The Kitchen Network: America’s Underground Chinese Restaurant Workers

It&#x27;s almost cathartic to hear the struggle of immigrants coming to the US for better opportunities transcends ethnic and racial backgrounds. We&#x27;ve heard this story differently before about Latino immigrants coming to the US and taking tough jobs in the kitchen to provide for a better life for their family. Anthony Bourdain even chronicles it in his book, Kitchen Confidential.<p>Of course this narrative of a hard working immigrant coming to this country to work goes squarely against what we hear from critics saying immigrants only come here to freeload. If anything, this article just shows how lazy Americans can be, when Americans can&#x27;t be bothered to eat meat or fish with bones, but of course that&#x27;s just an anecdote.<p>How do you create opportunities for immigrants and people in general? How do you empower people to leverage their own skills and monetize them, without others looking to exploit them.<p>Great article.

I was actually surprised that the workers in question are themselves Chinese. In and around DC (Indian Head extends perhaps 15 miles out) restaurants that 10 or 15 years ago would have been staffed entirely by Asians are overwhelmingly staffed by Hispanics under Asian management.<p>I often wonder what sort of path the people who used to work those jobs have taken since.

&gt;&gt;“Everything we do, we do for the next generation,” he said, and added, “No matter what, it beats sitting around in the village.”<p>Being from a small town in an impoverished area of the US, I can somewhat relate to that sentiment. Very interesting story. The author paints a very stark picture about restaurant workers from China. The subject of the story, who spoke the quote above, makes more than I would have supposed.

Fascinating article. One part in particular answered a question I&#x27;ve had about Houston for ages:<p>I visited Houston with a friend about a decade ago and we were both puzzled about the Chinatown area of the city. Why, we asked, would a city smack in the middle of the country have such a large Chinese population? NYC &amp; California made sense, but Texas?<p>And as it turns out:<p><i>&quot;Rain and his companions walked for a full day and most of the night, until, before dawn, they came to a road, where an associate of the smugglers picked them up. They went to Houston first, and from there a van took them straight to New York.&quot;</i><p>Waystation city on the international Chinese immigrants smuggling route for folks who just crossed the Mexican border. Fascinating.<p>EDIT: Aaaaaaand I&#x27;m wrong. Thank you shiftpgdn for the Wikipedia link and background.

This is the kind of article that I want to read in a newspaper. It&#x27;s a story about real people in my own area - not some scary, exotic, far-off place. Politics should not the only source of news.

&gt; <i>“There are only three jobs a Chinese immigrant can get without papers,” a woman from Beijing told me. “You can work at a massage parlor, you can work doing nails, or you can work in a restaurant.”</i><p>Curiously, Chinese laundries are not mentioned, and are ubiquitous here in NYC. I wonder it the omission is a mistake, or if there&#x27;s some reason laundries don&#x27;t fit in this list.

Great article! Being the fat guy I am, I had to google &quot;salt and cornstarch on meat&quot; and I&#x27;m glad I did! &quot;As odd as it sounds, don’t skip the cornstarch. The cornstarch absorbs additional moisture from the surface of the steaks. Drier exteriors mean even darker, more intense browning, which translates to bigger, more complex flavor.&quot;[1]<p>[1] <a href="http://americastestkitchen.tumblr.com/post/86246187118/perfect-grilled-steaks-with-these-3-must-do-tricks" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;americastestkitchen.tumblr.com&#x2F;post&#x2F;86246187118&#x2F;perfe...</a>

Anyone who&#x27;s interested in a more in-depth look should check out Fortune Cookie Chronicles. <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0446698970" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amazon.com&#x2F;gp&#x2F;product&#x2F;0446698970</a> It really explains why the food at 99.9% of the &quot;Szchewan&quot; and &quot;Peking&quot; etc. places all tastes the same.

A heartwarming story of conspiracy to violate immigration laws, the tax code, and employment discrimination law.

I remember going to Chinatown in San Francisco when I started college and seeing the job postings posted in a window for Chinese restaurants throughout the country. It blew my mind but also made so much sense.

If this story were about prostitutes, it would be read differently.