McALLEN — John Sun, the Rio Grande Valley restaurateur known for the House of China and its often zany advertisements, finally called it quits this month after 50 years of business in the restaurant scene.
Both Houses of China are now closed. Sun, 79, said he simply couldn’t keep up with younger employees anymore. The pandemic hurt business as well.
Sun was a pioneer of Asian cuisine in the Valley, which scarcely existed before his arrival.
A migrant from Taiwan, Sun built a thriving business and carved out a home for himself in McAllen, which welcomed him back warmly. He said the closure is difficult and prompted him and his wife to take a Mexican cruise, a vacation after a career that hasn’t allowed for many.
“We’re trying to stay away from that environment. The sad environment. It’s hard to say goodbye to people who worked for me for 20, 30 years. That’s the only reason I keep open these last four to five years.”
At its core, the House of China was an economic joint. Tasty food made with quality ingredients available on a budget was the guiding principle.
The buffet, with heaps of fried food, steamed vegetables and meats in a variety of sauces, was the marquee attraction.
Aggressive ad campaigns and Sun’s persona turned the business into something more.
Countless radio and television broadcasts seared the name into the minds of Valley residents: the ad reader would often stretch out “House of China” melodically to a background of generic East Asian music. Phonetically, the word “China” would look something like “Chinaaaaa.”
Sun would often appear — dressed as a coach or Bob Ross or James Bond, as the situation required — to emphasize his establishment’s commitment to quality in his trademark accent.
It was not just the House of China. It was John Sun’s House of China.
Sun came to Texas in the early 1970s. He’d moved to Virginia from Taiwan a few years earlier, earning himself a masters degree in thermal engineering.
The prospect of beachlife attracted him to Texas.
“During my student time, I’m working in restaurants to pay my expense,” he said. “So, let’s try opening a restaurant in Texas. Because Corpus Christi is a beautiful city.”
After a stint in Corpus, he moved to South Padre Island, running a restaurant there. In 1978 a friend called about a restaurant location by La Plaza Mall in McAllen.
Sun got a loan and opened the original House of China. There wasn’t much competition in the Asian food game at the time.
“Back then, McAllen, the Valley, is agriculture. Citrus. So it’s very behind from rest of the country,” Sun said. “We had the second Chinese restaurant opened in the Valley, the first one is Mr. Li, very respectable person, they had a chow mein in Pharr.”
The venture was a hit. Locals came to like it, and it was popular with the crowd who came over from Mexico.
In part, Sun attributed the success to the food itself. He claims one of the original chefs migrated from Taiwan after studying under the man who invented General Tso’s Chicken.
“Today — still the best seller,” Sun said.
The success was also the result of an awful lot of hard work, Sun said.
“You work seven days a week and 16-hour days,” he said. “I do that for a good almost 40 years.”
Sun eventually grew the restaurant to multiple locations. He supported that growth through frequently outrageous ad campaigns, many of them capitalizing on pop culture.
“A drive-thru faster than a Kardashian marriage,” one ad boasted.
Another ad from a decade ago shows Sun, in Bob Rossian fake fro and beard, dabbing soy sauce onto a canvas using “happy little eggrolls.” Another spoofs South Korean artist Psy’s 2012 hit “Gangnam Style” — rechristened “House of China Style” for Sun’s purposes.
Another bit featured a Sarah Palin lookalike striding past the buffet and endorsing the food.
“Heck, I can see China from my backyard, so I know a thing or two about Chinese food,” she says. A cutaway shows Sun, arching his eyebrows mischievously.
The ads seemed designed to make people wonder how on earth they got on TV. They were designed to make a mark.
“I’m very proud of that. If you have good food, you’ve got to tell the people,” Sun said.
Not all of Sun’s promotional tactics have aged as well, and he said some received criticism in recent years.
A running gag through many of the ads is Sun’s accent. He tends to mispronounce words with Ls and Rs.
Perhaps the most intricate of the business’ promotional gimmicks was a bit ostensibly advertising a forthcoming Christmas album from Sun in the style of a generic late night CD ad from the 90s.
Sun, wearing a sweater and a Santa hat, sits behind a piano, mispronouncing the lyrics to Christmas classics and singing egregiously off key.
“Oh come let us adore him” becomes “Oh come ret us adore him” when Sun sings. “Holy night” is “Hory night.”
Sun is, clearly, in on the joke. He sings with faux passion and gestures grandly.
A running gag in many of the ads was Sun plugging the business’ commitment to cholesterol free oil. Sun severely and consistently butchers the pronunciation of cholesterol.
Sun says over the years some have accused him of pretending. For the record, he really does speak in a heavy accent in normal conversation.
“That’s just the way I talk,” he said. “Everybody I talked to had no problem to understand me. I said, ‘Well, I’ll just keep the way I am.’”
Sun is fond of talking about employees he’s worked with over the years, and is especially fond of talking about his three children. He says he’s a self-proclaimed promoter for people raising families in the Valley, and is proud of his own experience doing so.
Sun is also proud of what he accomplished in South Texas. Sun was an outsider when he moved to Texas at the age of 29. He retires as a household name in a community he’s proud to call home.
“Valley is my hometown,” he said. “For all last 50 years we lived in the same house, for the last 40-some years, do the one job at the House of China. And I really appreciate it. I don’t know what to say.”
