While exploring the eight cuisines of the West Side Bazaar with travel writer Johnny Motley, he introduced me to friends Sam Berman-Cooper and Kaya Zhang. He’s from here and she’s from China.
When I mentioned Emperor Dumplings had opened the area’s first dim sum parlor in Tonawanda, Berman-Cooper and Zhang said they’d like to check it out. So I invited them to a dim sum lunch. During a thorough assessment of the Tonawanda parlor’s work, which ended in a unanimous thumbs-up, Zhang mentioned enjoying a recent meal at China Taste.
When somebody from China tells me they were pleased with a Chinese restaurant in Western New York, I ask them to show me what they ate.
I do the same with anyone I meet in Buffalo who was born in another country. If there are local restaurants serving the cuisine of their birth, I ask them where they go, and what they order. That’s how a reporter tracks down a story, following human intelligence to the source.
