My sister and I were discussing “foodies”, and we were wondering if people who describe themselves as “foodies” are usually white people.
I thought about it. Come to think of it, “foodie” seems to be a term usually used by/applied to people who are white. Perhaps it’s something about white people trying the food of other cultures?
(I’m not trying to bash white or non-white people in this thread, or even bash foodies. It’s just something I was wondering about.)
This hasn’t been my experience. The proportions of people I know who express an interest in high-caliber food (betokened by, say, trying exotic cuisines or ingredients, novel cooking techniques, enthusiasm for tasting menus) are roughly in proportion to the distribution of various races in American society generally.
It seems like all races are represented by the contestants on Chopped, but the producers might have certain quotas.
“Foodie,” the term, may be proportionately more popular among white people, but IME non-white people are more likely to be foodies, as I understand the concept. The term “whitebread” may suggest the gap I’m thinking of.
Looks like the OP is from Canada? The great majority of Canadians are white, so it wouldn’t be surprising if the foodies you meet are usually white people. 
“Foodie” is a term for a subset of yuppie types and their younger brethren like liberal college students at exclusive schools and they are overwhelmingly white so I would say it is true. That doesn’t mean that other groups aren’t into food. They are of course. Black people in the South invented some of the best American foods and immigrant groups bring their own with them and modify it over time to make incredible dishes. “Foodies” are different. They aren’t the original artists. They are more like the snobs at the art gallery.
“Foodie” means to me someone who isn’t just interested in some type of good cooking. It is someone who is always looking for the newest and hottest food trend and uses that to impress their friends (see also wine and beer connoisseurs). They may know how to cook quite well technically speaking but it is done the most expensive way possible using the best tools money can buy and the recipes used are usually out of the cookbooks of the latest hot chef rather than old family recipes.
There is nothing wrong with it except sometimes for the attitude that sometimes goes with it but I wouldn’t call it genuine. If this isn’t already an entry www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com , it should be.
“Foodie” conjures up a certain subculture. Like, someone who describes themselves as a foodie wouldn’t be into plain mayonnaise, but rather wasabi-and-chives spread made with extra extra virgin olive oil, imported from some obscure Mediterranean island, for $8.99 a jar.
And they will use words like “exquisite” to describe it.
So it sounds like something a person with a lot of disposable income would be into. People in this demographic are disproportionately white, but I know a black person who is one. She can be a little exasperating to be around, but hey, everyone’s got their “thing”.
Yeah, I think of “foodie” as a term people apply to themselves when they have a lot of money to try a lot of things. People who don’t have so much money just say “I’ll try anything.”
Some of you clearly have a different understanding of the term than I do. The people I know that I’d think of as foodies (or connoisseurs, above) certainly don’t do it to impress people.
It’s not about money. It’s not about ‘trying things,’ necessarily; some foodies are pretty firmly locked into specific cuisines.
It’s about caring, and paying attention, and appreciating.
Of the foodies that I know, one is black and one is Indian-American. So it is not a white thing.
Iron Chef is a Japanese game show…
I agree that foodie is probably correlated with SES, so any racial disparities are more due to SES disparities.
And my anecdotal evidence agrees - our foodie group is 3 WASPS, 3 Jews, one Indian and one African American (Hmm - Did I just describe a James Watt dinner group?)
I know a pretty wide rainbow of foodies.
I think there is a pretty big difference between a foodie and a food snob. Most foodies I know spend a lot more time in hole-in-the-wall ethnic restaurants than at the celebrity chef bistros. It’s all about the sampling the best of ______, and that’s rarely synonymous with the fanciest or most expensive. The best Chinese restaurants are always in unassuming suburban strip malls. The best tacos often come out of trucks. The best pizza usually come from busy, boisterous, moderately priced pizzerias. Now and then they might drop some dollars on a nice sushi restaurant or bistro, but even then it’s often about catching the $30 prix fixe lunch menu than spending a fortune going all out. I don’t know any foodie who doesn’t adore street food, from-scratch home cooking, and classic comfort foods.
Likewise, all the foodies I know like to cook with fresh, whole ingredients. The serious ones outfit their kitchen with cheap, durable stuff from restaurant supply stores. Now and then they may get excited about a really amazing cheese or a good cut of beef, but that probably doesn’t happen quite as often as getting excited about finding really good mangos at the Salvadorian grocery or huge bags of cheap spices from the Indian store.
Food snobs, on the other hand, outfit their kitchen from Williams-Sonoma and eat at the countless expensive mediocre restaurants out there.
Anyway, what makes a foodie a foodie is that food is an event, rather than an aside. It’s a hobby like any other, no better or worse than being a movie buff or a golfer.
True. I was married to a real one for a long time and she and her family are famous in the foodie world especially when it comes to cheeses. They are pretty genuine when it comes to food but I got exposed to lots of others who were the biggest assholes you ever met and a few of them are famous. I like good food as much as anyone else but it is like any other passion. Some people like it as a hobby, some like it as a business model because there is a market for it (like they do) and others embrace it as super-trenders to show their superiority and put other people down.
I associate the word "foodie mostly with the latter because there are better single word descriptors for the other types of people that appreciate or can produce great food. It is like any other hobby. There are some people that view it as a competition and take it extremes.
Over the last 20+ years, 99% of the foodies I met were . . . . Japanese.
Surprising, when you think of it.
I know it is a joke but I am not sure it is really true in the sense I know the term. Your friends might be picky about sushi, seafood, and noodles but are they switching themes constantly to find the best American BBQ (with custom cookers and specialty smoking wood) or the greatest Foie gras from France? The mark a real foodie is switching themes stay ahead of the game whether it is Ceviche from South America or an exotic dish from Ethiopia and the facination with each of them only lasts a few years at best.
Cute.
I don’t get it. Monstro is black herself.
I have three friends/friendly aquaintances who are self-described ‘foodies’ and two are black, one is Chinese-American. I also have met and heard of a bunch of white people who describe themselves thus, of course. But I don’t think it’s something less likely to be found among non-white Americans. I do think it’s far more common in urban, coastal America.
That’s the joke, silly.