just wanted to end on a poignant note, a thoughtful note. But you guys, episode number two has us checking out some of these second-generation ABC Cantonese spots that are trying to evolve the cuisine. So I'm pretty excited for that. Hey, and shout out to Alice Kitchen for keeping it pretty traditional but taking it one notch up. Hey, everybody, in the comments down below, you guys let us know what you think Cantonese restaurants can do to become more popular again. Now, that could be like a creative new dish or bringing something back or fusing something together. You guys come up with it. The best comment will get an Amazon gift card emailed to them and we'll message you guys. So make sure you leave your Instagram handle down below as well. You guys, this was episode one in our Cantonese series. I'm looking forward to episode two, episode three, and onward, something very close, near, dear to our hearts. This was another investigative episode of Hot Pop Boys. Thank you guys so much for watching, and until next time, we out. Peace. Ram that, man, before you cut it up. You got it out, all right? My hand's over and you got a Grammy. All right. This guy. Yeah.