中餐档次升至新高度 渐成美国富人美食选项

From coast to coast in the United States, there is a sense that a new day is dawning for Chinese cuisine. On the west coast, especially in the fine food-obsessed San Francisco Bay Area, chefs are taking advantage of the wealth and natural bounty to pioneer a new level of Chinese-American fine dining. On the east coast, some of the mainland’s most successful restaurateurs have opened their first overseas outposts, introducing eager local diners to the food of modern China.

从美国西海岸到东海岸，你能感受到，中餐的黎明即将到来。在西海岸，尤其是对美食着迷的旧金山湾区，大厨们正利用财富和丰富的大自然馈赠，探索如何将美国的中餐档次提升到新高度。在东海岸，中国内地一些最成功的餐厅在此开设了首家海外分店，向当地食客推广当代中国美食。

Everywhere, chefs and restaurant owners – both Chinese and Chinese American – are introducing new flavours and changing opinions of the cuisine itself.

在美国各地，大厨和餐厅老板——无论是中国籍还是华裔美国籍的，都纷纷推出新味道，他们对中餐的看法也在发生改变。

In the American restaurant industry, Chinese food has long been lumped with other so-called “ethnic” cuisines like Mexican or Thai, which were expected first and foremost to be cheap.

在美国的餐饮业，长期以来中餐与墨西哥菜和泰国菜等均被归入所谓的“少数族裔”美食，它们给人的第一印象就是便宜。

It had been accepted that diners who think nothing of spending US$500 (HK$3,900) on a tasting menu at The French Laundry would recoil at spending even a tenth of that at a Chinese restaurant – even if the chefs were equally skilled and working with ingredients sourcedfrom the same producers.

在“法国洗衣房”餐厅欣然为一份招牌赏味菜单花费500美元（约合3900港元）的食客，却不愿在一家中餐馆消费仅1/10的钱，这种现象已是司空见惯——即使中餐馆的厨师也一样厨艺精湛，即使他们所使用的食材也来自同样的供应商。

Now, chefs and the dining public are pushing back.

现在，厨师们和大众食客正在改变这种状况。

In New York, sophisticated restaurants such as Guan Fu Sichuan – New York Times critic Pete Wells’ second favourite restaurant of 2017 – Hao Noodle and Tea by Madam Zhu’s Kitchen from successful Chinese restaurateur Zhu Rong, and famed Peking duck purveyor DaDong have opened to great fanfare. But no one is pushing quite as hard as San Francisco-based restaurateur George Chen.

在纽约，一些高档餐厅比如“官府川菜”——《纽约时报》美食评论家皮特?韦尔斯2017年第二喜欢的餐厅、成功的中国餐饮人朱蓉女士开的“好面馆”以及著名的北京烤鸭店“大董”等都大受欢迎。但在提升中餐档次方面，没有谁比旧金山的餐厅老板乔治.陈更加努力。

His new restaurant, Eight Tables, is part exclusive dining experience, boasting both enough understated elegance to impress even San Francisco’s blase customers, and high prices.

乔治.陈的新店“八桌”有着独特的用餐体验，以优雅格调给厌倦了浮华的旧金山顾客留下深刻印象，价格也不便宜。

An intimate, opulent space hidden up a nondescript alley in San Francisco’s Chinatown, Eight Tables seats 38 and offers only a tasting menu,that starts – without wine, cocktails or optional ultra-high-end ingredients – at US$225.

这家餐厅隐藏在旧金山中国城一条并无明显特征的小巷内，餐厅共设38个餐位，仅提供一份招牌赏味菜单，没有葡萄酒、鸡尾酒或者其他可选的高端食材，最低价位225美元（约合1420元人民币）。

Chen thought up the idea for Eight Tables after 15 years in China, enjoying many dinners of si fang cai, private kitchens whose popularity has exploded in China in recent years.

在决定开“八桌”这家餐厅之前，乔治.陈在中国生活了15年，其间品尝过许多私房菜。近年来，私房菜开始在中国流行。

“Private kitchens are not of any particular ethnic or regional area. It’s about going to a very gifted chef and letting him do the creative things that he does. Chefs from Shanghai bring a little more Shanghainese influence, chefs from Hong Kong more Cantonese,” says Chen. “And for me it was the same thing: I was born in San Francisco and this is my cuisine.”

乔治.陈说：“私房菜不是来自某个具体的族裔或地区，而是让一名有天赋的厨师尽情发挥创造力。上海厨师会多一点上海菜的影响，香港厨师会多一点广东菜的影响。而对我来说都是一样：我出生在旧金山，这就是我的美食。”