 Put the almond chicken and the cashew chicken. Yep, 3.5 stars best. And I just love just poor Chinese food, man. That is the Chinese experience I want. A lot of people don't fully really respect Chinese related things. A lot of Chinese Americans have their image of Chinese food locked in time. Have lost their right to judge Chinese food. Get the update. And I'm Chinese, so you gotta listen to me. As people who have eaten at a thousand Chinese restaurants in their life and given this a lot of thought, I cannot get down with this statement. Welcome everybody to the Hot Pop Boys. David and Andrew here. David, what's going on? Freddie Wong just had a viral TikTok saying that all the great Chinese restaurants in America have to have 3.5 stars on Yelp. Not four, not three, not two, but 3.5. Some people agree with him. A lot of people disagree with him. And guess what, Andrew? I think Freddie Wong is pretty wrong. All right, we're gonna break it down from a micro, mid to a macro. We're also gonna give you our recommendations on how to actually find the most authentic best Chinese restaurant. If you're excited about this video, please do us a favor, hit that like button right now, and then let's play the clip. Go on Yelp and look for restaurants with 3.5 stars, exactly 3.5. Not three, not four, 3.5 stars is the sweet spot for authentic Chinese food. P.F. Chang's, 2.5 stars, bad, obviously, obviously bad. Din Tai Fung, four stars, too many stars, too many white people like it. The service is too good. The food's not as good as it could be. The dumplings here are better. I've been here. The waiters are not gonna pay attention to you. They're gonna be rude, but it's gonna taste better. That's what I'm talking about. 3.5 stars, that orange 3.5, that's exactly what you want. Why is this the case? Here's my theory. Cultural expectations for service are different in Asia. They're not as proactive. They're not gonna come up to you. They're not gonna just proactively give you refills. You need to flag down the waiters. People on Yelp are insufferable. They're digging all these restaurants because the service is bad. However, the food balances it out. So you end up at 3.5 stars. It's the sweet spot, trust me. Long story short guys, if you agree with this, you are probably non-Asian. Do not live in an Asian area. And number two, you may be an Asian that is living in a non-Asian area that has not updated your diasporic firmware pack to understand that the Chinese food landscape has changed dramatically since the year 2015, Andrew. What Freddie Wong said has some truthiness to it, but literally it's just outdated. And if you go to Chinese spots that opened after the year 2015 is simply no longer true. Guys, here's a little experiment. Go on Yelp in your major metropolitan area that you live in because that's what he was referring to. And if you go search on Yelp of Chinese restaurants and you skip all the 4.5 and the four out of five-star restaurants and you wait until you go to the 3.5, you're skipping hundreds of good Chinese restaurants, especially in the San Gabriel Valley, which is the Chinese food mecca of America, by the way. Just to play the devil's advocate, I will give Freddie this. First of all, he was using examples in 626. People have no idea what it's like to live there. That area is essentially like living in China in terms of the Chinese food diversity. Maybe even more diverse than China because it's less regionalized based off geography. But anyway, I'm telling you this, I'll give him this. Shanghai Dumpling House does maybe have better Shaolongbao than Dintai Fung per dollar. I don't think they're actually better than Dintai Fung, but Dintai Fung is so much more expensive I could see on a per dollar ratio. Also, I do think Dintai Fung's quality has dropped a little bit since they started franchising out. However, literally guys, if you go and only eat at 3.5 spots, you will simply be ignoring all the great new restaurants that have been ported in over the last 10 years to America, seven years to America. Heidi Lau, Dolar Shop, Andrew Chongqing, Lao Zhao. You won't even get Chongqing hot pot at 3.5. I just think this is major confirmation bias from people who like and have a preference for a certain style of Chinese food, but actually are not trying to seek out the best Chinese food. I actually try to seek out the best, the top quality. And a lot of people actually, they just wanna eat cheap Chinese food. So that's why they're like, oh, 3.5, that gives me the best deals. Do not get a good deal mixed up with the best, by the way. Standard, let's get into it. Was Freddie W correct or incorrect? I'll give you this. At one point in time, 10 years ago, he was correct. Literally in 2022, he is super wrong. I mean, that's the best way to put it. If you go to the 626, you go to Flushing, even if you go to the West LA and you search up what's 4.5 or 5 out of 5 versus what's 3.5, I give you with 85% confidence, not 100%. 85% confidence that the higher ranked Yelp spots in 2022 are better. I don't think Chinese food has to be rude in order for it to be good. Guys, the best Chinese restaurants, if you just do the search yourself. I mean, literally it's very easy. That's why to me, his whole theory was just like, so confusing because I was like, wait, how is he gonna bring up Din Tai Fung, which is the gold standard for Shaolong Bao? Yes, maybe they expanded and you think the quality has dropped a little bit, but it's still better than a lot of other spots. To be honest, I really only saw non-Asian people heavily agreeing with this. They're like, oh yeah, golden Phoenix Falcon in my city was also 3.5 and I'm like, you know, most restaurants logically just in America are 3.5 because if it's a good restaurant and then they have bad service that goes to Ford and drops to do a three and already averages 3.5. It's literally the law of averages. All right, moving on to the mid, I mean, why do people so often accept this type of theory and it's not just non-Chinese or non-Asians, it's actually a lot of other Chinese Americans who are accepting this whole idea of like, yeah man, I won't go to a Chinese restaurant unless it's got foggy, sticky menus and then like only ducks and chicken hanging out in the window, those are the only Chinese restaurants I go to and I'm Chinese, so you gotta listen to me. I think that everybody feels entitled to the Chinese representation that they find in their own life and they're not like seeking out everything new in their city to like fully understand the full picture and I just think that, yeah, a lot of people don't fully really respect Chinese related things. I don't think people would say that about tacos. I don't think people would say that about Japanese food, certainly not Japanese food, but for whatever reason, maybe due to the lower status that Chinese have had in America until recently in the West, like people just pretty much feel comfortable going, you know, that takeout my family had in Wisconsin for 30 years with the almond chicken and the cashew chicken. Yep, 3.5 stars best. You know, I think a lot of Chinese Americans have their image of Chinese food and their Chinese identity locked in time. It's frozen from when they were a kid and then at some point they stop absorbing new aspects of Chinese culture, even though being Chinese has changed over the past 15 to 10 years. So I'm saying like, you guys, if you want to speak on Chinese food, actually in a legitimate way, you have to experience Pan-Chinese-ness in its wholeness. You cannot just focus on what you grew up with because it has gone so much farther beyond that. And I gotta be honest, it's a lot of Kanto people, you know, Freddie Wong, Ally Wong, I'm not saying that their observations weren't correct for what they had seen at some point in their life, but in 2022, in a holistic sense, simply their observations are wrong. If they want to talk about, you know, five-ton Kanto spots, I could see it being a little bit more true, like not every aspect has moved at the same rate, but essentially, man, it's just like an old-school observation and an old belief that is just simply no longer true. I mean, just think of how ridiculous that sounds to be like, dude, the only Chinese spots I go to, the best one's got the little kid that's 12 years old at the cashier and the photos are all faded and it just kind of stinks and everybody seems real glum in there and like they just seem really poor and I just love just poor Chinese food, man, that's the best. Yeah, and people don't even really understand, like those people are not even having a good life, to be honest, like it's not that, you know, obviously I don't look down on anybody in poverty trying to uplift their circumstance, but literally they're running like hyper low margin, high volume, like back breaking systems and to be honest, a lot of people who make statements like this, they just have no clue. I mean, if you really wanted to extrapolate and now I'm gonna make a crazy statement now, they're just like Freddie Wong made a crazy statement, you could argue that only going to those spots is exploitative. Because honestly, a lot of those spots like, listen, they're ran by lower income immigrants who are trying to get by, they're trying to make a living, trying to send their kid to college and they are underpricing their food for volume reasons. So they're making like razor thin margins on their dishes and that's why it tastes so good and that's why you think it's such a great deal because it really is because they're not making as much as they could. Long story short guys, there is a major diasporic firmware upgrade available for 2022. I don't expect non Asians to necessarily download it and even if you're not Chinese, I don't expect you to fully download the most upgraded firmware. But if you are Chinese American and you still running a 2012 or 2015 firmware in terms of understanding Chinese cuisine and diasporic waves and patterns, man, get the update. You are cheapening Chinese food by doing this. That's all I'm saying. Now, listen, I'm not saying the spots that you grew up with aren't still great. I'm not saying that might not be your preference. I get it, everybody has a preference but do not stand there without doing the work and try to act like an authority on Chinese food because it's damaging because a lot of other people will believe you even though they shouldn't be believing you. But I wanna see the ducks and stuff like when I grew up and I'd go with my gung-gung. Oh my gosh, when the waiter throws the plate of food at my face, God, that is the Chinese experience I want. You know what I noticed, man? When it comes to like updating firmware patches for different levels of understanding, there's certain things like in society that people are like, oh, okay, we're all gonna update our firmware patch for like understanding gender and orientation, right? But when it comes to Chinese food, even ABCs themselves are like, well, I really like like 007 GoldenEye on N64 and I don't really like like the newer versions. They move too fast and there's too many weapons and there's too many variables. So I'm just gonna stick with 007 GoldenEye. Literally, that's like you ignoring all the video games that came out since GoldenEye. David, but NBA 2K12 was the best 2K. There has not been a NBA game better than that one yet. Oh, all right, everybody. This is that part of the video where we tell you really how to find the most authentic Chinese restaurant. Now, it might not be as simple as just looking at the star rating, but these are the best ways right here. Listen, long story short, guys. First of all, you have to decide whether you like good, authentic, or just your favorite because Chinese food is very unique in the sense that we went everywhere in the world and catered extremely hard to the taste buds of whatever region that we were in. That's why you've got hood Chinese food. You've got country Chinese food. You've got Mexican Chinese food. You've got Cuban Chinese food. You've got Brazilian Chinese food and literally any country you go to in the entire world, they have their own version of Chinese food that has been hyper localized. Yes, so again, a Chinese dish can be extremely tasty and cheap and inauthentic. It's completely possible. So if you're looking for authenticity though, definitely go on the reviews and look for Chinese names or Chinese people that are reviewing it. Anybody that says, yeah, this has a good hometown taste. Those type of reviews are really good. Or if you're looking at the names and trying to see if they're Chinese, you got to look for the Xs, the ZH. And honestly, I wouldn't even trust ABCs. I think ABCs after this whole Freddie Wong debacle, Andrew have lost their right to judge Chinese food. Like at least the majority of them have, to be honest. Listen guys, you can use Yelp. Yes, I said Yelp is legit in 2022. Foursquare Trip Advisor, you could cross reference. I think Foursquare is an underrated one. I don't see a lot of people use. If you actually talk to Chinese people, they use Xiao Hongshu. They use Chur Huo, Chur Huo is Mandarin for foodie. I mean, they got their own blogs and stuff like this. And actually surprisingly, Andrew, a lot of educated Jewish American writers know a ton about Chinese food. One time, Andrew, me and you talked with Chuck Schumer for five minutes about peeking duck, different wraps, fluffy wraps, thin wraps. I was surprised at how much he knew. Guys, definitely look at Eater articles. I actually trust a lot of their opinions. New York Times, LA Times. These people are professionals and trying to really dig deep and break down and analyze that dish. So that's why I think that, obviously the people who thought about it more and are more experienced should have more weight with their opinion. What Freddie Wong said had some truth to it. Obviously it would not get nine million views, but literally it's just outmoded and outdated. And in 2022, if you actually eat at new modern Chinese spots for new modern Chinese people, it is simply wrong. But listen, anybody can believe what they wanna believe. I don't think that people just only going to eat at 3.5 spots is gonna shift the economic futures of anybody's success or downfall. But I just think it's goofy the way everybody feels hyper entitled to just judge Chinese food however they want with doing literally zero research. So in the media, Andrew, it's this evil, nemoidian and empire with a hive mind. But in America, it's just like, yep, whatever I think is the best fried longtons and cheese brand goons, they're the best. You know, 3.5. All right, everybody, you know what? We're gonna end it off right there. You let us know in the comments down below what you think of Freddie Wong's 3.5 star theory. Honestly, I think it's very wrong and outdated at this point in time. But you let us know how do you find the best Chinese restaurant and what do you think about what we said? I think it cheapens Chinese restaurants, but you can disagree with me. It kind of feels like a classic TikTok thing where you kind of mix something that's kind of true with something that's like really wrong, almost like Dr. Umar Johnson and it just collaborates to really explode. All right, everybody. Thank you so much for watching this video. Please hit that like button, turn on your notifications and check out other episodes of the hot pot boys. Until next time, we out. Peace.