If Raymond Chandler Were Still Alive He Would Be Eating At Bamboo Inn in Los Angeles
Chinese food in Los Angeles and throughout the United States in the 1940s was a far cry from what it's like today. That's because the only Chinese in America at the time were rooted in the rural villages outside the city formerly known as Canton, as these were the only migrants to arrive in the United States before the Chinese Exclusion Laws were enacted by the United States in 1882. Those exclusion laws were not practically repealed until after World War II, and not fully repealed until the 1960s. Consequently what Americans believed to be Chinese food was from an unrepresentative local cuisine, further altered by available local ingredients, as well as the tastes of the American public. Looking at menus of the day shows they were peppered with dishes such as chop suey, chow mein, won ton soup, egg foo young, stir fried beef, chicken, pork, shrimp and vegetable dishes and egg rolls. On top of this, while Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City have fa...