The local paper today had an article touching on this subject, but from a reversed position.
Who's Cookin'? Chef's Look May Be Off, Food And Service Are Right On
BY JOANN JACOBSEN-WELLS
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
MURRAY -- When China-born Danielle Sprague opened the Little Hong Kong Cafe in downtown Murray last fall, she made her husband promise to stay out of the kitchen.
Not because he cannot cook Chinese food. When they were dating, his stir-fry beef and broccoli won her over. He talked and cooked the part of an authentic Chinese chef.
But Danielle worried that his appearance would scare off customers.
"When you come to a Chinese place, the last thing you want is a fat American walking out of the kitchen wearing a dirty apron," said Rufus Sprague, a Kaysville native. "Even now, she gets mad when I come out of the kitchen. She is afraid they won't come back if they learn an American is cooking their food."
Come to find out that one of the charms of Little Hong Kong is the cook, a 6-foot-5-inch, 280-pound, Cantonese-speaking jock who prefers baloney sandwiches over moo goo gai pan.
"I heard him talking in the kitchen and thought he was Chinese," said South Jordan firefighter Sean Hines, who has lunch at the cafe at least once a week. "I was shocked when he came out, but also impressed, because usually the chefs don't come out and talk with the people they serve the food to."
Rufus wants their advice on how to improve the product.
"One day we asked him why they didn't have orange chicken on the luncheon menu and the next thing we knew he was back in the kitchen cooking it up," said George McCaleb, a supervisor at Hunter Douglas who averages two or three lunches a week at Little Hong Kong. "They are more than attentive. They go overboard."
"Ninety percent of our business is repeat customers, so if something doesn't taste right, they tell us," said Rufus, who was perfectly content to stay away from the cafe Danielle and her sister bought at 118 E. Vine St.
"One day I get a call . . . from Danielle, who told me she had just bought a restaurant. I thought she was kidding," said Rufus, who jokes that the only oriental food Danielle can cook is ramen noodles. "I didn't have much say in the matter, obviously."
Rufus had envisioned a career in sportscasting. After serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Hong Kong, he enrolled at Utah Valley State College to play baseball and major in broadcasting and communications. He was looking for a place to live when he saw on the college message board that a Chinese student had a single room for rent.
Through the roommate, Rufus met Danielle, who was born in Fujian, China, and reared in Hong Kong, the youngest of six children. In 1993, she came to live with a brother in Alabama, then traveled west to enroll at Brigham Young University.
They fell in love, married, and when Rufus graduated, the couple moved to Cedar City, where Rufus did the play-by-play of high school games for a local television station. A similar job took them to Vernal the next year.
It was Danielle's career in accounting that in 1999 brought them back to the Wasatch Front, where Danielle worked for Associated Title Co., and, in her spare time, looked for a restaurant to buy.
"During college, I worked as a waitress for three years, so I knew that end of the restaurant business. Plus, I have done the accounting for my friends who own restaurants," said Dan- ielle, who received a master's of business administration from Utah State University.
"I had the confidence I would do well."
Danielle and her sister bought the old Feis Garden Chinese restaurant, remodeled it, and hired a Chinese cook whose food, she hoped, would attract customers. They came. When business got busy, Rufus -- then working for AT&T Media Services -- began helping out in the kitchen at night. When two cooks who couldn't keep up with the pace quit, Danielle relented and Rufus quit his job to become a full-time chef.
"I have always been into cooking. I watch cooking shows on TV and 'Yan Can Cook' videos. I had an interest in it," he said.
Rufus is assisted in the kitchen by Danielle's father, Wong Bun, who worked for a steel manufacturing company in Hong Kong, and, according to Rufus, is a worse cook than Danielle, but does all the chopping and deep-frying.
Wong Bun and his wife, Tang Kam-fa -- neither of whom speak English -- moved to Utah in 1999 to live with the Spragues. During the day, grandma tends her bilingual grandchildren, Kinsee, 2, and Tanner, 4. Danielle's niece, Wing, and sister, Niece, alternate with Danielle as waitresses, while the American cooks.
"The first response [of some people] is that they are scared. Some people say, 'You aren't the cook, are you?' Sometimes, he has told them he is the busboy," Danielle said. "A couple of people haven't come back. It's Chinese food. They want a Chinese man cooking it."
Most do not care.
Geoff Watson, owner of Geoff Watson Corvette, frequents the cafe three times a week with some of his 10 children. His reasons are simple: "It's the best Chinese food I have found anywhere and the people are nice to us."
Although Rufus and Danielle do not want to lose the family-friendly atmosphere of their establishment, expansion is in the offing. Danielle, who will take the state certified public accountant exam in November, already is checking out larger Chinese restaurants.
Even the customers can have racial expectations...
Phil
