Johnny Kan
Johnny Kan (1906-1972) was a Chinese American restaurateur in Chinatown, San Francisco, ca 1950-1970. He was the owner of Johnny Kan's restaurant, which opened in 1953, and published a book on Cantonese cuisine, Eight Immortal Flavors, which was praised by Craig Claiborne and James Beard.[1]
"Kan's was the first restaurant in Chinatown to win the Holiday (magazine) Award for fine dining; that award was given to Kan's for 14 consecutive years. Its name was frequently on top ten lists of San Francisco restaurants. World-famous celebrities, movie stars, the rich and the powerful came to Kan's, and their appearances were written up by San Francisco columnist Herb Caen."(Chinese Historical Society of America, 2013)
The introduction of an innovative version of the Lazy Susan to Chinese restaurants has been attributed to Kan's: "The trail of the Chinese Lazy Susan finally picks up in the 1950's, which is when Chinese food got its makeover. The hub of Chinese American cuisine was San Francisco's Chinatown, where a new generation of entrepreneurial restaurant owners was trying to better adapt Chinese cooking to American tastes. One of them was Johnny Kan, who opened a Cantonese-style restaurant in 1953. He worked with three Chinese-American friends (George Hall, John C. Young (both brothers-in-law who started a booming soy sauce company) and George Chow who had helped acquire the very important liquor license - to try to make his restaurant both respectable and modern...In the mid-1950's, Hall...put together a revolving tabletop that became the pivotal element of Kan's new banquet room."[2]
"Frank Sinatra dined at Kan's regularly, as did Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., and Marilyn Monroe. Herb Caen was also a regular, writing tales from the restaurant in his column." [3]
Following the immediate success of Kan's Restaurant, the four partners recruited a fifth partner, Dan Lee, and opened another premium Chinese restaurant in Palo Alto, on the San Francisco Peninsula, and named it Ming's. Although Ming's finally closed in 2014, Kan's, after more than 60 years, still survives under different ownership.
References
Eight Immortal Flavors: Secrets of Cantonese Cookery from San Francisco's Chinatown, Johnny Kan and Charles L. Leong. Berkeley, California: Howell-North Books, 1963
- ↑
- ↑ Smithsonian Magazine, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/lazy-susan-classic-centerpiece-chinese-resturants-neither-classic-nor-chinese-180949844/
- ↑ KCBS' Rebecca Corral Reports, http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2011/02/27/san-francisco-exhibit-showcases-%e2%80%98lost-history%e2%80%99-of-famed-restaurant/
External links
- Kan photographed with Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, in San Francisco (1941). SF Museum.
- Photograph of Johnny Kan and John C. Young seated with others at a large dining table featuring Chinese Lazy Susans. Smithsonian magazine.
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