Comments on: Dispatches From Xinjiang: Uyghur Restaurant Eden Arrives In America To Mixed Reviews

By: Beige Wind

Beige Wind — Fri, 15 Jan 2016 04:28:48 +0000

My sense is that outside of Xinjiang and Central Asia their customer base is primarily Han. Uyghur food is quite popular throughout China and among Chinese-Americans. By labeling themselves Uyghur Chinese they are continuing to market themselves to that audience in the U.S. They are also distinguishing themselves from Central Asian and other halal food sellers for ignorant Americans who still don’t necessarily know how to locate the origins of Uyghurs. And they are clearly marking themselves as non-splitist. Since their primary source of business is still in China, they are policing themselves in the same way they would back in China.

By: bruce

bruce — Fri, 27 Nov 2015 00:21:58 +0000

They’ve got a brand-name problem. Or didn’t you notice?

A restaurant that serves “Chinese Uyghur” food?

I’ve been to them in China. I took a Kashgar friend to a “Uyghur” restaurant in Zhejiang. We ordered yoghurt. I complained to the waitress that there was a huge, unappetizing amount of sugar in the yoghurt, which is never served that way among Uyghurs, who enjoy authentic, unadulterated (and rather sour) yoghurt. “We have to make it with sugar,” she explained. “Otherwise, our Chinese customers won’t eat it.”

Can you imagine a restaurant opening stateside which describes itself as cooking, say, “Chinese Tibetan” dishes? I wouldn’t recommend that.

That would imply a rather colonial dining experience . . .