When an Asian restaurant named Yellow Fever opened more than four years ago in the unassuming Southern California suburb of Torrance, some people were perturbed but kept their opinions to themselves. After all, they thought, how much harm could a single fast-casual restaurant do in a strip mall?

The business expanded, opening another location a few miles northwest on a bustling boulevard in the Venice neighborhood of Los Angeles. Yet it was only last week, after Yellow Fever opened a third location as part of a Whole Foods 365 store in Long Beach, Calif., that criticism overflowed on social media.

“WAS ‘ME LOVE YOU LONG TIME’ RICE BOWLS ALREADY TAKEN, @WholeFoods @365byWholeFoods????” Jenny Yang, a comedian and writer in Los Angeles who grew up in Torrance, wrote on Twitter on Saturday.

As the Asian-American cultural critic Jeff Yang would note minutes later in a reply to Ms. Yang, there was another layer of nuance: The restaurant’s co-founder and executive chef is an Asian-American woman.

