Bad translations from Chinese menus into western languages are a mainstay of translator humour. It just seems to be almost impossibly difficult to accurately translate the names of many delicious Chinese dishes.
The various cuisines of China are among the finest in the world. In general, China has an extremely complex culture of gastronomy, Chinese creativity is applied to the names of dishes, and many culinary terms in Chinese simply don’t have direct correlates in other languages. In English, the word ‘dumpling’, for example, is used for many Chinese dishes, all of which are unlike the dumplings that feature in western European cooking.
Perhaps a bigger question is why people feel the need to translate from Chinese at all. It makes sense to transliterate into the Roman alphabet, as otherwise non-Chinese people wouldn’t be able to read the menu – but if we are happy to adopt words like pizza and spaghetti and bouillabaisse and crumble from and into many languages, why do we need literal translations of the names of Chinese dishes?
Perhaps, as Chinese cuisine is ever-more integrated into menus outside China, these hilariously bad menu translations will become outdated, as a growing number of Chinese dishes will simply become part of our global diet.
Photo Source: https://unsplash.com/photos/steamed-dumplings-on-steamer-q66grqqHpDQ
