NextSharkNextShark.com
Latest Newsletter🍵 New alcohol/cancer study in AsiansRead

Article

NYC Restaurant Accused of Cultural Appropriation With ‘American Food’ Dumplings

dumplings

    Asian America Daily - in under 5 minutes

    Get our collection of Asian America's most essential stories, to your inbox daily, for free!

    Unsure? Check out our Newsletter Archive

    A restaurant in Brooklyn has been accused of cultural appropriation for serving dim sum based on American diner classics.

    Brooklyn Chop House, located at 150 Nassau St., offers cheeseburger shumai, pastrami dumplings, and French onion soup dumplings, to name a few.

    In a new video from Thrillist, managing partner Stratis Morfogen explains the inspiration behind the restaurant’s “fusion” cuisine.

    “So basically what I enjoyed most is my American steakhouse, but I don’t think we need another cream of spinach, baked potato, shrimp cocktail type of steakhouse,” he says. “With Brooklyn Chop House I did a double meaning on chop. Chopsticks, chop steak.”

    Image via Facebook / Thrillist

    According to Morfogen, the dumplings they serve are based on his favorite dishes from his father and uncles’ menu.

    “Being a third generation restaurateur where my father and uncles had about a dozen restaurants in New York, I took the favorite parts of what I enjoyed the most is that from his diner he had the classic Reuben sandwich and the pastrami sandwich and the bacon cheeseburger even the Philly cheesesteak and the French onion soup.”

    Image via Facebook / Thrillist

    “What I wanted to do is marry that, all those diner signature dishes and then make them all into dumplings.”

    Image via Facebook / Thrillist

    Thrillist goes on to show how the restaurant’s cheeseburger shumai, pastrami dumplings and French onion soup dumplings are made.

    Image via Facebook / Thrillist

    The video has received more than 456,000 views on Facebook since it was posted on Nov. 27.

    While many reacted positively, some thought that the restaurant “ruined” dim sum and accused it of appropriating Chinese cuisine.

    One Facebook user also accused Morfogen of racism. He defended himself by saying he has a Chinese and two African American partners in the business.

    Featured Images via Facebook / Thrillist

    Support our Journalism with a Contribution

    Many people might not know this, but despite our large and loyal following which we are immensely grateful for, NextShark is still a small bootstrapped startup that runs on no outside funding or loans.

    Everything you see today is built on the backs of warriors who have sacrificed opportunities to help give Asians all over the world a bigger voice.

    However, we still face many trials and tribulations in our industry, from figuring out the most sustainable business model for independent media companies to facing the current COVID-19 pandemic decimating advertising revenues across the board.

    We hope you consider making a contribution so we can continue to provide you with quality content that informs, educates and inspires the Asian community. Even a $1 contribution goes a long way.  Thank you for everyone's support. We love you all and can't appreciate you guys enough.

    Support NextShark

    Mastercard, Visa, Amex, Discover, Paypal