Conversations with Tyler / episode intelligence
Speakers in the public record
Claim mix
Evidence policy
Every row below preserves an exact excerpt. Identified speakers are linked; unresolved voices are labeled and excluded from people counts.
Claim ledger
22 published records
01 / belief
“I would say that in the early days, so 1949, the defeated nationalists fled to Taiwan with, as you were saying, the chefs and their food traditions.”
02 / uncertainty
“Here am I, Tyler Cowen, I’m in Shanghai. I don’t know Chinese and let’s say I don’t have Chinese friends.”
03 / belief
“I think 60 years on from that, I don’t — there are some like there’s a fantastic Suzhou bakery in this food street in Taiwan where they make really traditional Suzhou pastries.”
04 / commitment
“At the same time, it’s rare that I will prefer to eat organs, or offal, or the various stranger items you might be served.”
05 / uncertainty
“I’m just following step by step and I don’t know what it means or where it’s going.”
06 / belief
“I would say at the level of individual dishes, very interesting dishes, but China has it all already.”
07 / belief
“I would say that if you’re talking about farmhouse cooking, and the cooking actually, particularly at this region, I see a lot of affinities with Italian cooking.”
08 / belief
“Many Chinese waiters and restaurateurs that I know in London have had the experience of Westerners ordering food and then complaining that there are bones in it or that it’s fatty meat, all of which are good things in China, and then complaining and making a scene. I think people are just — it’s easier.”
09 / belief
“I think you would agree, Shanghai is one of the wealthier, more modern parts of China.”
10 / belief
“The other thing is, I think most of the Sichuan pepper that is exported has been exported and handled by Cantonese people.”
11 / belief
“There was an amazing series of cookery books produced around 1980, I think, when they photographed the classical dishes of four great cuisines of China.”
12 / belief
“Dairy, obviously, I know if you’re lactose intolerant as many Asians are, drinking milk is probably never going to happen, I agree with you.”
13 / recommendation
“I think gong bao chicken is a really good introduction to stir frying because it’s not complicated.”
14 / evaluation
“I think lots of Chinese parents now feed their children milk because they think it’ll make them grow big and strong.”
15 / evaluation
“Also, because food has, since the beginning of Chinese history, been understood as the absolute foundation of good health, there’s no difference between food and medicine in China.”
16 / evaluation
“For me, you know, as a great advocate of Chinese cooking, and I do have to admit that the desserts and sweet things is possibly one aspect in which Western cuisines might have the edge. [laughter] I think that’s because of the use of dairy products.”
17 / evaluation
“Also, because China is such a food-orientated culture, and it has been since the beginnings of history, that if you want to understand China, almost more than anywhere else, food is a really good window into the culture, into the way people live, into history, everything.”
18 / recommendation
“You’re allowed four things as advice — not for yourself because you’re cooking at a much higher level — but to recommend to people such as ourselves for cooking, eating, enjoying Chinese food.”
19 / evaluation
“The reason is, I think, the methodology of Western food inspectors, which is they tend to go as individuals or small groups.”
20 / preference
“I would say there’s much greater integration of China in the West, and my personal Chinese life in my Western Chinese life, which I also like very much.”
21 / recommendation
“I would recommend some Shanghainese wontons in soup stuffed with shepherd’s purse, which is a wild variety of the brassicas, and pork, just to show you the lighter, gentler side of Shanghainese cooking.”
22 / evaluation
“When you skip cuisines that far, you feel like you go in, and even though you’re doing everything it says in the recipe, you realize how much little skill is required just to make a recipe come out right. It’s stuff that you don’t even know you’re doing [laughs] because you know how it should be, you know how this thing works.”