"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
> On Sun, 7 Dec 2003 09:30:01 -0000, "ahem" >
> wrote:
>
> >Come on frogleg - let's swap recipes - this SHOULD be fun and
educational!
> >Sometimes just fun, sometimes just educational, sometimes neither!!! ;-))
>
> To get this out of non-interested faces, my e-mail is
> frogleg-at-hotmail dot com

This thread is getting more responses than any other I've seen for ages - I
think it's still interesting as a group discussion!

>
> Don't know if I can supply interesting recipes -- I'm a foodfan but a
> rotten cook. Most of my successes have been shear chance and many
> times unrepeatable (I mean that I can't replicate them, not that
> they're too awful to pronounce).

Lots of us cook in ways that are unrepeatable - good and bad.....like a
great laksa dish I made a few months ago - I don't know why, but I can't
make it quite as good again! Same basic ingredients, same source for
coconut, same fishy additions, but it's missing something! But for the main
if you share recipes, they can be tweaked and made better/ different by
others in the group?

Rita

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
> On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 05:45:16 GMT, "Peter Dy" >
> wrote:
>
> >"Frogleg" > wrote
>
> etc., etc.
>
> This is getting out of hand. We're going to have a novel posted soon.
>
> >> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes." One sauce? I dunno.
> >
> >Restaurant owners/worker have told me, and I've read it, that they want
to
> >serve vegetables Americans are used to. I'm sure if you asked diners in
> >such restaurants, they would say the same: I prefer American vegetables.
> >So, if you don't want to call that "Americanized", what, pray tell, do
you
> >suggest we call it?
>
> Is the problem American tastes, restauranteurs' expectations, or
> availability of ingredients? You imply the second, and assume the
> first.


You didn't answer the question. You also seem to have poor reading skills,
as I specifically said that availability wasn't the problem: "there are
Chinese vegetables pouring out into the streets in the grocery stores 3
blocks away."


[...]
> >If I know what Fish-Flavored Pork is supposed to be and what it's
supposed
> >to taste like, and a restaurant serves me a "Fish-Flavored Pork" dish
that
> >bears little resemblance to the real thing, and instead seems to have the
> >same sauce that they used for the fried noodle dish (which they should
have
> >used for that dish either), then I say that they have "dumbed it down"
for
> >the diners. What do you want to call it?
>
> Fish-Flavored Pork? *That* sounds interesting. Again, you mention "the
> restaurant served me." Maybe there *are* too many bad restaurants in
> the US. I expect there are equally bad ones in Madrid and Bangalore,
> but wouldn't Chinese food be equally "dumbed down" for the Spanish or
> Indians?


You didn't answer the question.


> My complaint (one of them) is that adaptations to local tastes and
> ingredients is (sometimes) judged artful adaptation in the rest of the
> world, but "dumbing down" when it comes to the US. With this
> discussion, I *do* think I'm missing something by not being able to
> taste particularly actractive cuisines on their home ground.


I agree now.


But I
> refuse to believe that my access to "Mexican" and "Thai" and
> "Pakistani" food is beneath contempt, nor my efforts to explore with
> the help of cookbooks and delightful web sites, in my own kitchen.


Only you seem to feel your access "beneath contempt."


[...]
> I resent being told (implied) that I'm "dumb" for liking green papaya
> salad, because it isn't the *right* green papaya salad. Or that I can
> never make *proper* dosa outside the Indian subcontinent. Nor can I
> say I like Indian or Thai or Chinese cooking because I've never
> experienced the real thing. And I don't/can't get the right soy or
> fish sauce.


Only the voice in your head seems to be telling you these things.


OK. I'll keep seeking recipes and ingredients and growing
> things and making curry with canned cocount milk and lurk for
> possiblities that please me and won't earn the scorn of afa'rs.


If you've earned any scorn here, quasi-troll, it is not because you use
canned coconut milk.

Peter

Frogleg wrote:

> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes."

Hey, its the truth.

If you are born here, and ate nothing but poorly represented ethnic
food, you would not know what you are missing untill you finally
had the real deal, and guess what? You might find the REAL food
not to your liking!

How about "ignorant tastebuds" for "dumbed down"?

"American tastes" can't be helped. We are what we eat.

The same can be said of anybody from any other country as
foods/spices and customs differ from culture to culture.


--
"Bubba got a blowjob, BU$H ****ed us all!" - Slim

George "The AWOL President" Bush: http://awol.gq.nu/4dawol.htm

WHY IRAQ?: http://www.angelfire.com/creep/gwbush/remindus.html

VOTE HIM OUT! November 4, 2004

"slim" > wrote in message
...
[...]
> How about "ignorant tastebuds" for "dumbed down"?


You're right, but was blaming more the restaurants in question: They dumb it
down because they think we are dumb.

Peter

[...]

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 04:55:55 GMT, slim > wrote:

>Frogleg wrote:
>
>> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes."

>If you are born here, and ate nothing but poorly represented ethnic
>food, you would not know what you are missing untill you finally
>had the real deal, and guess what? You might find the REAL food
>not to your liking!

But why must everything from a "foreign" cuisine that is cooked/served
inside the US automatically become inferior "poorly represented
ethnic" food? Why can't at least some of it become "cleverly adapted"
or "emblematic of American willingness to embrace new tastes"? I
*haven't* been trying to say that pizza is fine Italian cuisine, or
that a corner Chinese takeout represents a pinnacle in dining.

I guess what I don't like is the scorn. I say "I like Thai food" and
am smacked because it isn't "real" Thai food. Why isn't it? I can only
read English translations, but it looks to me as if all the
ingredients for Pad Thai or Som Tam are available locally. If a
(formerly) Thai person living in the US makes these foods, or if I do,
are they automatically "poorly represented"?

Now, in searching out recipes, I came across a description of Bangkok
street food that made my mouth water. No, I've never come across
mango/coconut cream pancake 'tacos', or thin pork slices and noodles
in broth. Dipping fruit in a salt/sugar/chile combo sounds like
something I would like. And I'll bet American fruit, salt, sugar, and
chiles are pretty much the same. I haven't tasted *all* Thai food, but
I've enjoyed *some* quite a bit.
>
>How about "ignorant tastebuds" for "dumbed down"?

Well, ignorance isn't *really* a pejorative -- merely another name for
inexperience. I guess I can go with that. :-)
>
>"American tastes" can't be helped. We are what we eat.
>
>The same can be said of anybody from any other country as
>foods/spices and customs differ from culture to culture.

Exactly. Again, it's the scorn I bristle at.

On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 20:33:12 GMT, "Peter Dy" >
wrote:

>"Frogleg" > wrote

>> >> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes." One sauce? I dunno.
>> >
>> >Restaurant owners/worker have told me, and I've read it, that they want
>to
>> >serve vegetables Americans are used to. I'm sure if you asked diners in
>> >such restaurants, they would say the same: I prefer American vegetables.
>> >So, if you don't want to call that "Americanized", what, pray tell, do
>you
>> >suggest we call it?
>>
>> Is the problem American tastes, restauranteurs' expectations, or
>> availability of ingredients? You imply the second, and assume the
>> first.
>
>You didn't answer the question. You also seem to have poor reading skills,
>as I specifically said that availability wasn't the problem: "there are
>Chinese vegetables pouring out into the streets in the grocery stores 3
>blocks away."

OK. I read just fine. What Chinese veg are pouring into the street in
your neighborhood that "Americans" won't eat? [If Americans won't eat
them, maybe that's why grocers stock them just sweep them out the
door?] As I said, my resources are limited. I know of 2 small
Korean/Thai grocery stores. Gottum lemon grass. Gottum Thai eggplant
and taro and long beans and chiles and galangal and green papaya.
Regular supermarket has bok choi and 'napa' cabbage (at ruinous
prices, considering the weight) and mango and papaya and pineapple and
plantain and... I'm asuming, perhaps incorrectly, that they wouldn't
stock these things if *someone* didn't buy them.
>
>[...]
>> >If I know what Fish-Flavored Pork is supposed to be and what it's
>supposed
>> >to taste like, and a restaurant serves me a "Fish-Flavored Pork" dish
>that
>> >bears little resemblance to the real thing, and instead seems to have the
>> >same sauce that they used for the fried noodle dish (which they should
>have
>> >used for that dish either), then I say that they have "dumbed it down"
>for
>> >the diners. What do you want to call it?

>You didn't answer the question.

I'd call it a poor restaurant. Although a brief web search reveals
quite a few different recipes for fish-flavored pork (shreds), both
with and without sauce. I *did* find some interesting sites with
good-sounding recipes that I'll go back to. Thanks for the push.
>
>OK. I'll keep seeking recipes and ingredients and growing
>> things and making curry with canned cocount milk and lurk for
>> possiblities that please me and won't earn the scorn of afa'rs.
>
>If you've earned any scorn here, quasi-troll, it is not because you use
>canned coconut milk.

Please do enlighten me.

I'm going to go mix up some salt, sugar, and chile flakes and see how
they taste with

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...

>
> But why must everything from a "foreign" cuisine that is cooked/served
> inside the US automatically become inferior "poorly represented
> ethnic" food? Why can't at least some of it become "cleverly adapted"
> or "emblematic of American willingness to embrace new tastes"? I
> *haven't* been trying to say that pizza is fine Italian cuisine, or
> that a corner Chinese takeout represents a pinnacle in dining.
>

I don't think anyone has said "everything" is inferior. And once you get
into "cleverly adapted" foods it starts becoming fusion cuisine. There's
nothing wrong with fusion as long as it's labelled accordingly, but to say
it's "just like the original" (whatever that may be) would be incorrect.

> I guess what I don't like is the scorn. I say "I like Thai food" and
> am smacked because it isn't "real" Thai food. Why isn't it? I can only
> read English translations, but it looks to me as if all the
> ingredients for Pad Thai or Som Tam are available locally. If a
> (formerly) Thai person living in the US makes these foods, or if I do,
> are they automatically "poorly represented"?
>

Even though it was just an example, in the case of Thai food, the reason
most North American Thai food isn't Thai is because it is made by Laotians
who pass themselves off as Thai. Most farangs don't know the difference,
anyway (or don't think there's a difference, for that matter) so they quite
happily rave about their favourite Thai food which, in fact, isn't even
Thai. You could make the argument that Laotian food is like Northern Thai
food, anyway, but from what I've tasted Northern Thai food is still more
flavourful than Laotian food. Of course, it's possible that the Laotian
food I've eaten was just not very good, but IME, what I say is true.

> Now, in searching out recipes, I came across a description of Bangkok
> street food that made my mouth water. No, I've never come across
> mango/coconut cream pancake 'tacos', or thin pork slices and noodles
> in broth. Dipping fruit in a salt/sugar/chile combo sounds like
> something I would like. And I'll bet American fruit, salt, sugar, and
> chiles are pretty much the same. I haven't tasted *all* Thai food, but
> I've enjoyed *some* quite a bit.
>

I might be repeating what others have already said, as I've not been reading
this thread thoroughly, but...

I would disagree about American fruit, salt, sugar, and chiles being pretty
much the same as their Thai counterparts. There is a huge difference in
flavour between what is available in NA and what is available in Thailand
with respect to fruits and chiles, as well. But if you've never had them
(Thai versions) then you wouldn't know and shouldn't make such a judgment
(I'm not talking about you, personally, but a general "you"). I could
easily say that the French bread I get at a local bakery is as good as
anything in France. However, since I've never been to France it would be
ridiculous of me to make such a statement. IMO, it's equally ridiculous to
say "This Thai food is really good" when you (again, a general "you") don't
really know anything about Thai food (now I'm ranting about a food critic in
my city who raves about "ethnic" restaurants yet admittedly knows nothing
about the respective ethnic cuisines). However, if you take the time to
learn about a particular cuisine (speak with members of that group about the
food, read respectable cookbooks, etc) then it's a different matter. You'd
have a greater base of knowledge from which to make your judgments.

>
> Exactly. Again, it's the scorn I bristle at.

I don't think it's scorn. I think it's sympathy :-).

rona

--
***For e-mail, replace .com with .ca Sorry for the inconvenience!***

Frogleg > wrote:
+ Dipping fruit in a salt/sugar/chile combo sounds like
+ something I would like. And I'll bet American fruit, salt, sugar, and
+ chiles are pretty much the same.

I don't know about Thai, but I call apples from Japan "ringo" and mandarin
oranges from Japan "mikan" because they're not quite like the apples
(even the Fuji apples) or mandarin oranges here. (I got a whole tub of
a dozen or so really beautiful and delicious mikan for only 250 yen.
All the fruits they sold looked so picture perfect there. Even the
fruits in the tiny shops on little, crooked, out-of-the-way streets made
the stuff at large supermarkets here look frighteningly diseased.)

The takoyaki I've been able to find here is an over-salty, gluey,
heavy, rubbery, and pretty much inedible imitation of what I got there.
The tempura and katsu are lighter and crispier there, and the curry is
a bit more subtle and complex. I suppose all that can be chalked up to
having poor restaurants here, but we're talking about sit-down restaurants
here charging rather high prices for having worse food than cheap food
courts and street vendors there. I was told that I should expect to pay
insanely high prices for food there, but their idea of cheap fast food is
so much better and more varied than our idea of sit-down restaurant food
that I ended up spending only a small fraction on food that I expected
to spend. Their portions also weren't as small as I was led to expect.

"Betty Lee" > wrote in message
...
>
> I don't know about Thai, but I call apples from Japan "ringo" and mandarin
> oranges from Japan "mikan" because they're not quite like the apples
> (even the Fuji apples) or mandarin oranges here. (I got a whole tub of
> a dozen or so really beautiful and delicious mikan for only 250 yen.
> All the fruits they sold looked so picture perfect there. Even the
> fruits in the tiny shops on little, crooked, out-of-the-way streets made
> the stuff at large supermarkets here look frighteningly diseased.)
>

sigh! That's why I miss Japan sometimes. The food sold at supermarkets was
generally much better quality than what one can find in the average Canadian
or American supermarket. I attribute it to smaller yields and greater care.
That and the "fact" (in quotations because it's really just my opinion) that
Japanese people seem to expect better quality so they get it. My Japanese
friends who live in Canada now bemoan the lack of flavourful fresh
food--they say even the cabbages they buy are tougher and less sweet tasting
than what they are used to.

<snip>

>I was told that I should expect to pay
> insanely high prices for food there, but their idea of cheap fast food is
> so much better and more varied than our idea of sit-down restaurant food
> that I ended up spending only a small fraction on food that I expected
> to spend. Their portions also weren't as small as I was led to expect.
>

Except for at restaurants that served Japanese food (particularly kaiseki
restaurants), I found Japanese-sized portions to be just big as North
American portions. One of my favourite experiences in Japan was watching a
female friend chow down on a serving of noodles (sort of like Cantonese chow
mein but a bit different). It was an individual serving but was almost the
size of a shared-serving of Cantonese chow mein in Winnipeg (for 4 people,
depending on who's eating). My friend, who was about a child's size 10, ate
the whole thing all by herself.

To be fair, I had some lousy "ethnic" food in Japan, so the dumbing down or
adaptation of various ethnic foods is not unique to Canada or the US. Being
served samosas that had been frozen, defrosted in a microwave, then fried
and served with ketchup is one that stands out in my mind. Another one is
the "Chinese" food served in Kobe's Chinatown. It was as bad as food court
Chinese food found in malls all across Canada. I learned much later that
the best Chinese food in Japan is found far away from any of the Chinatowns
(this includes Nagasaki and Yokohama).

rona
--
***For e-mail, replace .com with .ca Sorry for the inconvenience!***

Frogleg wrote:
>
> On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 04:55:55 GMT, slim > wrote:
>
> >Frogleg wrote:
> >
> >> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes."
>
> >If you are born here, and ate nothing but poorly represented ethnic
> >food, you would not know what you are missing untill you finally
> >had the real deal, and guess what? You might find the REAL food
> >not to your liking!
>
> But why must everything from a "foreign" cuisine that is cooked/served
> inside the US automatically become inferior "poorly represented
> ethnic" food?

Not everything is.

> Why can't at least some of it become "cleverly adapted"
> or "emblematic of American willingness to embrace new tastes"?

I have no problem when its marketed as such.

> I *haven't* been trying to say that pizza is fine Italian cuisine, or
> that a corner Chinese takeout represents a pinnacle in dining.

Thats true.

But remember, neither has any real connection with the stuff
derved "back home"......wherever "home" happens to be,

> I guess what I don't like is the scorn. I say "I like Thai food" and
> am smacked because it isn't "real" Thai food. Why isn't it? I can only
> read English translations, but it looks to me as if all the
> ingredients for Pad Thai or Som Tam are available locally. If a
> (formerly) Thai person living in the US makes these foods, or if I do,
> are they automatically "poorly represented"?

Not at all. Its the commercial misrepresentation that I can't stand.

> Now, in searching out recipes, I came across a description of Bangkok
> street food that made my mouth water. No, I've never come across
> mango/coconut cream pancake 'tacos', or thin pork slices and noodles
> in broth. Dipping fruit in a salt/sugar/chile combo sounds like
> something I would like. And I'll bet American fruit, salt, sugar, and
> chiles are pretty much the same. I haven't tasted *all* Thai food, but
> I've enjoyed *some* quite a bit.
> >
> >How about "ignorant tastebuds" for "dumbed down"?
>
> Well, ignorance isn't *really* a pejorative -- merely another name for
> inexperience. I guess I can go with that. :-)
> >
> >"American tastes" can't be helped. We are what we eat.
> >
> >The same can be said of anybody from any other country as
> >foods/spices and customs differ from culture to culture.
>
> Exactly. Again, it's the scorn I bristle at.

As you should.

--
"Bubba got a blowjob, BU$H ****ed us all!" - Slim

George "The AWOL President" Bush: http://awol.gq.nu/4dawol.htm

WHY IRAQ?: http://www.angelfire.com/creep/gwbush/remindus.html

VOTE HIM OUT! November 4, 2004

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
> On Tue, 09 Dec 2003 20:33:12 GMT, "Peter Dy" >
> wrote:
>
> >"Frogleg" > wrote
>
> >> >> I resent "dumbed down" and "American tastes." One sauce? I dunno.
> >> >
> >> >Restaurant owners/worker have told me, and I've read it, that they
want
> >to
> >> >serve vegetables Americans are used to. I'm sure if you asked diners
in
> >> >such restaurants, they would say the same: I prefer American
vegetables.
> >> >So, if you don't want to call that "Americanized", what, pray tell, do
> >you
> >> >suggest we call it?
> >>
> >> Is the problem American tastes, restauranteurs' expectations, or
> >> availability of ingredients? You imply the second, and assume the
> >> first.
> >
> >You didn't answer the question. You also seem to have poor reading
skills,
> >as I specifically said that availability wasn't the problem: "there are
> >Chinese vegetables pouring out into the streets in the grocery stores 3
> >blocks away."
>
> OK. I read just fine. What Chinese veg are pouring into the street in
> your neighborhood that "Americans" won't eat?


I already mentioned some such Chinese vegetables. You really want me to
list all the Chinese vegetables one won't find at an Americanized
restaurant?


[If Americans won't eat
> them, maybe that's why grocers stock them just sweep them out the
> door?]


There're not literally pouring into the streets! LOL!

Adiós, troll.

Peter

On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 08:16:12 -0600, "Rona Yuthasastrakosol"
> wrote:

>"Frogleg" > wrote in message
.. .
>
>>
>> But why must everything from a "foreign" cuisine that is cooked/served
>> inside the US automatically become inferior "poorly represented
>> ethnic" food? Why can't at least some of it become "cleverly adapted"
>> or "emblematic of American willingness to embrace new tastes"?
>
>I don't think anyone has said "everything" is inferior.

From "Tea" earlier in the thread: "But I would suspect
that most Chinese food in the US is horrid- just as most food in the
US is horrid."

>And once you get
>into "cleverly adapted" foods it starts becoming fusion cuisine. There's
>nothing wrong with fusion as long as it's labelled accordingly, but to say
>it's "just like the original" (whatever that may be) would be incorrect.

I never said "just like the original" because much of this began, more
or less, when I was told I couldn't like Thai food, because, unless
I'd been to Thailand, I had insufficient experience to express an
opinion. I must say I like "Thai-American" or "Chinese-American" or
"French-American" food. And probably "distinctly inferior to the
original Thai-American." Which proves I go out of my way to seek out
bad food. Talk about a no-win situation! I should just eat (and
discuss) tuna casserole, Taco Bell, and hot dogs. Because I'm a dumb,
ignorant, no-taste American.

>Even though it was just an example, in the case of Thai food, the reason
>most North American Thai food isn't Thai is because it is made by Laotians
>who pass themselves off as Thai. Most farangs don't know the difference,

Oh, gee whiz. Now I have to inquire into the specific background of
cooks? The restaurant (where I had lunch yesterday) is a tiny place in
a small shopping strip. It is labeled a Thai restaurant and grocery,
named after the wife of the husband (Caucasian in apperance)/wife
(Asian in appearance) owners/cooks. 'Though I have been going here for
some 10 years or more, I've never been so rude as to inquire about
specific ancestry. The travel posters on the walls are for Thailand.
Does that count?

>anyway (or don't think there's a difference, for that matter) so they quite
>happily rave about their favourite Thai food which, in fact, isn't even
>Thai. You could make the argument that Laotian food is like Northern Thai
>food, anyway, but from what I've tasted Northern Thai food is still more
>flavourful than Laotian food. Of course, it's possible that the Laotian
>food I've eaten was just not very good, but IME, what I say is true.

I've also heard Chinese-American food dissed because it's all
Cantonese. Until much became Szechuan, and then *that* became
non-authentic. So one can visit and eat in China and have "correct"
dining experiences, but not if you only visit in Canton or Szechuan.

BTW, the quote is "What I tell you three times is true." Lewis
Carroll. :-)
>
>> Now, in searching out recipes, I came across a description of Bangkok
>> street food that made my mouth water. No, I've never come across
>> mango/coconut cream pancake 'tacos', or thin pork slices and noodles
>> in broth. Dipping fruit in a salt/sugar/chile combo sounds like
>> something I would like. And I'll bet American fruit, salt, sugar, and
>> chiles are pretty much the same. I haven't tasted *all* Thai food, but
>> I've enjoyed *some* quite a bit.

>I would disagree about American fruit, salt, sugar, and chiles being pretty
>much the same as their Thai counterparts. There is a huge difference in
>flavour between what is available in NA and what is available in Thailand
>with respect to fruits and chiles, as well.

I think salt is pretty standard. :-) Is the fruit-dipping mixture
made with palm sugar? (I have some, but it's pretty solid/syrupy.) I
am well aware of the variety of chiles (and flakes) available. I was
thinking of using (oh, geez -- the jar only says "product of Thailand"
without pedigree, or specified variety) the chile flakes I normally
carry around to ginger up bland food.

I will yield (many) fruits. I'm somewhat interested in food origins,
and North America is singularly deficient in natives. Pineapple and
papaya originated in middle/South America, BTW. (Chiles are
"American.") A tropical/subtropical climate supports many fruits, and
I realize we have access to far from a full spectrum of fruits just
because kiwi and carambola are now supermarket standards. Since the
page I stumbled across mentioned pineapple, was thinking of trying the
'dip' with that.


> IMO, it's equally ridiculous to
>say "This Thai food is really good" when you (again, a general "you") don't
>really know anything about Thai food

The thin end of a wedge! I didn't/don't say "this is good Thai food,"
I say, "this food tastes really good to me." I *like* what is
represented to be Thai food in the US. If I have to say, "I like a lot
of food that is cooked with or accompanied by rice noodles or rice,
and sometimes with coconut milk, lime juice, chiles, fish sauce,
basil, cilantro, chicken, fish, pork, chicken, lemon grass, cucumber,
different soy sauce..." every time I mean Thai, I'm gonna wear out my
kybd. :-)

Don't mean to be confrontational, Rona. I'm just debating. I *know*
you care about food. Your trip pics were great, particularly the food
close-ups!

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
>
> From "Tea" earlier in the thread: "But I would suspect
> that most Chinese food in the US is horrid- just as most food in the
> US is horrid."
>

"Most" isn't "everything". And it sounds to me like Tea has a problem with
the US, anyway, so I wouldn't put too much faith in his/her statement.
However, I would go so far to say "most" of the food in Canada, and likely
the US, ethnic or otherwise is mediocre. I've not been to all the
restaurants in Canada or the US but I do tend to arrange travel
itineraries/sight-seeing around food and restaurants. A lot of food out
there is just not very good (in my opinion, of course). It seems the
general population is quite happy with mediocrity and sees no reason to
demand otherwise. Just look at Perkin's and Appleby's and the like.

>I must say I like "Thai-American" or "Chinese-American" or
> "French-American" food.

Why is that a bad thing? I don't have a problem with that at all.
Sometimes my friends drag me out to another Thai restaurant they've been
raving about and ask me if it's good. I usually end up saying, "It might be
good food, but it's not Thai" (and in fact, it's not usually good at all but
I don't tell them that). I think it's important to understand there is a
difference between (fill-in-ethnicity-here) food and
Americanized-(fill-in-ethnicity-here) food. That way if you (general you)
ever visit Thailand or whatever country, you'll know what to expect, or what
not to expect.

>And probably "distinctly inferior to the
> original Thai-American." Which proves I go out of my way to seek out
> bad food. Talk about a no-win situation! I should just eat (and
> discuss) tuna casserole, Taco Bell, and hot dogs. Because I'm a dumb,
> ignorant, no-taste American.
>

Proves? I think you're being quite hypersensitive here.

>
> Oh, gee whiz. Now I have to inquire into the specific background of
> cooks? The restaurant (where I had lunch yesterday) is a tiny place in
> a small shopping strip. It is labeled a Thai restaurant and grocery,
> named after the wife of the husband (Caucasian in apperance)/wife
> (Asian in appearance) owners/cooks. 'Though I have been going here for
> some 10 years or more, I've never been so rude as to inquire about
> specific ancestry. The travel posters on the walls are for Thailand.
> Does that count?
>

No, it doesn't count. FWIW, we often ask about ethnicities when we go to
"ethnic" restaurants. Not in a confrontational way, but just sort of as an
aside. Once, my mother was talking to a waiter at a Japanese restaurant and
asked him, as an aside, if the cooks were Japanese. He said, "Yes." Then
she started talking to one of the sushi chefs about food and asked, "Are you
Japanese?" and he replied "No, I'm Vietnamese." Turned out the restaurant
was Vietnamese owned and run, but they were passing it off as "authentic
Japanese". Now, my mother used to work with immigrants and she has a very
good eye for identifying various ethnicities (Sudanese vs Eritrean, Laotian
vs. Thai vs. Vietnamese, for example). She knew she was being lied to by
the first waiter but he probably thought "She won't know the difference,
anyway" so he passed everyone off as Japanese, likely to make the restaurant
appear to be more "authentic." It was not and the food was not.

I should add, that it is entirely possible that the owners and cooks had
lived in Japan and studied Japanese cooking, but it is not likely. Most
Vietnamese people I met in Japan were working in factories and construction
sites, and had not assimilated into Japanese culture at all (and were not
really "allowed to" assimilate).

>
> I've also heard Chinese-American food dissed because it's all
> Cantonese. Until much became Szechuan, and then *that* became
> non-authentic. So one can visit and eat in China and have "correct"
> dining experiences, but not if you only visit in Canton or Szechuan.
>

I've never heard anything like that.

>
> I think salt is pretty standard. :-)

But different salts have different flavours. Iodized table salt vs Malden
sea salt vs grey salt, etc. If you do a side-by-side taste test, you'll
notice the differences.

>Is the fruit-dipping mixture
> made with palm sugar? (I have some, but it's pretty solid/syrupy.) I
> am well aware of the variety of chiles (and flakes) available. I was
> thinking of using (oh, geez -- the jar only says "product of Thailand"
> without pedigree, or specified variety) the chile flakes I normally
> carry around to ginger up bland food.
>

I'm not sure. I would guess palm sugar, but I've never had fruit dipped in
seasonings so I wouldn't know. I've never been allowed to eat from food
carts (except some fried foods), unless you count the food stalls at
department stores (which sell stuff you can buy from carts, but in a cleaner
environment).

>
> The thin end of a wedge! I didn't/don't say "this is good Thai food,"
> I say, "this food tastes really good to me." I *like* what is
> represented to be Thai food in the US. If I have to say, "I like a lot
> of food that is cooked with or accompanied by rice noodles or rice,
> and sometimes with coconut milk, lime juice, chiles, fish sauce,
> basil, cilantro, chicken, fish, pork, chicken, lemon grass, cucumber,
> different soy sauce..." every time I mean Thai, I'm gonna wear out my
> kybd. :-)
>

I don't think it would be a hardship to say "I like the Thai food I've had,
but I don't know how 'Thai' it is" or something like that. What's wrong
with adding a (short) disclaimer?


> Don't mean to be confrontational, Rona. I'm just debating. I *know*
> you care about food. Your trip pics were great, particularly the food
> close-ups!

It's always fun to take pictures of food!

rona

--
***For e-mail, replace .com with .ca Sorry for the inconvenience!***

Frogleg wrote:
> Now, back to afa -- should I just overwinter my lemon grass it its
> pot, or maybe dig up and put in water for new shoots indoors? Too bad
> I can't grow water chestnuts. :-)

But you *can* grow water chestnuts! Buy some firm ones without rotten
spots, bury them under an inch or two of moist, sandy soil in a wide
container without drainage, and when they start to send up shoots
maintain the container in a slightly flooded state, letting it dry
back to damp soil occasionally. And keep it blasted with light.
Water chestnut plants look a little like reeds or rushes, and
they spread underground like little damp potatoes.

krnntp

Or just buy jicama. (Ohnos!) (Actually, I am told that one can
also substitute Hamburger Helper for water chestnuts).

"KR" > wrote in message
s.com...
> Frogleg wrote:
> > Now, back to afa -- should I just overwinter my lemon grass it its
> > pot, or maybe dig up and put in water for new shoots indoors? Too bad
> > I can't grow water chestnuts. :-)
>
> But you *can* grow water chestnuts! Buy some firm ones without rotten
> spots, bury them under an inch or two of moist, sandy soil in a wide
> container without drainage, and when they start to send up shoots
> maintain the container in a slightly flooded state, letting it dry
> back to damp soil occasionally. And keep it blasted with light.
> Water chestnut plants look a little like reeds or rushes, and
> they spread underground like little damp potatoes.
>

Perhaps you can answer a question about water chestnuts. Are they a seasonal
vegetable? At the moment they are plentiful and good in the DC area but
sometimes good ones are very hard to find. I fthink fresh ones are
infinitely superior in taste and texture to canned even if it is a bit
tedious to peel them.

--
James V. Silverton
Potomac, Maryland, USA

On Tue, 9 Dec 2003 14:39:56 -0000, "ahem" >
wrote:

>
>"Frogleg" > wrote
>>
>> Don't know if I can supply interesting recipes -- I'm a foodfan but a
>> rotten cook. Most of my successes have been shear chance and many
>> times unrepeatable (I mean that I can't replicate them, not that
>> they're too awful to pronounce).
>
>Lots of us cook in ways that are unrepeatable - good and bad.....like a
>great laksa dish I made a few months ago - I don't know why, but I can't
>make it quite as good again! Same basic ingredients, same source for
>coconut, same fishy additions, but it's missing something! But for the main
>if you share recipes, they can be tweaked and made better/ different by
>others in the group?

Well, I posted for help with an imitation of yesterday's lunch. I
guess one thing I'm missing is 'sweet' soy sauce. The little
restaurant offers many dishes with chicken, beef, or pork (or shrimp),
so I'm thinking Spicy Basil Chicken made with beef isn't authentic or
genuine or whatever. Sure tastes good, 'though.

What's the Malay dish (or dishes) you'd make for a first-time
taster/guest? I'm trying to think of the reverse and my mind's a
blank. Maybe a roast chicken with thyme (or sage) and a lemon and
onion inside. Asparagus, or green beans with walnuts. Or steamed
artichokes. Baked potato is simple and "typical". I've not made 4 pies
in my whole life, but I'd take a shot at apple pie just for the
ambiance. :-)

On Thu, 11 Dec 2003 08:30:15 -0600, "Rona Yuthasastrakosol"
> wrote:

>"Frogleg" > wrote

>> From "Tea" earlier in the thread: "But I would suspect
>> that most Chinese food in the US is horrid- just as most food in the
>> US is horrid."
>>
>
>"Most" isn't "everything".
>However, I would go so far to say "most" of the food in Canada, and likely
>the US, ethnic or otherwise is mediocre.

!!! Say, what? Holy catfish! From Miami to Seattle, and NYC to San
Diego (and Qubec to Vancouver), few can get a decent meal?! Good
grief! A vast culinary wasteland indeed. Over a quarter of a billion
people in darkness. Sad, sad.

>I've not been to all the
>restaurants in Canada or the US but I do tend to arrange travel
>itineraries/sight-seeing around food and restaurants. A lot of food out
>there is just not very good (in my opinion, of course). It seems the
>general population is quite happy with mediocrity and sees no reason to
>demand otherwise. Just look at Perkin's and Appleby's and the like.

As one sig has it, "remember, half the people you meet are below
average." Mediocre means middle, average. And you know what 'mass
market' means. It means appealing to the largest possible base of
consumers. It *doesn't* mean that non-mass books and movies and food
and interests are entirely entirely submerged. (Although I whine
continually/continuously it's gonna happen any day now.)

The mass market in the US is probably not too different than the same
elsewhere. The success of McDonald's worldwide, gruesome as it seems,
means that a burger and fries has mass appeal way beyond the borders
of the US. *I* don't care for it; *you* may not; but it's not going to
keep millions of Chinese and French and Morrocans from having Mac
Attacks.

Still, there's presumably good Morrocan food in Marrakesh, and French
food in Paris, and California food in Napa.

I *absolutely* agree too many are satisfied with mediocre. I argued
this point with someone who shortly served a Christmas salad with
"fresh" cherry tomatoes that were virtually indistinguishable from red
cottonballs. I see rock hard or far overripe fruits in supermarkets.
But *I* don't buy them. Nor do good restaurants, or careful home
cooks.

>Sometimes my friends drag me out to another Thai restaurant they've been
>raving about and ask me if it's good. I usually end up saying, "It might be
>good food, but it's not Thai" (and in fact, it's not usually good at all but
>I don't tell them that). I think it's important to understand there is a
>difference between (fill-in-ethnicity-here) food and
>Americanized-(fill-in-ethnicity-here) food. That way if you (general you)
>ever visit Thailand or whatever country, you'll know what to expect, or what
>not to expect.

Oh, I *hope* there'd be some surprises. :-) I *don't* expect American
restaurants to feature a full spectrum of fill-in-the-blank foods, but
I *do* think I can get some idea on home ground. To push the point,
what am I missing if I combine thinly-sliced grilled beef, lime juice,
fish sauce, green onion, chile flakes ("product of Thailand"), and
cilantro, and thinking I'm eating Yum Nua? OK, the toasted rice part.
I *can* do that, too, but I don't miss it when I don't. What variation
on Som Tam is too arcane for non-Thai preparation?

>But different salts have different flavours. Iodized table salt vs Malden
>sea salt vs grey salt, etc. If you do a side-by-side taste test, you'll
>notice the differences.

Really? As I've read, most "taste tests" have turned up highly
ambiguous results. Anyhow, I'm not in the class to pay $30/lb for salt
scraped up from some small Balkan beach. I doubt many Thai vendors of
street-food are either.

>> I didn't/don't say "this is good Thai food,"
>> I say, "this food tastes really good to me." I *like* what is
>> represented to be Thai food in the US. If I have to say, "I like a lot
>> of food that is cooked with or accompanied by rice noodles or rice,
>> and sometimes with coconut milk, lime juice, chiles, fish sauce,
>> basil, cilantro, chicken, fish, pork, chicken, lemon grass, cucumber,
>> different soy sauce..." every time I mean Thai, I'm gonna wear out my
>> kybd. :-)
>>
>
>I don't think it would be a hardship to say "I like the Thai food I've had,
>but I don't know how 'Thai' it is" or something like that. What's wrong
>with adding a (short) disclaimer?

To every flippin' reference to liking 'Thai' food? "I like the pizza
I've had in one restaurant in Albuquerque and one place in Arlington
and another in Palo Alto, but I don't know how Italian it is." "I
like plum clafouti I've made from a Julia Child recipe, but I don't
know how French it is." "I liked the posole I had at El Farol in Santa
Fe, but I don't know how Mexican it was." "I apologize for eating tuna
salad and baked potatoes, but I'm pretty sure this is 'American.'"

As Sturgeon's Law has it, "90% of science fiction is crap. Of course,
90% of everything is crap."

I think I remember reading that they are harvested in the fall.
I'm honestly not sure whether to pause and harvest mine, or just leave
them growing where they are for the winter. Although I'm pretty
sure that commercial crops of water chestnut go through a period
of dormancy, I'm not so clear on whether that is a preferred part
of the plants' life cycle, as it is with turmeric, or if it could be
avoided completely with the right environmental conditions.

***

You drove me to Google to validate the depths of my own ignorance,
and I have come away with some useful info: Namely, water chestnuts
are officially harvested in the fall; and tuber formation is related to
shorter day lengths. Under 12 hrs of daylight encourages the formation
of new chestnuts. Over 12 hours of daylight appears to actively
discourage them.

Here's the useful article:
http://tinyurl.com/ysho

I was also happy to note that at least this particular group of
researchers is pretty fuzzy, themselves, on the other factors which
may or may not make water chestnuts tick.

krnntp

James Silverton wrote:

> "KR" > wrote in message
> s.com...
>
>>Frogleg wrote:
>>
>>>Now, back to afa -- should I just overwinter my lemon grass it its
>>>pot, or maybe dig up and put in water for new shoots indoors? Too bad
>>>I can't grow water chestnuts. :-)
>>
>>But you *can* grow water chestnuts! Buy some firm ones without rotten
>>spots, bury them under an inch or two of moist, sandy soil in a wide
>>container without drainage, and when they start to send up shoots
>>maintain the container in a slightly flooded state, letting it dry
>>back to damp soil occasionally. And keep it blasted with light.
>>Water chestnut plants look a little like reeds or rushes, and
>>they spread underground like little damp potatoes.
>>
>
>
> Perhaps you can answer a question about water chestnuts. Are they a seasonal
> vegetable? At the moment they are plentiful and good in the DC area but
> sometimes good ones are very hard to find. I fthink fresh ones are
> infinitely superior in taste and texture to canned even if it is a bit
> tedious to peel them.
>

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 10 Dec 2003 08:16:12 -0600, "Rona Yuthasastrakosol"
> > wrote:
>
> >"Frogleg" > wrote in message
> .. .
> >
> >>
> >> But why must everything from a "foreign" cuisine that is cooked/served
> >> inside the US automatically become inferior "poorly represented
> >> ethnic" food? Why can't at least some of it become "cleverly adapted"
> >> or "emblematic of American willingness to embrace new tastes"?
> >
> >I don't think anyone has said "everything" is inferior.
>
> From "Tea" earlier in the thread: "But I would suspect
> that most Chinese food in the US is horrid- just as most food in the
> US is horrid."

I did say this- and I think you miss my point. You keep acting like someone
will take food away from you because it's not 'authentic'. This is YOUR
personal obsession.
I sometimes make corn bread- from the box. It's inauthentic. Authentic corn
bread should actually be made in a cast iron skillet that has been seasoned
for several years. It should not be overly sweet. If one really wants to be
authentic, one should use unsalted butter (Big House style) or pork grease
(poor man's style) for the pan.. How do I know this? Because my family has
been making corn bread on both sides for generations, and one day I hope to
inherit my mother's cast iron frying pan (it's been getting seasoned for
about 45 years now, so it should be about right). Nevertheless, I (and
sometimes even my mother) not only swear by Jiffy corn bread mix, I add
extra sugar and butter- and often make corn muffins in a teflon-coated
cupcake pan. Do I care that when I do so I am turning my back on a proud
tradition that goes back to plantation life in Maryland? Hell, no. Neither
does Mom. I doubt that the people at my local okonomiyaki joint give a crap
that okonomiyaki is a dish that rose out of the expediency of Hiroshima
mothers having to feed their children after the atomic bomb was dropped-
it's as 'authentic' a Japanese dish as the cheese crackers I pick up at my
local Japanese market, right next to the squid-flavored 'Italian' spaghetti
sauce and the Kewpie brand mayonnaise. By the way- okonomiyaki doesn't have
that 'zing' if you don't use Kewpie mayonnaise on it, dribbled right over
the bonito flakes writhing from the pancake steam.
>
> >And once you get
> >into "cleverly adapted" foods it starts becoming fusion cuisine. There's
> >nothing wrong with fusion as long as it's labelled accordingly, but to
say
> >it's "just like the original" (whatever that may be) would be incorrect.
>
> I never said "just like the original" because much of this began, more
> or less, when I was told I couldn't like Thai food, because,

Let's stop right here. OK? Because frankly, I'm getting sick of this. Who
the hell told you this? And why did you listen? And why are you still
wingeing about it, when everyone here has said the opposite?

Yah know, when I was in college, one of my friends was actually told by a
religion professor that there were no black Catholic saints- which is so
untrue (St. Augustine- one of the 'doctors of the Church'- was from North
Africa, for pete's sake. How dark he was, I don't know- but St. Martin de
Porres is always displayed as being as black as the proverbial Ace of
Spades). She then asked me. I named about three saints. She went to the
school library and found a good half dozen more. Strangely, she did not
spend the rest of the school year yakking on about how he told her some
stuff and nonsense, since she felt that the ramblings of an idiotic racist
religion professor weren't worth repeating except as a joke. At the time
when this happened, we were both 20. How old will you have to be before
your pain caused by the remarks of unnamed twits comes to an end? Or do you
just enjoy repeating idiocy for the fun of it?

I'll tell you something- when you keep repeating idiocy that you've taken
to heart, it eventually seeps into your brain and makes you sound like an
idiot too, even if you aren't one. The truth is this- the only authentic
cornbread in the ENTIRE world was made by my mother in her kitchen. It was
made in her special fry pan. It can only be made on a hot summer day, and
she has to be sweating to make it. It's only real when served with
fresh-squeezed lemonade, fresh-brewed iced tea, or cold whole milk poured
out of a milk bottle. It must be made in a stove manufactured shortly after
1960 but before 1967. Unfortunately, you can never have authentic cornbread,
because my parents moved out of the apartment that held that stove in 1972.
For a bizarre reason that escapes me, my father insists that my mother never
made authentic cornbread, since the only person who ever made authentic
cornbread was my paternal great grandmother in an oven located in a small
town in South Carolina. No doubt that worthy lady, were I to hold a seance,
would locate authentic cornbread as having been made by her mother. My
mother also insists that she doesn't make real cornbread (even when she uses
real cornmeal and her pan), because the whole world knows that only my
grandmother made authentic cornbread. I assume that the same thing can be
said about Thai cuisine- you can never get it, because it's only authentic
if it is made by a mother or grandmother, preferably in a location that no
longer exists or can't be inhabited, or could only be made if one can raise
the dead from their slumber. Or, it can only be made by a restaurant that no
longer exists, or by a friend with whom you've lost touch who came from that
part of the world- which is true of all authentic food. In fact, I do
believe my mother's cornbread from 1969 (I was 7 at the time, and knew a
great deal about food) tastes better and more authentic than anything she
now turns out of her kitchen.

"Rona Yuthasastrakosol" > wrote in message
...
> "Frogleg" > wrote in message
> ...
> >
> > From "Tea" earlier in the thread: "But I would suspect
> > that most Chinese food in the US is horrid- just as most food in the
> > US is horrid."
> >
>
> "Most" isn't "everything". And it sounds to me like Tea has a problem
with
> the US, anyway, so I wouldn't put too much faith in his/her statement.

Actually, I don't have a problem with the US. Most of the food all humans
eat isn't very hot. We don't usually have time to make gourmet food, and
few people in the world can afford such things, except maybe at festivals.


> However, I would go so far to say "most" of the food in Canada, and likely
> the US, ethnic or otherwise is mediocre.

"Mediocre' is actually a much better word than 'horrid'. I'll agree to
that. But quite frankly, most of what we eat in the US at chain restaurants
is 'horrid'. It's not just mediocre. Food that is made up of seemingly
nothing more than salt, sugar, fat and cottony bread of all kinds is pretty
damn horrid, and that's what most of us eat. IF it were that great, you
wouldn't get people to watch cooking shows- they represent of pornographic
fantasia of what we would eat if we had time and/or money- just as fashion
and home magazines show us what we would like to have in an ideal world.
That said, I think most home cooking is pretty damn good, even (and maybe
especially) when it's not fancy and made from the heart. I think the US has
wonderful cuisines- we match up against some of the best in the world when
we aren't eating fast food crap or doing poor renditions of other people's
stuff (which is not to say that all ethnic restaurant food is a poor
rendition- far from it).

It has been said by cooks with far more knowledge than I that Americans are
insecure about food. We are also (wrongfully) insecure about culture and
dreadfully afraid of knowledge. At the same time we produce some of the
most interesting culture and knowledge in the world- and usually don't value
either until it gets translated back to us (think of the number of people
who have pooh-poohed Westerns but love Seven Samurai without ever learning
about John Ford, or who will trip over themselves to get Stones tickets
while ignoring the blues artists who were their direct influences).
I don't think many people would argue that Americans are living in the best
and worst of times at once, food-wise. We have better artisanal breads,
cheeses, beers, wines and fruits available than ever before- and most people
are grossly overweight from eating at Wendy's while out and making Kraft Mac
'n' Cheese at home. We have great local cuisines- some of which are dying
because we are so busy learning Tuscan cooking. It isn't as if we don't
have 'peasant' foods here, whether homegrown, transplanted, or fusionized.

I hapen to love American food, in all its mutated, *******ized glory.
Everything from homemade macaroni and cheese to totally nasty Wonder Bread
and American cheese sandwiches. I like American food even when it is
horrid, when I'm in the right mood, or I wouldn't drool over White Castle.
But liking it doesn't mean I think everything I long to eat is good, or even
mediocre, anymore than my inexplicable desire to watch 'The Beastmaster'
every it comes on tv elevates that movie above the level of trash to which
it truly belongs. That movie is horrid, not mediocre. My love for it is
indefensible. So is my love for pork rinds and Dr. Pepper, and so is my
Chinese neighbor's love of chicken feet. The difference is, unlike most
people in the US, I'm not going to defend my love of such things, or pretend
that my adoration is ironic or kitschy, or that such a desire doesn't really
reflect a momentary lapse of reason. I love crtain things for the same
reason a woman will love her baby even if it is ugly- because it is
familiar, and simply just because.

Now, if you want to say that the average American simply eats medicre food,
knowing that it's mediocre, ok. I would argue that the average American-
like the average person anywhere in the world- eats mediocre food, even
downright bad food, and thinks it is the best thing ever. That may not
strike you as horrid, but it strikes me that way, especially since in the
US, at least, most of us do have a choice not to eat non-stop crap. If we
didn't have a choice, you wouldn't be on a list called alt.food.asian, there
wouldn't be a slowly growing 'slow food' movement, and 'Iron Chef' wouldn't
have anyone watching it. Lots of people think most food in the US is so
horrid that instead of buying crappy cookies from Keebler, they are learning
how to bake for the first time in their lives. I suspect the same thing is
happening in every part of the world where people are digging out old and
new recipes, many of which were once thought of as 'traditional', and
adapting them to modern life. I salute them. Crappy, badly made, over-salted
and chemicalized fatty food that takes years off your life and deadens your
soul is fine as a lark once in a while, but if you make a diet of it- well,
you are what you eat.

If most of the food people in the US eat is not horrid- horrid being the
opposite of tasty, satisfying and reasonably good for you- why is it that we
learn to cook from magazines and books, and not from our parents? Why does
it kill us and rot our insides? Why do we have to designate certain foods as
'tasty, satisfying and reasonably good for you' while charging a premium-
isn't that what 'organic' and 'free-range' and 'gourmet' and 'artisanal'
mean to most people? I for one think it's horrid that poor people can't
afford a normal chicken from a farm, one that does not have tumors from
being pumped with stroids and growth hormones, one that actually tastes like
a chicken, without having to pay top dollar for it. It's more than
mediocre- it's a crime. It's a crime that most American children have never
tasted fresh squeezed lemonade, and think that 'Countrytime' brand is like
the real thing. I have a feeling that underneath, you think the same thing,
since you strike me as a thoughtful person. When chickens served on almost
100% of American tables don't taste like real chickens- and they don't- the
word 'horrid' doesn't seem like too much of an exaggeration. Forget
'authenticity'. If you have all the right ingredients but those ingredients
don't taste like anything, the biggest problem is not whether you are
faithfully recreating a recipe from Thailand or even Vermont. The question
is whether you are eating something that is worth putting in your mouth- and
that seems to be a growing problem to people all over the world, or there
wouldn't be so much screaming about irradiation, hormones, steroids, and
factory farming pretty much everywhere on the planet.

"Frogleg" > wrote in message
...
> On Thu, 11 Dec 2003 08:30:15 -0600, "Rona Yuthasastrakosol"
> > wrote:
>
>
> As Sturgeon's Law has it, "90% of science fiction is crap. Of course,
> 90% of everything is crap."
On this we can agree. I was not taking a swipe at American food, or the US.
What I was saying is that most food is crap. What makes it even more crappy
is the tolerance of round the clock crap. Mediocrity than Long Island to the
Golden Gate, or from Vancouver to Prince Edward Island, is more than
'mediocre'- it's horrid. I'm not Canadian, but I know in the US we do
actually have wonderful foodways, yet most of our food is pretty bad because
most people do not cook, are used to eating mass-market food, and haven't
had a chance to train their taste buds. If I lived in French Polynesia and
only ate Spam, I wouldn't recognize good food either- because I would
probably assume that all food is supposed to be over-salted and filled with
fat.

As for salt- yes, different salts can taste different because of mineral
content. They can even taste differently because of how they are harvested
and how they are processed (my Welsh sea salt tastes differently from my
French sea salt, which is different from my American table salt- just as my
Mexican and Italian oregano are different from each other). However- and
this is important- great cooking has always been as much defined by the
artfulness of the cook in bringing out the best in the ingredients at had,
as it is by the quality of the ingredients. A Chinese cook on a tramp
steamer in the 1920s would have had a different set of ingredients available
to him than his ancestor on a merchant ship during the 1820s, but both would
have made interesting adaptions to their favorite dishes. I'm not so sure
that the roti found in Jamaica today is any less authentic in its own way
than roti found in Mumbai. It's authentic in its own way. The same with
curried goat, which differs from island to island and house to house in the
Caribbean. There is no such thing as a quintessential recipe for curried
goat- unless your mother made it. And who your mother was, and how good her
skills were, and whether she had to adapt the recipe to life in New York (as
my Haitian neighbors did when I was growing up) where some ingredients might
be unobtainable, will determine your understanding of how curried goat
should taste. Any arguments otherwise are nothing more than nostalgia and
wishful thinking, not unless anyone actually believes there is only one
curried goat recipe in the whole wide world. For me, authentic curried goat
tastes like the way my neighbor's mother made it. Jerk chicken is now
supposed to taste the way it did a week ago when I was in Jamaica- or the
way my 'Bajan neighbor made it when I was a teenager, which was very
different. It's rather like finding the 'real' recipe for turducken or
cheesecake- or that holy grail of American foods, the only good and proper
recipe for barbequed spare ribs. If you don't believe me on the last one,
just google 'barbequed ribs' and see what you get. People from St. Louis
have burst blood vessels while trying to explain to lunkheads from Texas and
North Carolina that there is only one true way to barbeque ribs. They are
wrong of course, since everyone knows that only North Carolinians have the
right recipe- which is different in every household, and is passed down as
sacred writ from father to son. All other recipes are just plain wrong,
stupid and should never be printed as fact, so unless you know a North
Carolinian, you can throw out all your barbeque recipes right now. Except
for my father's recipe, of course. Even though he is from South Carolina,
he has the one true recipe- and if I can get him drunk so that he will give
it to me, I may share it with the rest of the world. Of course, if I do
that, you will all 'ruin' it by using the wrong hot sauce as the base (which
can only be bought in one small general store in a tiny town in South
Carolina, but the town's name is a secret), even though it will taste
perfectly fine to you. It shouldn't though. After, it won't be authentic,
will it?

"Rona Yuthasastrakosol" > wrote in message
news [...]
> Even though it was just an example, in the case of Thai food, the reason
> most North American Thai food isn't Thai is because it is made by Laotians
> who pass themselves off as Thai. Most farangs don't know the difference,
> anyway (or don't think there's a difference, for that matter) so they
quite
> happily rave about their favourite Thai food which, in fact, isn't even
> Thai.


I became "friends" with the owners of two Thai restaurants, one in Berkeley,
CA, and one in Seattle. I never thought to ask if they were not Thai after
all, but rather Laotian. They said they were from Bangkok, and one took a
trip back to Bangkok when I knew her. I suppose that doesn't mean she
wasn't Laotian though. Waitstaff have greated me in Thai at Thai
restaurants too. What makes you think most restaurants are cooked by
Laotian chefs?

The food I've had at my favorite Thai restaurants in the US tasted basically
just like that I had in Bangkok. Of course, now I hold a less favorable
view of Thai restaurants in the US: They've gone downhill, but more in a
"bad" sense and not necessarily in an inauthentic sense. I haven't eaten in
a Thai restaurant in years.

Peter

[...]

> wrote in message
...
> "Tea" > wrote:
> > []
> > I sometimes make corn bread- from the box. It's inauthentic.
> > [ . . . ]
> > In fact, I do believe my mother's cornbread from 1969 (I was 7 at the
> > time, and > knew a great deal about food) tastes better and more
> > authentic than anything she > now turns out of her kitchen.
>
> The history of cornbread in your family heritage was a delightful
> read.Taste is more important than authenticity, if we can get by the
> emotional baggage.


But "taste" is a social construct. It always cracked me up when Americans
said about the Iron Chef show: "But the dishes are geared for Japanese
tastes. That's why they think they are so delicious." As if most
everything we hear, read, and experience here in the States about food is
not geared for American tastes.

Peter

"Tea" > wrote in message
.. .
>
> "Frogleg" > wrote in message
> ...
> > On Thu, 11 Dec 2003 08:30:15 -0600, "Rona Yuthasastrakosol"
> > > wrote:
> >
> >
> > As Sturgeon's Law has it, "90% of science fiction is crap. Of course,
> > 90% of everything is crap."
> On this we can agree. I was not taking a swipe at American food, or the
US.
> What I was saying is that most food is crap.


I'm flabbergasted. Don't know what do say. This evening I had a yummy Big
Mac. Wasn't horrid or crap. The fries were soggy though...


[...]
> As for salt- yes, different salts can taste different because of mineral
> content. They can even taste differently because of how they are
harvested
> and how they are processed (my Welsh sea salt tastes differently from my
> French sea salt, which is different from my American table salt- just as
my
> Mexican and Italian oregano are different from each other). However- and
> this is important- great cooking has always been as much defined by the
> artfulness of the cook in bringing out the best in the ingredients at had,
> as it is by the quality of the ingredients. A Chinese cook on a tramp
> steamer in the 1920s would have had a different set of ingredients
available
> to him than his ancestor on a merchant ship during the 1820s, but both
would
> have made interesting adaptions to their favorite dishes. I'm not so sure
> that the roti found in Jamaica today is any less authentic in its own way
> than roti found in Mumbai. It's authentic in its own way. The same with
> curried goat, which differs from island to island and house to house in
the
> Caribbean. There is no such thing as a quintessential recipe for curried
> goat- unless your mother made it. And who your mother was, and how good
her
> skills were, and whether she had to adapt the recipe to life in New York
(as
> my Haitian neighbors did when I was growing up) where some ingredients
might
> be unobtainable, will determine your understanding of how curried goat
> should taste. Any arguments otherwise are nothing more than nostalgia and
> wishful thinking, not unless anyone actually believes there is only one
> curried goat recipe in the whole wide world. For me, authentic curried
goat
> tastes like the way my neighbor's mother made it. Jerk chicken is now
> supposed to taste the way it did a week ago when I was in Jamaica- or the
> way my 'Bajan neighbor made it when I was a teenager, which was very
> different. It's rather like finding the 'real' recipe for turducken or
> cheesecake- or that holy grail of American foods, the only good and proper
> recipe for barbequed spare ribs. If you don't believe me on the last one,
> just google 'barbequed ribs' and see what you get. People from St. Louis
> have burst blood vessels while trying to explain to lunkheads from Texas
and
> North Carolina that there is only one true way to barbeque ribs. They are
> wrong of course, since everyone knows that only North Carolinians have the
> right recipe- which is different in every household, and is passed down as
> sacred writ from father to son. All other recipes are just plain wrong,
> stupid and should never be printed as fact, so unless you know a North
> Carolinian, you can throw out all your barbeque recipes right now. Except
> for my father's recipe, of course. Even though he is from South Carolina,
> he has the one true recipe- and if I can get him drunk so that he will
give
> it to me, I may share it with the rest of the world. Of course, if I do
> that, you will all 'ruin' it by using the wrong hot sauce as the base
(which
> can only be bought in one small general store in a tiny town in South
> Carolina, but the town's name is a secret), even though it will taste
> perfectly fine to you. It shouldn't though. After, it won't be
authentic,
> will it?


First you say Jamaican rotis are "authentic in its own way," then later you
talk about "real" recipes and you say things like "they are wrong." I can't
disagree more strongly. Your definition of "authentic" reeks way too much
of Plato, as if, as I wrote elsewhere, there is some Form for "Real BBQ
Ribs." Nonsense.

My definition of authentic is simply this: It is like what you find if you
went to the place of origin. Origin, not in the sense of back to the times
of Adam and Eve, but origin in the sense of Jamaican roti in Jamaica, Indian
rotis in India.

The Mexican chocolate (the tablets for the beverage) one finds in stores
here in the US are not from Oaxaca. Oaxacan chocolate is different and
distinct. Unless someone brings you back tablets from Oaxaca or unless you
go there, you can't experience it in the US -- unless you have a recipe and
ways to grind it properly. Well, I recently read an article by some silly
anthropologist (You're an anthropologist, right? I dunno, I have problems
with them, again and again.), where he stressed the fact that, well, Oaxacan
chocolate these days uses almonds from California and cinnamon from Africa,
or whereever. "So it's not authentic!" he proclaimed with apparent relish.
That's a bizarre and dogmatic use of the term "authentic," and from my
experience, only anthropologists seem to use the word that way. Quite
simply, Oaxacan chocolate is different from other chocolates in Mexico. I'm
sure way back when, when they used home-grown almonds and cinnamon, things
may have been better. But that doesn't mean that we can't talk about
authentic Oaxacan chocolate--it is authentic to the extent that it differs
noticeably from other Mexican chocolates.

I did like one of your other replies to froglady though.

Peter

[...]

On Thu, 11 Dec 2003 14:47:38 GMT, KR > wrote:

>Frogleg wrote:
>> Now, back to afa -- should I just overwinter my lemon grass it its
>> pot, or maybe dig up and put in water for new shoots indoors? Too bad
>> I can't grow water chestnuts. :-)
>
>But you *can* grow water chestnuts! Buy some firm ones without rotten
>spots,...

<snip growing directions>

Haven't ever seen fresh ones for sale. But I haven't been looking.
Perhaps the Korean grocery might have them sometime.

On Fri, 12 Dec 2003 04:07:59 GMT, "Tea" > wrote:

>
>"Frogleg" > wrote in message
.. .

>> As Sturgeon's Law has it, "90% of science fiction is crap. Of course,
>> 90% of everything is crap."

>On this we can agree. I was not taking a swipe at American food, or the US.
>What I was saying is that most food is crap. What makes it even more crappy
>is the tolerance of round the clock crap. Mediocrity than Long Island to the
>Golden Gate, or from Vancouver to Prince Edward Island, is more than
>'mediocre'- it's horrid. I'm not Canadian, but I know in the US we do
>actually have wonderful foodways, yet most of our food is pretty bad because
>most people do not cook, are used to eating mass-market food, and haven't
>had a chance to train their taste buds. If I lived in French Polynesia and
>only ate Spam, I wouldn't recognize good food either- because I would
>probably assume that all food is supposed to be over-salted and filled with
>fat.

This is, at least in part, my point. I don't like being pushed into a
chauvinsit corner, but these sweeping pronouncements often convey (to
me) that the rest of the world is a paradise of native culture, and
everything American is sub-standard or suspect. I look around my
lower-middle class neighborhood supermarket and am saddened by its
aisles of snack food and sugary cereals, and perpetual offerings of
well-traveled produce. However, I know this isn't a whole-country
phenomenon. I've also read of the care and interest many French take
in their food. All of them?

Tastes and food fashions change, too. While it's not a definitive
statistic, sales of cookbooks of every conceivable stripe have risen
astronomically in the past decade. They may not be "authentic," but
how many Thai restaurants were there 20 years ago? Salsa overtook
catsup as the most popular condiment some time ago. Current interest
in "organic" standards shows at least *some* are concerned with food
issues. Even fast-food outlets are responding to pressure and offering
healthier alternatives. Of course, whether 'healthy' is precisely
congruent with 'excellent' is another discussion. :-)

The Slow Food movement shows that some realize an emphasis on
quick'n'easy may be misguided. We're coming along.

I've never been anywhere in Asia, but here I am with a kitchenful of
dahl and coconut milk and (inferior) nam pla and sesame oil and sesame
seeds and nori and ginger and tamarind and chiles. I may not be in the
center of the normal distribution curve, but I don't think I'm *that*
far out on an edge.

Tea wrote:

> my Welsh sea salt tastes differently from my
> French sea salt, which is different from my American table salt- just as my
> Mexican and Italian oregano are different from each other).

NB. This is a pretty irrelevant point, but Mexican and Italian oreganos come from entirely different plants.

Best - krnntp

"Peter Dy" > wrote in message
. com...
>
>
> I became "friends" with the owners of two Thai restaurants, one in
Berkeley,
> CA, and one in Seattle. I never thought to ask if they were not Thai
after
> all, but rather Laotian. They said they were from Bangkok, and one took a
> trip back to Bangkok when I knew her. I suppose that doesn't mean she
> wasn't Laotian though. Waitstaff have greated me in Thai at Thai
> restaurants too. What makes you think most restaurants are cooked by
> Laotian chefs?
>

I was grossly exagerating my claim by including all of North America, just
for impact :-). I only know for certain that all but one of the Thai
restaurants in Winnipeg (there are roughly 10+ for a population of around
700 000) are owned and operated by Laotian families. Granted, one of them
lived in Thailand with his family as an adult, and passes himself off as
Thai (tells everyone he's Thai) but he's definitely Laotian. He's also the
one who advertises that his chef is from a hotel in Thailand, but my father
spoke to the chef and found he worked as a busboy at that hotel. I also
know the Thai restaurants in Keene, NH and Brattleboro, VT are owned and
operated by Laotians (I talked with the owners of both) and at least one of
the restaurants I visited in Portland, OR was Laotian owned and operated
(the others just had bad food, I think). In smaller restaurants we always
talk to the owners, waitstaff, or whomever and ask questions, including
where they're from. We used to ask if they knew about the Yuthasastrkosol
family but now there are Thais who don't even know the name so that test
doesn't work anymore :-). In larger restaurants, it's much more difficult
to learn about the ethnicities of the owners and chefs, though.

One reason Laotians easily pass themselves off as Thai is because Laotian
and Thai languages are mutually intelligible. Another is that many Laotians
lived in Thailand, often as refugees from what I understand. And, of
course, there's always the "most people can't tell the difference" reason.
I would guess that in places like the San Francisco-area and Los Angeles,
which have fairly large populations of Thais, more restaurants would be
owned and operated by Thais than in other places (but that does not mean all
would be Thai). However, in smaller areas the likelihood of finding Thai as
opposed to Laotian food becomes much smaller.

> The food I've had at my favorite Thai restaurants in the US tasted
basically
> just like that I had in Bangkok. Of course, now I hold a less favorable
> view of Thai restaurants in the US: They've gone downhill, but more in a
> "bad" sense and not necessarily in an inauthentic sense. I haven't eaten
in
> a Thai restaurant in years.
>

Have you ever been to Lotus of Siam (??) in Las Vegas? I've always wanted
to go to LV, just to try it. I've read so many good things about it.
However, I also read that Thai-phoon in Portland was one of the best Thai
restaurants in the US, and if that's the case, Thai restaurants in the US
must really suck.

rona
--
***For e-mail, replace .com with .ca Sorry for the inconvenience!***

"Rona Yuthasastrakosol" > wrote in message
...
>
> I was grossly exagerating

Oops. I had intended to fix that. It's "exaggerating" (those double
consonants get me every time!).

rona

> wrote in message
...
> "Peter Dy" > wrote:
> > > wrote in message
> > ...
> > > "Tea" > wrote:
> > > > []
> > > > I sometimes make corn bread- from the box. It's inauthentic.
> > > > [ . . . ]
> > > > In fact, I do believe my mother's cornbread from 1969 (I was 7 at
the
> > > > time, and > knew a great deal about food) tastes better and more
> > > > authentic than anything she > now turns out of her kitchen.
> > >
> > > The history of cornbread in your family heritage was a delightful
> > > read.Taste is more important than authenticity, if we can get by the
> > > emotional baggage.
> >
> > But "taste" is a social construct. It always cracked me up when
> > Americans said about the Iron Chef show: "But the dishes are geared for
> > Japanese tastes. That's why they think they are so delicious." As if
> > most everything we hear, read, and experience here in the States about
> > food is not geared for American tastes.
> >
> Peter, I was referring to how the food tastes when you put it in your
> mouth, as contrasted with 'taste' as a social construct, the latter being
> part of what I referred to as 'emotional baggage'. Hope this clarifies.


And I was saying that they are the same.

The true path to enlightenment is through authenticity. Only through
authenticity can one expand one's taste -- on the tongue and otherwise. I
call this the Noble Onefold Path.

Peter

> wrote in message
...
> "Peter Dy" > wrote:
[...]\
> > > > > The history of cornbread in your family heritage was a delightful
> > > > > read.Taste is more important than authenticity, if we can get by
> > > > > the emotional baggage.
> > > >
> > > > But "taste" is a social construct. It always cracked me up when
> > > > Americans said about the Iron Chef show: "But the dishes are geared
> > > > for Japanese tastes. That's why they think they are so delicious."
> > > > As if most everything we hear, read, and experience here in the
> > > > States about food is not geared for American tastes.
> > > >
> > > Peter, I was referring to how the food tastes when you put it in your
> > > mouth, as contrasted with 'taste' as a social construct, the latter
> > > being part of what I referred to as 'emotional baggage'. Hope this
> > > clarifies.
> >
> > And I was saying that they are the same.
> >
> > The true path to enlightenment is through authenticity. Only through
> > authenticity can one expand one's taste -- on the tongue and otherwise.
> > I call this the Noble Onefold Path.
> >
> The true path to enlightenment is through experience. Only through
> experience does one develop knowledge and wisdom. Authenticity is of
> historical interest as a teaching aid. YMMV


Experience that doesn't go beyond one's local horizons is impoverished, as
far as food is concerned, and other things as well, I suppose.

Peter

Peter Dy wrote:

> > What I was saying is that most food is crap.
>
> I'm flabbergasted. Don't know what do say. This evening I had a yummy Big
> Mac. Wasn't horrid or crap. The fries were soggy though...

If only I could get White Castles and McFries at the same place.....mmmmmmm.


--

"Bubba got a bl-wjob, BU$H f-cked us all!" - Slim

George "The AWOL President" Bush: http://awol.gq.nu/4dawol.htm

WHY IRAQ?: http://www.angelfire.com/creep/gwbush/remindus.html

VOTE HIM OUT! November 4, 2004

Salut/Hi Frogleg,

I'm back from the UK and as the one who most incurred your wrath, I'll
answer yet again, in the full knowledge that you won't change your mind.

le/on Fri, 12 Dec 2003 12:54:44 GMT, tu disais/you said:-

>This is, at least in part, my point. I don't like being pushed into a
>chauvinsit corner,

But that's exactly where you are if you reject many special ethnic products
as "newts' sweat" or whatever, and in the same breath claim that what you
get as ethnic food in the USA is just as good as the real thing. I'm not
making value judgements, simply stating facts. To give a couple of examples,
chickens and beef - both used extensively in Asian food. 99% of the
production of both in the US is entirely different from that found in asia.
The taste and texture is entirely different. This doesn't lead to subtle
differences of no importance, but to profound differences in cooking time,
texture - so important to asian food - and intensity of flavour.

Another thing. In Asia - at least in Singapore Malacca and Hong Kong, where
I've eaten asian food AND seen the markets, no restaurant worth its name
would consider using anything other than live seafood. In the USA, how many
do so? I'd suggest that 99% use frozen food. Again, this doesn't make for
tiny differences, but a huge difference. Add these differences to the
availability of fresh (exotic in the US) vegetables as opposed to imported
ones and you can see that "dumbed down" is a kind understatement.

Now if you've not got enough money to travel, and CAN'T ever taste these
foods as they should be, that's bad luck. But you should be honest enough
with yourself to look the facts in the face. Sorry.

> but these sweeping pronouncements often convey (to me) that the rest of the world is a paradise of native culture, and
>everything American is sub-standard or suspect.

I've not said that nor suggested it. All I've said is that for a variety of
reasons foods from other countries as served in the USA is a pallid
imitation of the real thing. Kindly don't generalise from there to subjects
about which I've not spoken, and about which you don't know my thoughts.

--
All the Best
Ian Hoare

Sometimes oi just sits and thinks
Sometimes oi just sits.

On Mon, 29 Dec 2003 16:22:29 +0100, Ian Hoare
> wrote:

>Salut/Hi Frogleg,

Hey, Ian. Great to see you back!
>
>I'm back from the UK and as the one who most incurred your wrath, I'll
>answer yet again, in the full knowledge that you won't change your mind.

(Funny how both never changing one's mind, and *always* changing one's
mind are both derogatory.)

>
>>This is, at least in part, my point. I don't like being pushed into a
>>chauvinsit corner,
>
>But that's exactly where you are if you reject many special ethnic products
>as "newts' sweat" or whatever, and in the same breath claim that what you
>get as ethnic food in the USA is just as good as the real thing.

I believe I introduced toad-sweat (no mention of newts) when asking
what secret local ingredients were so essential to a cuisine that no
dish could be properly made outside the country/area of origin. I did
*not* reject ethnic products en masse, although I have no desire to
try chicken feet or shark's fin in any guise. I *never* said my local
choices were "as good as the real thing," although I *will* argue that
aside from non-traveling ingredients, *many* dishes can be respectably
reproduced and enjoyed.

>The taste and texture [of chicken and beef] is entirely different.
>This doesn't lead to subtle
>differences of no importance, but to profound differences in cooking time,
>texture - so important to asian food - and intensity of flavour.

This may be true. However, a good part of the charm, to me, is the
Asian use of meat as a flavoring, not a primary ingredient. A recently
posted recipe for Cha Jang Mein contains 4oz of pork and an optional
4oz of shrimp for 8 servings, together with a boatload of spices, veg,
and noodles. You gonna tell me I can't get the right kind of 1/2 oz of
pork to have an "authentic" experience?
>
>Another thing. In Asia - at least in Singapore Malacca and Hong Kong, where
>I've eaten asian food AND seen the markets, no restaurant worth its name
>would consider using anything other than live seafood. In the USA, how many
>do so?

I will admit that my experience with live seafood (outside lobster,
oysters, and crab) is limited. I've never been to one of those toney
restaurants with a fish tank to choose from.

> Add these differences to the
>availability of fresh (exotic in the US) vegetables as opposed to imported
>ones and you can see that "dumbed down" is a kind understatement.

I reject that entirely. It is *difficult* but not impossible to have a
considerable variety of fresh "exotic" vegetables. Fruits are
trickier. I have grown bitter melon, lemon grass, Thai basil &
eggplant, long beans, winged beans, bok choi, a zillion chiles, quite
a variety of peas, melons, etc., etc. You are also short-changing
the originators of any cuisine in implying it *can't* be adapted. "Oh,
my. I would make my special soup, but now that I can't get the leaves
that grow on only one plant that lives only in that 1 acre outside my
village, it's impossible." This is the stuff of fairy tale, not
reality. I betcha if you take a Hong Kong chef and plunk him down in
the middle of California, he's not going to sit and whine about how he
can no longer create "authentic" dishes. He will figure out something
brilliant to do with artichokes and sail on.

> All I've said is that for a variety of
>reasons foods from other countries as served in the USA is a pallid
>imitation of the real thing. Kindly don't generalise from there to subjects
>about which I've not spoken, and about which you don't know my thoughts.

No mind-reader, I. The green papaya salad at Thai Kitchen (housed in a
former Taco Bell building) is *far* from palid. And given the simple
ingredients, well within the different recipes/reports I've read (in
English. Maybe it's completely different in Thai).

I *don't* think much of "ethnic" food in the US is equal, much less
superior to home-grown, except in spots. Have a measly 3 data points
(2 Beijing natives and 1 visitor) who prefer Peking(sic) duck in Palo
Alto to that in Beijing. I expect that if I wanted to have a whole
flock of terrific Thai food, the place to go would be Thailand. OTOH,
if I want to *sample* a taste of Thai -- get an idea of the flavors
and cooking styles, a little restaurant in the US may have a limited
menu, but not "palid", or dumbed-down cuisine. Is Vietnamese-French
dumbed-down French or dumbed-down Vietnamese? Or a happy coming
together of foodies eager to build on both?