How do all the Chinese takeout restaurants have the same menu? Is there some secret “American Chinese food” cookbook that everyone uses?
This is probably because everyone copies the success of another. And as a result, everyone expect all chinese takeout to have the same dishes. Its a cycle.
Every Chinese place near me has the exact same egg rolls. I mean like they look and taste EXACTLY the same. Same thing with a few other dishes like lo mein noodles, sesame chicken, etc. I assume there’s some food supplier in the area that they all get their stuff from. Any thoughts on this / how widespread is this?
There are usually 2-3 competing suppliers for every location, but all those suppliers stock the same products and its just the price that is different. Now to answer your question, there are premade egg rolls and I am sure places order those egg rolls because they don’t want to make their own. However, I am not sure how widespread it is. Even places that dont order the premade egg roll still have to order the veges to put in the egg rolls and that is the same regardless of where you go. And becauses egg rolls are so lightly seasoned and the veges are usually the same, rolls premade or not usually look and taste the same. There are small differences if you pay close attention, but usually people put such an abundance of extra sauce on it that they cant even taste the difference anyways.
