Mmmmmmmmmmmm, Fritos! :o
I sometimes use them to scrape ribbons from a brick of cream cheese and then let the combination melt in my mouth. Pure bliss!
It started as Fair Food. The fritos bag makes it easy for the vendor to throw everything together and for the visitor to walk around seeing the sites while eating it.
I’ve noticed that a lot of people see reports about Fair Food and confuse it with American Cuisine. We do not eat this stuff on a regular basis. Well, I suppose maybe in frat houses you might find it served. . .
Vendors compete for the most cringe-inducing combinations. That’s the origin of the doughnut-as-cheeseburger-bun and fried butter, and Koolickles (A pickle frozen in Kool-aid).
In all fairness, the Scottish really started it all with their deep-fried snicker bars.
Wait a minute—are you saying there is no actual bacon there? A Land Without Bacon?
Italy has dozens of different kinds of pork products. I’d call pancetta close enough to be called bacon.
I just Googled Koolickles and it appears that they’re not frozen, just steeped in brine that contains Kool-Aid and sugar. Disgusting either way.
Yeah, I’d probably call it a type of unsmoked bacon. Different enough from American bacon that I wouldn’t substitute one for the other usually, but similar enough that it can be called a type of bacon. German speck like bauchspeck is pretty close to American bacon, being smoked, cured, and made from pork belly.
There are a great many people in the world, even including many Americans, who have never tried biscuits and gravy. Most non-Americans wouldn’t even have a clue what the dish is, since while many places have a food called “biscuit” or something similar, the American biscuit is quite unlike any of those other foods (the closest actual relative is the scone). But I’ve never heard of anyone, from any country, who’s ever actually tried biscuits and gravy without loving it.
Indeed. What’s not to like? Sausage, gravy, and biscuits.
Moreover, given the fact that she, a white woman, said “that’s what white people eat” I’d lay a bet she was entirely joking anyway. Someone either called what she was eating pierogi, or suggested that samosas are just like pierogi, and she quipped in reply.
(Is pierogi the plural form too? I didn’t know that…)
Huh! Next you’ll be saying haggis is no good! :mad:
Yes; from my limited knowledge of Polish, I believe the singular is pierog.
Biscuits and gravy I don’t even think is all that regional any longer. It’s kind of like chicken and waffles in that it may have been regional at one point, but there are so many restaurants all over now that try to cash in on “hey this is [some other region] style food” that you can find that stuff everywhere. Cracker Barrel for example is mostly national (or at least not at all confined to the Southeast) and sells Biscuits and Gravy as a standard menu item. That’s probably one of the more well known big chains but I think even Hardee’s/Carl Jr served it as a national menu item for awhile.
The one common denominator of course is that you won’t find it on any nice menu items, and it’s pretty strictly served for breakfast. A lot of people don’t eat at sit down restaurants for breakfast, and the restaurants that serve sit down restaurants all tend to be the lower end of the restaurant world (essentially diner style places.)
In English, it’s “pierogies.”
Yes, “pierog” is the singular in Polish, but generally not used in English. For the plural, I hear both “pierogi” and “pierogies” here in English.
Just like Pampers are “pampersy” (plural) in Russian. 
I was hitchhiking through Wisconsin once in the dead of winter (don’t ask me why; it’s a long story!) and freezing my ass off just west of the Dells. I was still miles from home and hadn’t had a lift in hours, so I decided to go into a roadside restaurant for some coffee. I was damned near flat broke, so you can imagine the delight I felt when I saw the cheapest thing on the menu was biscuits and sausage gravy. As difficult as it is to believe (this was 1983 or '84), I swear they cost only a half dollar, and when they came, they were on a huge platter.
I have seldom enjoyed a meal in a sit-down restaurant so much in my life! :o
I seem to mention my brother rather a lot on SDMB: but please, nobody breathe a word to him about the bolded-above idea. He’s a keen foodie and cook, and very adventurous; and loves vegetables, with broccoli high on his “like” list. I’m into the same kind of stuff, but in a somewhat less adventurous way – and am not keen on broccoli: will reluctantly eat it as a straight “side” to a meal, but that’s where I stop. I see him absolutely loving the idea of sweet broccoli pie; and making one, and trying it on me.
What? How dare you Sir. How very dare you. Are you suggesting I have some kind of prejudice against the peasentry? I’ ll have you know some of my best friends are very nearly poor. Why, my cleaning lady is BULGARIAN for goodness sake.
I demand satisfaction.
The idea that grits and polenta are virtually the same product is common enough that Alton Brown dedicated an entire episode of Good Eats to it. I never saw the whole thing, so maybe he offers a better explanation.
And I don’t think that the really aggressive bitter taste that I associate with masa harina is present in hominy grits.
I was born in California and we moved around a lot, but my growing up school years were UP of Mich, Wisconsin and Minnesota. I’ve got Midwest street cred and *used *to have the accent to prove it. 
I moved away, my sister stayed. Going back after many years was a culture shock.