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Hi everyone and welcome back to America Under the Microscope. Welcome back, James.

Hi, Lulu. I'm glad to be here.

So I thought before we get on with today's topic, let me ask you something. It has been some time since the last time you went back to the States, right?

I guess it has. Yeah, it's been quite a while.

Is there anything that you really miss?

Um, yeah. But one thing I really, really miss, something you can't get here…

OK.

Are diners.

Diners? Like restaurants?

Yeah, type of restaurant which is pretty unique to America, and China has nothing close to it.

OK. So let's talk about diners. After all, this is something you see that's part of American culture, you do see in TV shows, movies a lot.

They're everywhere. They are a big part of just American dining restaurants. You can't really go to a restaurant without ever going to a diner.

So what are diners? Actually, if you go online and check diner and check the translation, nothing really fits the translation. I think partially it's because like you said, we don't really have the equivalent. 中国文化里是没有这个完全能对应diner的这种restaurant. So what are diners?

Well. Very simply, they are very casual sit-down restaurants that serve classic American cuisine.

So just American restaurant.

Yeah, but not the same as fast food or things, because these are sit-down restaurants meaning there are waiters, you sit down at tables, you order from a menu, food is delivered to you.

Okay. So let's talk about diners. Let's get into the details about diners. So maybe our listeners can get to see this specific part of the culture.

Right. So one thing I want to tell everyone is a lot of Chinese people I know who went to America have always said like Man, eating in restaurants is really expensive in America.

Oh, because you have very… like we talked about before you have a high percentage of tip like 15, 20%.

Yeah, and also just higher cost of food and all that stuff. Now diners are quite reasonably priced.

Can you give us an idea?

Sure. So like... a few years ago I was in New York City just for a vacation and in the morning, we went to diners to have breakfast and in New York City, Manhattan, you were able to get a breakfast with coffee for $5.

Wow. I thought even the food trucks are much more expensive than that.

And the breakfast was two eggs, potatoes, sausage and toast.

Yeah, that sounds really inexpensive, really cheap.

Yeah it was, and a pretty good sized breakfast.

And you mentioned that's a diner in New York, in Manhattan out of all those places. Does that mean that you do see diners in big cities?

Right. Diners are everywhere, you'll find them in the bigger city like New York, all the way to the smallest town in rural Alabama. They are everywhere.

And, are they like your regular restaurant so they open for breakfast or lunch or dinner they close in between?

So diners are open all day. So they don't take breaks between meals like some nicer restaurants too.

Ah. So like an all-day restaurant.

They're all-day. Some are 24 hours. But if they're not, they definitely open early in the morning. Because a big thing people go to diners for probably the most is breakfast. And a lot of diners will serve breakfast foods all day long.

So is it one of those, because based on all these TV shows I have been watching, it's a bit like middle of the night, if you want to actually go grab a bite to eat, your chances are probably diners.

Yes. Diners are going to be one of your best choices to get any decent cooked food.

What kind of people go to diners? Do you like actually go on your own? Or like do you go with a friend or with colleagues or with family?

If you ever watch a lot of TV or movies, you'll see all kinds of things, like some people go there by themselves like as a routine; some people go there with their kids; some will go just with friends and it's all of that. Diners are friendly to everyone, family, individuals, couples, they're just what we would consider a very family friendly place.

Actually, coming back to diners themselves, I was going to ask that are they more like fast food? Do they have lots of chain diners or is it all like individual named after person, for example, like Peter's or like Tom's diner that sort of thing？

To be fair, most diners probably are a chain because there are some fairly big chain you'll find all over the country.

Danny's?

Denny's is probably the biggest one. If our… any people in our audience ever flew to America and left the airport, they'd probably find a Denny's outside the airport.

And IHOP?

IHOP is another big one, International House of Pancakes.

This is what I don't get. They don't just serve pancakes but they call themselves house of pancakes.

Yeah, you go there and eat pancakes and then we have WAFFLE HOUSE.

Which doesn't just sell waffles.

Yeah, but that's what everyone seemed to order there. Right? WAFFLE HOUSE is mostly just in the south. I've never actually been to one, because there are none in my part of the country.

Um.

But they're very well known in the south.

To be honest, when I was checking online about diners, like the Chinese articles about diners, because I want to find a good translation for it. And someone said in a really funny way that diners are just那篇文章说diners就是美国大众的黄焖鸡米饭和沙县小吃. Do you get that joke?

I do get that joke.

Would you say that's somewhat similar?

That's not too far off, I would say, not at all.

So those will be like your WAFFLE HOUSE, I mean, 黄焖鸡米饭. They don't just sell one thing. They also sell a bit of other things.

Yeah.

It's just really like cheap comfort food, I guess. So what is a diner like? If you go into a diner, what does it look like?

Let me try to paint a picture for you.

Um.

So at a diner, you usually walk in the front door, then you'll be greeted by a waiter or waitress, taking you to a table. And the tables are always, almost always booths with like the fake leather and like the hard plastic top tables, or just really simple metal chairs and table tops. And there are some dining counters as well where you have stools and people sitting on the stools eating at the counter.

You know what? That sounds exactly like 2 BROKE GIRLS.

The girls in 2 BROKE GIRLS work at a pretty standard diner.

That would be a standard diner.

You can think of what that place looks like. That's what a lot of diners look like. Same colors, same lighting, same tables, even the same ketchup bottles and the sugar box they have on the table would look just like that.

It's not like your fanciest establishment.

No.

It's just like a very every day you walk in and you'll be fed.

Yeah, and they're quite noisy too, because there's a lot of you can hear the sound of the kitchen, you can hear them cook; you can hear all the clanking of the glasses and the plates. So it's not a quiet place and…

Because it's pretty much like an open kitchen.

Not exactly, but it's usually like they have the bar where the waitress pours the coffee and drinks and stuff, and then the kitchens right behind it and you can usually see through the window.

Um.

The cooks on the back prepping the eggs and bacon and stuff.

Now let's come to food since you mentioned bacon.

Bacon.

You don't go to diners to eat healthy food, do you?

Bacon is not healthy?

Depending on how you cook it.

So right. Diners probably are most famous for breakfast foods. Most Americans, if they go to a diner is in the morning, and diner breakfast food would be things like fried eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, pancakes, waffles, hash browns which is a type of fried potatoes.

Is that the thing they sell in McDonald's.

Not exactly. What they have in McDonald's is like the hash browns patties, like they put it into a like a brick and fry it. In America, they shred the potato and they put it right on top of the griddle and fry it that way.

就是那种薯饼, 把土豆丝直接上去煎出来的那种.

Yeah, they're actually really similar to, there's a… in Shanxi, there's like a potato cake that they have a fried potato cake. That's really similar.

I'm sure you can find, in food, a lot of countries have similarities, I'm sure you can find that in China.

Fried potatoes are fried potatoes. And then coffee. Lots of coffee.

And for lunch, same sort of thing？

Well, for lunch and dinners are usually the same food. That's generally things like sandwiches, burgers, fried foods, like fried chicken and stuff like that.

Can I ask you something, because something I really miss living in Beijing now, is a sort of like all these breakfast places used to be able to just go into any of these really, really small street breakfast place.

So you can get 油条 and 豆腐脑?

Yeah.

I miss that, too.

Yeah, that sort of thing. But you also have obviously the very small like tiny restaurants that you can just go in, have a very quick sit-down breakfast and then on your way to work. Is that the same idea with diner serving breakfast food. People go there, they order things that are really quickly served and then they have a coffee, have that and then start their day of work?

Yeah, you got to think about, it's like they might go on like I'll have two eggs, two beacons and toast. And how long does it take to fry an egg? It doesn't take long at all. And in a restaurant, they most likely cook the bacon in an oven. So they have cooked it and then they just finish it on the griddle top. So they cook it very quickly.

I see. What about dessert?

Ha. Pie. The thing that diners are probably most famous for would be pies, like apple pie and things like that. Some diners are quite famous for it, and also milk shakes.

Yeah, if you think about a lot of TV shows and movies, you constantly hear, one of the very frequent lines is like Oh, this is what and what diner, they have like the best apple pie…

That's not too far off.

In all the state.

Some of them do have cakes and other things, but pies probably the famous thing you'll find places like we got this cake today. Some of them have donuts, but pie and milk shakes probably would definitely be the two most common.

One thing though. What about drinks? Do they serve beer or even wine?

That honestly depends from diner to diner. I've been to many diners in America that serve no alcohol. I've been to some that do have it. Because in general some of these restaurants they just don't want to deal with the alcohol license. They need to get to sell alcohol.

Oh. Of course, because if you want to sell alcohol in the diner, you need an extra license.

You need another license and that requires another fee and more inspections. And if you’re big business it’s going to be breakfast, there aren't that many people who want to be ordering a beer with their eggs.

I would be really worried if diners have filled with drunk people, professional drunks with their beer and hash browns.

Well, there are some bars that serve at breakfast

Exactly. OK. So we have touched upon the basics of American diners. In advanced episode I thought we can go deeper into it and talking about why are diners still a thing, a cultural symbol in the United States and also how it compares to other type of eateries.

Sounds good.

We'll see you next time.

Bye-bye, everyone.

Bye.