Prize Watch: Gourmand Prize for Hui, Chop Suey Nation

Chop Suey Nation: The Legion Cafe and Other Stories from Canada’s Chinese Restaurants, the recent memoir and history by Toronto journalist Ann Hui, has received a Gourmand World Cookbook Award in the Chinese cooking and food writing category.

From Christopher Cheung's review in The Tyee: 

Ann Hui’s Chop Suey Nation proves I’m the real know-nothing. I learned that dishes I thought were random fusions — items as innocuous as ginger beef — are actually thoughtful creations, crafted with trial and error by immigrant chefs for foreign palates.

In her book Hui tells the rich history of the Chinese Canadian restaurants that chop-suey cuisine emerged from, and how these places gave, and are still giving, bright futures to generations of immigrant families.