Why are there more Asian food bloggers?
Here are our five top theories to explain this phenomenon
Since I entered the food blogging stratosphere back in 2014, I’ve met a lot of like-minded foodies at restaurant launches and foodie meetups in Sydney over the years. And, what I’ve noticed time and time again, is that the majority of foodies are of an Asian ethnicity, probably close to two-thirds is my best estimate. I recently attended the Food Critics and Bloggers Australia (FCBA) NSW Meetup at Mr Tipply’s and yet again, we all pointed out that there was definitely an over-representation of Asians.
Drool Worthy World consists of a team of three food bloggers and not surprisingly, we are all of Asian ethnicity. This begs the question, why? Why are there more Asian Food Bloggers? According to the 2011 Census, Asians represent 19% of the population in Sydney. Why then, is it that close to 70% of foodies in Sydney are Asian?
“Asians represent 19% of the population in Sydney. Why then, is it that close to 70% of foodies in Sydney are Asian?”
This isn’t an easy question to answer and of course, any blog post about race is sure sound somewhat “racist” but being Asian myself, you know that I don’t have racist intentions in writing this. Just curious about it all.
So here are my top five theories behind why there are more Asian food bloggers:
1. Food is a means of showing familial love and affection
Hugs, kisses, phrases such as “I love you” are not common in the Asian household. Rather, a more common phrase is, “Ni chi fan le ma?” which translates into “Have you eaten yet?” Although the usual PDAs and “I love you” texts seen in many Western cultures are not common in Asian families, that’s not to say that Asian parents do not love their children as much. In fact, they show their strong love through unwavering loyalty, constant concern, unbounded generosity and a LOT of food.
It’s a different way of showing love, not better or worse but it leaves a huge impact on the way we see and value food. As a result of this, Asian children place a huge emphasis on the significance of food in their lives and its means of showing how much we care for those who matter to us, be it friends or family. The way to our hearts if through our stomachs.
“Asians place a huge emphasis on the significance of food in their lives and its means of showing how much we care for those who matter to us, be it friends or family.”
2. We like to show off
Now, the significance of food in the Asian culture may be a key reason behind why there are more Asian food bloggers but it doesn’t quite explain why we like to publicize it. We could just keep the food we share with our friends and family to ourselves. Why then, do we choose to show the world and write extensive descriptions about it?
In Asian countries, it’s all about having “face”. According to Wikipedia, the almighty source of all information, “the term face idiomatically refers to one’s own sense of dignity or prestige in social contexts.” To understand this concept, you need to know that many Asian people see themselves existing within a integrated network of a wide range of people including their immediate family, extended family, co-workers, schoolmates. This network forms the basis of a complex fabric of social relationships that becomes the all-important “guanxi” that determines the basis of our success in society. For it is “guanxi” i.e. “our connections” that drives whether or not we land our dream job or get exclusive access to certain products or events. It’s who you know, not what you know.
Based on this, we have a need to display the very best of ourselves in a public light and by doing so, we not only show off to our existing “guanxi”, we also gain more “guanxi” that will only improve our societal status. Hence, the incessant photos of everything from holiday snaps to food photography, we love to show off.
“we have a need to display the very best of ourselves in a public light”
3. We’re more technology-savvy
Asians love to get their hands on the latest tech gadgets and software. When the new iPhone comes out, Asians flock to the Apple stores, waiting in lines for hours one end. We want the best cameras, desktops, laptops, printers and the list goes on. Our love of technology also extends to the internet — we can spend hours indoors, glued to the computer screens or phones, tinkering with blog posts and website coding to perfect our food blogs. The ‘Asian nerd’ stereotype, I must admit, is partly true.
4. We like to keep records
Perhaps it stems from a desire to keep records and memories of experiences. Chinese history dates back thousands of years but in more recent decades, during the Cultural Revolution, there was a period of time where many documents and photos were lost and memories were forcibly repressed. Educated youth were sent to the countryside, often away from family. Food was scarce and rationed. Now that times have changed, perhaps we feel compelled to take advantage of our freedom to eat what we like and document our experiences.
5. We have a more diversified palete for food
According to a scientific paper published 2011 investigating Western-Asian flavour differences, Ahn et al. found that besides differences in cooking methods, dining habits and local ingredients, there are also differences in flavour pairings between these cuisines. Western cuisines tend to include ingredients of similar flavour molecules together in one recipe whereas Asian cuisines do the complete opposite — they actually avoid ingredients that share the same flavour compounds, creating more distinctive and complex flavours.
These results came as quite a surprise as the ‘food pairing hypothesis’ had been used for decades to find novel ingredient combinations e.g. white chocolate and caviar have been paired by some top hatted restaurants because they had been found to share the same flavour compound, trimethylamine.
Since Asian food works because it avoids food pairing, this hypothesis was debunked and the study concluded that this “discovery of patterns may transcend specific dishes or ingredients”, opening up new creative flavour combinations.
Perhaps there is something about the complex and contrasting flavours of Asian cooking that we have grown up with that has helped us develop a diversified palate to venture out and try new cuisines, dishes and describe them in detail in our food blogs.
“Perhaps there is something about the complex and contrasting flavours of Asian cooking that we have grown up with that has helped us develop a diversified palate”
Do you agree or disagree with my theories? There certainly are more food bloggers with Asian ethnicity but as to why, I still don’t quite definitively know. Comment below with your own theories.
