Chinese-Dominican Food and Culture

History

Migration from China began in the second half of the 19^th century and continues to this day [1]. Many Chinese immigrants also came to the DR from other parts of the region, like Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Peru, and Ecuador.

The early Chinese immigrants to Latin America and the Caribbean came or were brought over to work as laborers in the sugar plantations in the English and Spanish colonies and former colonies after the slave trade became illegal in the 19^th century. The ones who followed tended to be entrepreneurs: they opened businesses like laundries, bakeries, supermarkets, hotels, and restaurants.

Chinese Dominican food

Chinese immigrants to the DR opened popular eateries known as 'Pica pollo' all over the country, selling fried chicken and a combination of Dominican and Chinese food. They also opened more upscale Chinese restaurants in the main cities, which soon became popular with the locals.

In this way, Dominicans of all socio-economic levels got to know and love Chinese food, going as far as to make some dishes their own, including Chop suey, Chofan (chow fan) -- fried rice with chicken -- and Chicharrón de pollo [2].

"Los chinos de Bonao"

One such restaurant in the DR was the Chinese-owned Sang Lee Lung roadside stop near Bonao on the highway between Santo Domingo and Santiago during the Trujillo dictatorship in the mid-20^th century. It was especially famous for its chicharrones de pollo. The road was bad in those days, and the journey took several hours.

Travelers who stopped at the restaurant included high-ranking government and military officials and possibly the dictator himself. As the story goes, the restaurant owners would overhear them discussing their business and were said to be aware of sensitive information and government plans before anything was made public. The government officials assumed that they did not know sufficient Spanish to understand their internal conversations.

This is said to be the origin of the popular Dominican saying "Eso lo saben hasta los chinos de Bonao" (even the Chinese from Bonao know this), which is told to someone who is the last to hear about something.

An article in a Taiwanese magazine in Spanish explains it as follows:

"To avoid problems in those uncertain times, the Chinese who worked in the restaurant would keep firmly silent about what they heard. For this reason, whenever asked, they would say they knew nothing. But really, they knew everything. [The saying] also shows the level of affinity between the Chinese presence and Dominican identity." [3]

Is your family part of the Dominican Chinese diaspora? Do you keep any part of our culinary heritage? We'd love to hear more in the comments!