[www.geocities.com/aipsg/1200youth.htm+the+word+desi&hl=en]Explanation](http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:VraMkW0BHZ8J:[url) of Desi
Also, I have, umm, no problem with the use of the word Desi. I don’t use it under pressure or because I’m trying to be PC…I use it because it’s polite, somewhat akin to labelling a Canadian an American rather than a fellow North American. I hope I’m not heading for a pitting.
It does, thank you, and is pretty nifty too. Little cultural tidbits like that are fascinating.
Does clear up my confusion, that is. Should’ve previewed.
And I’m not bothered in the least, if that’s what you’re afraid of. I may be a bleeding heart but I’m not one of the Offenderati and even made a non-PC joke myself up-thread. I was just completely unfamiliar with the term.
Well, I’m a white chick who loves Kool-Aid and sugary sodas. Go figure.
Never. Screw white people! Naw, I dunno, probably. Like I said, I try to be noncontroversial.
anu-la: I don’t think we’re at the same school, since I don’t recognize your location. In this case, DI stands for the Daily Illini. Is that where you’re at?
They had chicken and catfish, actually.
So am I incorrect in thinking that some black people might be offended? What about black people who grew up in the north, where we don’t normally eat food like that? Is it common for black people in Chicago and Detroit and wherever to eat soul food? Is this type of food eaten by people in the South, whether they’re white or black, and black people, whether they’re from the North or South?
I’m ceratinly not looking for reasons to be offended, so don’t misinterpret me like that. I had originally thought that this type of food was just a Southern thing, and not really a black thing. I honestly don’t know very much about this type of food at all. Just looking for anecdotes and opinions, I guess.
That’s an old location. We go to the same school.
Strange, yet awesome. I only know one other Doper who currently goes here, and he doesn’t post very often. Now I want to know who you are! Did you go to the garba this semester? I went last semester.
I go to the lawschool…I think you’re in undergrad, right? You looked really young in your photo from the photo thread.
If you see me around campustown getting take-out at Empire, scream hello.
I am indeed in undergrad (everyone says I look really young–usually people think I’m around 16). I remember your photos now. Cool!
I’m white and hate kool-aid and catfish but the rest is pretty typical of a meal I’d eat at my mom’s house. I’d kill for some beans with ham hocks, rice, fried potatoes, turnip greens, and hot buttered cornbread right now. And not that god forsaken yellow crap you get in a box either.
Cornbread isn’t sweet but tea is. You yankees got it backwards.
Mmmm, pass the soul food! I’m a Jew from Miami, but I love ham hocks, fried chicken, barbecued anything, fried catfish, mac and cheese, collard greens, cornbread, and plenty of sweet tea. Some people might go to a restaurant and be impressed if they have white linen tableclothes and fine place settings, but not me. If I go to a restaurant, I’m impressed if each table has its own bottle of hot sauce!
AwSnappity. I’d be more offended by a botched effort. I mean, if I was promised a Soul Food dinner and the catfish was served baked with cilantro, the macaroni and cheese came straight out of a box mix, the Kool-Aid was watery and some weird flavor like lime, the collard greens were cooked without meat and there was no hot sauce anywhere to be found, I’d be a little heated. You can’t really stereotype ethnic foods; you can only prepare them right or wrong.
Most blacks in Detroit and Chicago are descendants those blacks who relocated during the Great Migration from the South: f’rinstance, my relatives in Michigan relocated from West Tenneseee and my family in New York City came up from South Carolina. Unless you just can’t cook there’s not a black person in the north who can claim to be completely ignorant of Southern cooking.
No matter where you live, you tend to eat whatever you have easy access to: if my local grocery store stocked 5-pound bags of grits, I’d be eating grits. Since it doesn’t, I eat Egg McMuffins. My once-steady diet of seafood since I’ve moved away from home dribbled to a once-a month thing because it’s freakin’ expensive up here. I’m used to perch, shrimp and crabs: I’m lucky if I eat sardines.
Soul food is not generally an everyday thing for me or anyone else I know; it’s too much work, for one. It’s eaten during holidays, special occassions and Sundays (like in the movie SOUL FOOD), or every once in while a good old fashioned weekend fish fry.
The overlap of white cuisine and black cuisine in the South is considerable, but there are, as with anything, nuances. What Shagnasty and I said about beverages, chopped up greens and lower end pork parts are all pretty much true. Everybody in the South eats grits, but I’ve only ever seen black people eat theirs with hot sauce (Yum!) or syrup or jelly. (Disgusting.) Most black people I know bake mac and cheese like a casserole with TONS of cheese. Most white people’s macaroni is creamy and lighter on cheese.
It’s funny seeing you guys refer to this stuff as soul food. Growing up in the south, it was known to me simply as “food”.
The only reason that I get a kick out of this is that there are relatively few things that outsiders truly appreciate about the south, but our food seems to be one of them :).
Awesome. Thanks for the responses! That’s what I was looking for.
I hope you’re joking.If not… imagines what the reaction would be if a poster had put up something saying ‘screw black people’
Pardon my blatant ignorance on Themed Days and Months by the Deparment of Calendar Thingies, but is there an Asian Peoples History Month?
Cause if there is, I think ramen noodles and OB beer would be excellent.
Personally I would have liked a few more items to choose from. That being said, I remember my University days and ANY change in the dining hall menu was a welcome respite from the usual crap they served. Of course, they probably got the Soul Food wrong too.
By the way, the proper Kool-Aid flavor to serve would have been RED. Not grape. Yes, red is a FLAVOR. 
Of course I’m joking. You conveniently edited out the very next sentence where I contradicted the “screw white people” and I answered your question seriously, that I probably would have nixed it if there was a possibility that white people would have been offended (and yellow people, and brown people, and orange people, and purple people…)
I agree. If someone’s going to serve me good food, I say bring it on!
And I’m a white boy in Florida, but many of the menu items being listed here sound great to me. And as Askia said, there’s a lot of overlap in “black” cooking and southern cooking. I don’t pretend to know the differences in nuance, but I know I likes me some good southern cookin’, and if the food’s good, I’m not complaining.
My dad grew up in North Carolina, in about as rural an area you could find. And he grew up learning all sorts of good southern cooking. I love it when he makes his New Years pot of black-eyed peas. Yummmmmmmmmmm.
Damn – you guys are making me hungry.
What are they going to serve for the White History Month dinner?
What are they going to serve for the Brown History Month dinner?
What are they going to serve for the Yellow History Month dinner?
What are they going to serve for the Pink-And-Purple-Polka-Dotted History Month dinner?
Why do we even have a (color of your choice) History Month in the first place?
