(upbeat music) - [Danielle] China's rise as a global superpower isn't just washing billions of (inaudible) onto our shores.

It's also bringing with it the amazing diversity of Chinese food and culinary tradition.

In this episode of Lucky Chow, we'll trace China's influence from the kitchens of new moms - During pregnancy, you take care of the baby inside you and after you give birth, you take good care of yourself during postpartum.

- [Danielle] To a nocturnal New York cocktail den.

- We design the bar like a classic New York speakeasy style but then we have baijiu in it so it's like a merge of west and east culture.

- [Danielle] And a wealthy San Francisco wedding banquet.

- It's gonna be a lot of good food.

A lot of good people, a lot of fun.

Hopefully some good games going on and definitely a lot of alcohol, I'll tell you that much (laughs).

- [Danielle] Join us for an eye opening look at how China and America are meeting and melding over food.

- Ganbei.

(upbeat introduction music) - [Danielle] Taking care of a newborn baby is one of life's joys, but who takes care of mom?

In China, an ancient tradition called Zuò yuè zee or confinement month, is designed to restore the health of postpartum mothers.

I've come to the Los Angeles suburb of Walnut to visit Jing Mommy, where Nicole Huang has put an American entrepreneurial spin on the Chinese practice.

Her industrial kitchen prepares and packages healthy meals that follow age old concepts of foods that heat and cool the body and she delivers them to new moms across the country.

- All the women in my family practice Zuò yuè zee, the month of confinement.

And it's this belief that it's that month that is most critical to the health of the woman's future, to the future of a woman's health, is that true?

That if you don't properly rest and nourish yourself during that month after childbirth, that your entire health will be compromised?

- Because you adjust your body, the body type, back to normal.

It's like during pregnancy, the whole body changes like the heart beats faster and we gain weight and there's more pressure on the joints.

At the tummy grow bigger, we get heartburns.

And I always feel hot because of the hormone changes so there's some bad changes during pregnancy.

Even when we give birth, then we lost a lot of blood and we use a lot of energy which is chi in Chinese, so we want to recover from all the bad and there is an old Taiwanese saying (speaking Taiwanese).

So what I mean is during pregnancy, you take care of the baby inside you and after you give birth, you take good care of yourself during postpartum.

This is part of the breakfast.

The egg, and this is mushroom egg, and we also have carrot egg right now.

- So it has the ginger that you were talking about.

- The ginger will help to get rid of the coldness, the humid in your body.

- Yes.

- And the rice wine will heat up your body and better circulation, faster metabolism, so you can recover faster.

And the sesame oil, in Chinese traditional medicine helps the uterus to contract.

And also nourish the liver and the kidney.

Over here is a sesame oil chicken soup.

We have the ginger, the rice wine, and the sesame oil all in there.

- And there's so much chicken, so it's so condensed, right?

- Right.

- Like everything a woman is putting into her body has to have the optimal level of nutrition.

And are you using all parts of the chicken?

I only see dark meat here.

- Yeah, we only use dark meat because the moms here, they don't really like that much of the white meat.

The Chinese mom, they tend to like dark meat better.

There's a lot of herbs we use in the soup, especially on the third stage or the heating stage.

So there's that (foreign language).

So there's a lot of Chinese herbs that will help moms to recover faster and more efficient.

We give mommy veggies that according to what they can eat, so there's Chinese food therapy.

We understand the food type according to their effectiveness so there's hot or heating the (foreign language), and there's cooling (foreign language) that are also mild.

So we avoid all the cooling stuff and we give them the heating stuff.

So what you see in our kitchen, you only see the heating or the mild stuff.

You will never see the cooling stuff.

- Oh really?

So you're not supposed to drink like ice water.

- No, no, no, no ice cream, no yogurt.

- Okay.

- Our meal is computerized.

How many meal we deliver every day, the number gets so big we cannot count by our fingers anymore.

We serve around 40 to 80.

I know the range is very big because they don't give births at the same month so it varies.

And the chef come in at five o'clock to start cooking and preparation and we start the meal delivery around 8:30 or 9 o'clock around that time.

Okay so this is a whole day of meal.

- Okay.

- So here's the breakfast, there's egg, there's porridge, and for lunch you get a fish soup so you can see there's the fish and this is the mushroom.

- Yes.

- The sesame oil mushroom.

- Okay.

- And one rice and two veggie.

And for the rice we don't give them white rice.

We give them brown rice or all the multigrain rice because white rice will just get them fat.

Dinner, there is the sesame oil chicken that we saw in the kitchen and there's two soup.

Also, you're only getting one soup.

This for the first and second week which is mild and warm stage and this is the heating stage, the third stage.

- This is really healthy.

I mean this is like food that people should be eating very day.

You know what?

I think I should have listened to my mom because she kept saying, "You don't eat this, you're going to age prematurely, you're going to have poor health, you're going to get tired more."

And now she's like, "See, I told you so.

I was right."

- It's also interesting because we have a lot of customer the people that truly believers are the second time mom.

Mostly the first time, they didn't do it right so they have a lot of things going on.

Like you get cold feet, sore back, you lose a lot of hair and stuff - I have all of that.

- So second time when they have the baby second time they tend to do it correct.

So here we have the packing slip because we have a lot of customer so the packing slip will have what they should eat during that day because everyone start different day and ends up different day.

So every packing slip is a little bit different.

- So who are your clients?

Are there any non Chinese clients that you service?

- It's over 90 percent Chinese.

It's kind of hard for American to take the concept that you cannot eat anything cold, you get like ice right after childbirth but in Chinese tradition that is not allowed.

- Yes.

- So the concept is a little bit hard for them to accept.

We do get a couple once in a while but mostly it's just Chinese.

- How far away do you send the meals to?

- We have customer in Hawaii.

- Really?

- So New York we have a lot of customers too.

- Really?

- So just anywhere that our driver can't deliver, we'll send frozen package to them.

- It's about really like eating as much as you can, right?

During that month.

The focus isn't on losing weight right?

- You're not trying to lose weight during that time.

- Outside I meet three satisfied customers of Jing Mommy.

Why did you decide to Zuò yuè zee?

- Because we think that it's really easier for us so we don't have to cook for the food and we do see how the body can regenerate, recover faster and I think anyone will agree, my wife will agree that it makes the process just so much easier.

- So what did you think of the whole process?

Do you miss it or would you do it again?

- Yeah, I will definitely do it again when we have number two.

- Okay and are you going to eat the food again?

- Yeah, why not?

It's there and it's good and it's just so convenient instead of order pizza delivery.

- Did you like the food too?

Were you breastfed?

- Yes.

- He was breastfed right?

- Yes.

- So that's why you have such good skin because you drank all that delicious soup.

Yes, that is why.

It's delivery time.

No pizza or general Tso's chicken here just nutritious food for new moms.

Who pay about 2000 dollars for a month of meals.

(upbeat music) That's great because I mean in America the focus is always on the baby and the mother's neglected but in the Chinese tradition, the most important person in the house after childbirth is always the mother.

That's the only month where you can really just be catered and doted on right?

- Mini vacation for new moms.

- Yes, it looks good but it's not for you this time.

It's for the queen of the house.

When you think of Asian spirits, you probably think of Japanese sake or Korean soju but one of the world's most popular and potent liquors is Chinese, the grain alcohol known as baijiu.

In Manhattan's trendy SoHo neighborhood, there's a slick downstairs den that's giving Americans an elegant introduction to this fiery Chinese brew.

So why did you decide to open a baijiu bar?

- I used to work in event planning for a while.

I'm very interested in it so I thought about maybe opening my own place but there's like so many bars and restaurants in New York so I was like if I do it I want to do something different and special.

Also, speak up for the Chinese culture.

So I was like what's better than having a bar with baijiu?

We designed the bar like a classic New York speakeasy style but then we have baijiu in this.

So it's a merge of West and East culture.

It's a widely consumed liquor but how little people know about it.

Like a lot of people doesn't even Chinese younger generation they drink it.

Now there are more bars that actually carry baijiu in China but it's still a lot of people doesn't know the history about it, a lot of people doesn't know where it come from, what it's made of.

- What exactly is baijiu?

- So baijiu is mainly made with sorghum.

It's a grain, I think only Asian people consume.

Like a lot of American people doesn't even heard about sorghum.

Most of baijiu liquor company, they're along the river because they really need good water to produce it.

So traditionally, it's all the factory are built next to the river and baijiu actually the making process is like very complicated and long.

It take a long time to ferment it but we ferment it in ceramic jar instead of oak barrel so that's why it doesn't color.

It looks like water.

- What does baijiu taste like?

- It's very unique.

It's definitely not like nothing else you will try it.

Some of them are very funky and earthy and some of them are more citrusy.

It's hard to describe it exactly how it tastes like because you cannot relate it to anything else.

You really have to experience yourself.

- I think Americans come in and they think of baijiu as this novelty product but in fact it has such a rich cultural tradition.

It's inspired poets, painters, tell me about that rich history.

- It's funny actually many famous poet in China, in the history, they're big drinkers and they wrote a lot of famous poems after drinking and even one of the famous poem he wrote one of poem about du kang.

It's one of the most famous Chinese liquor.

- You have a wonderful bartender that you work with but he's Venezuelan.

How did you choose him to represent baijiu?

- I think when I first met Orson, we were talking about making cocktails it's like he's not just like a bartender he's more like a chef to cocktails so I think that's very important.

- Well you're really kind of reinventing the whole template because there's never been a baijiu cocktail bar.

How did you come up with the menu?

- Well, it was a challenge but the first thing was do research.

Learn everything I could about the category.

Try the most (inaudible) I could so I start getting more familiar because doesn't matter what I think or what I want to do is I know the customer I cannot decide anything.

So the more you drink it, the more you feel it.

We're going to add one ounce of this and this is the grapefruit liquor combined with a (inaudible), combined with some of the secret flavors, everything is here.

So you're going to put one ounce.

This is rosemary gin so we infuse (inaudible) with rosemary so what we do is we take out all the leaves from the rosemary, cook a little bit so we take it out the oils and after we infuse it, we blend it with more gin and pour here.

Fresh lemon juice and we using three quarters as an ounce.

So (inaudible) is very popular in summertime and in America we do this delicious strawberry rhubarb pies and I use it for cocktail so we do one ounce.

All the ice.

Shake it hard.

- I will help you.

- Yeah, no.

- Wow!.

- Voila.

- That's quite a shake.

I may not shake like a pro but I'm pretty good with a blow torch.

- You put in the top and you have the cocktail.

- This is really delicious, you know.

It's potent with the gin but it's not too sweet.

I love the touch of rhubarb.

- It's not too sweet.

- It's perfect for springtime.

- Yeah.

- Ganbei.

- Ganbei.

- When Chinese people come to America for the Gold Rush, China used to be the poor.

We used to be under communism and the people doesn't have money, they don't have the money to afford a lot of things but now it's different.

Everyone, the living standard is higher, everything is better in China so people start looking at things differently.

They are not focusing on coming to America, making money but they are more focusing on what they can bring from China to western culture.

They wanted to western people start learning about us too.

I am happy that happened.

I am happy people starting from a small thing and they see much more behind it.

I think its changing.

I think baijiu is coming to a new age.

(soft music) - When I want to serve my family a hardy, easy delicious meal my first choice is always hot pot.

My trip to Chinatown market provides the ingredients for this thousand year old Chinese dish.

Veggies like cabbage, dicon, and lotus root.

Tofu, shellfish, thinly sliced beef, fish cakes.

They all go into a hearty broth that's cooked on the table for maximum family participation.

We then use an electric burner rather than a coal fire but no other meal connects us so closely to our Chinese roots.

My love of hot pot goes back to my childhood when visits to my Chinese grandmother in Southern California always included outings to one of the San Gabriel valley's hot pot restaurants.

In Monterey Park, the heart of the valley's Chinese community I'm checking out a new place that's serving hot pot with a cultural history lesson on the side.

- Our name it's called a Private Party restaurant which is opened by three great friends together.

So we want to have like a private room for our friends to gather together so hot pot is really a good choice so people can do whatever they like.

Just put in your pot and eat yourself.

So you can have anything in the pot.

- What are the different types of hot pot?

I mean what does Beijing style hot pot mean?

- Basically you have to use the different material off the pot which is copper.

Our original pot is smaller on the top and then you just put charcoal instead of using electronic.

So it gives more flavor, actually.

And there's no soup base.

It's just water.

- Oh, okay.

- So you can taste the meats fresh and the vegetables and everything so we don't taste any sauce.

So then you have a sauce separately.

You can make your own sauce whatever you like.

- Right.

- Here you have two soups already.

- Yeah this is based on what customers want.

- Oh really?

- Yeah, they want some flavors.

- So what are the two flavors?

- This one we have the mushroom pot and the other one is the most popular one, it's the spicy hot pot.

- Whether or not you notice Mau on the wall, the bubbling broth on the table will draw your attention.

You know I'm also intrigued by all the cultural revolution posters around here and the fact that we're eating Beijing style hot pot.

Like our generation is the first generation to grow up without feeling Mau's regime and so it's almost like the image of the cultural revolution is just devoid of propaganda.

It's just a fun icon, almost (foreign).

- Yeah, I don't want to be too serious about Mau's theory or that's not the focus of our restaurant.

Just make it more relaxing.

- It's funny because people in China eat hot pot all year round right?

- Oh, yeah.

Because people here, Americans always think of this as a cold weather food.

It's like how can you eat such hot soup in the summer time?

- Yeah actually with the AC actually you can enjoy it anytime.

- Right?

Yeah.

- With some cold beer it's really good actually.

- I'm going to put some spam in there.

I've never had spam with hot pot before.

- Yeah actually with spicy it's pretty good.

- Is this a mountain yam or just a potato?

- No, it's a potato yes.

- I love the shrimp, you know.

It just flavors the broth so much.

And then the pumpkin.

Lotus root this is - Oh, I love lotus root with spicy.

- It's good luck isn't it right?

It's kind of a Buddhist vegetable.

- It's called a pure plant.

Actually hot pot is very free style.

Whatever you like to do, how you like to do it.

For me?

Thank you.

That looks nice.

- Yeah.

I just wanted to do the swish swish out.

Private Party may slightly invoke the cultural revolution but what can be more democratic than a meal where everyone shares the cooking?

(instrumental music) I'm in San Francisco's Chinatown where the sound of clacking mah jong tiles drifts up from basement gambling halls and the rich smells of Chinese cooking beckon from hundreds of restaurants.

I'm here to witness a true cultural collision.

The wedding of a second generation Chinese American and his immigrant bride.

Who's just arrived from Northern China.

It's going to be a fusion affair with a mix of languages and customs.

From lion dancers to hip hop and a truly stunning number of selfies.

Anchoring it all: a traditional Chinese banquet of eight lucky courses ripe with symbolism.

Hi, how are you?

Hi.

It's so nice to meet you guys and congratulations.

Thank you for letting us film your wedding.

This is a real honor.

Mike is a native of the San Francisco Bay area but he and Linda have traveled a long way to make these memories.

- (speaks foreign language).

- How did you guys meet?

- Basically we met in China while I was working there.

We met in (foreign).

- (foreign)?

So you just fell in love the second you saw Linda?

Yeah, pretty much.

It was love at first sight as they all say.

That's what they all say.

Well, it's going to be a lot of good food, a lot of good people, a lot of fun.

Hopefully some good games going on and definitely a lot of alcohol, I'll tell you that much.

- So it's a traditional Chinese wedding would you say or an American one?

- It'll be more traditional Chinese.

We're going to have lion dancers too.

They were here earlier to take some pictures but they will definitely be some lion dancing.

More traditional Chinese food and hopefully everything goes well and tastes good.

So hope you'll have fun.

- Well double happiness for your future.

- Thank you.

- The decorations may be Chinese, but the spirit of the wedding is universal.

It reflects the address, Grant Avenue, the Chinatown street that's one of America's most famous melting pots.

(upbeat music) Around the room, the guests easily switch between Chinese and English.

The real language is Chinglish right down to the ubiquitous selfie sticks.

When the guests need a break from eating and dancing Mike and Linda have provided games in the ultimate cross-cultural signifier Disney accessories.

(upbeat music) - Cheers.

- There you go.

- Cheers.

- The MC announces the wedding party and after their triumphant entrance it's time for the purely Chinese part of the program.

The lion dance or wushi has been adding color and excitement to all sorts of Chinese celebrations for almost 2000 years.

For Mike and Linda, the dance should also bring good fortune to the marriage.

Maybe Mike should have remembered to bring more cash for tips though.

Finally, its time for the food.

The waiters arrive with the dishes that symbolize longevity, fertility, wealth, and of course, double happiness.

Noodles for long life, fish for wealth, duck for fidelity, and that humble staple, rice because the first question a Chinese person asks will always be, "Have you had your rice today?"

(upbeat music) And all of it washed down with copious supplies of the best spirits.

(upbeat music) For this one day in a lifetime, Mike and Linda pull out all the stops.

(upbeat music) As the party rolls on, it's time to compare selfies and offer louder and louder toasts to the happy couple.

Following tradition, they go from table to table to thanks their guests with toasts of their own as well as hongbao, the red packets of cash that change hands at every Chinese celebration.

(upbeat music) For Mike it's a night of celebration among old friends.

For Linda, it's an exciting and perhaps slightly daunting introduction to a new world.

For me, it's a demonstration of how cultures can come together to form something new that keeps the best parts of both and how the best place to make that happen is at a feast.

(upbeat music)