Ethnic cuisine, what's to like and not like.

In My Humble Opinion
1

Tonight my wife and I had dinner with someone my wife use to work with. She is originally from southeast Texas, near Louisiana. She wanted my wife and I to try some of the traditional foods from that area, she called the food Creotex. The meal started with a black bean gumbo. I did not find the smell very appealing and it tasted worse. My wife did not like it either but her 2 kids and her boyfriend ate the stuff up. The next course was a shrimp stew on white rice with fried okra and some spicy cheese biscuits. I choked down a few shrimp and some of the rice and a couple biscuits. My wife claimed a stomach ache and ate one biscuit. Desert was a thick chocolate brownie topped with Klondike bar. Her family thought the meal was fantastic, my wife and I did not care for much of the meal except for desert. I know the desert wasn’t Creole or Creotex but I was not going to complain.

On the drive home my wife and I decided that someplace like New Orleans would not be someplace we would visit because of the cuisine. Besides Creole, my wife says she won’t eat Japanese food either, but she will eat Chinese. I don’t care for Japanese or Chinese, and I may not like French food base on the stuff a former girl friend use to pass off as French. We agreed we would and do eat many other ethnic food types such as Mexican, German, Italian, and Greek. I have tried Indian a few times, the food was good but much to hot. My question, are there any ethnic food types you don’t care for? And if you were to prepare an ethnic meal for guests, what would you fix?

2

I have never eaten it but judging from my friend’s descriptions, Swedish food is right outta there for me.

I would definitely serve Indian food, after all, I am Indian.

3

I love: Hunan, Schezuan, Thai, Italian, French country, Southern, Ukrainian, TexMex

I hate: Japanese, French fancy, yuppified BBQ, California cute

I think I can skip, based on descriptions: Nordic

:smiley:

4

Honestly, there isn’t anything I can think of that I won’t eat. Or at least try.

And I can’t think of anything I really, truly hate. Oh wait, I’m not a big fan of Gefilte Fish.

My husband and I have prepared meals for guest from several different ethnic cuisines. His specialties are Mexican and Italian, mine is Puerto Rican/Caribbean.

A meal I’d fix:

Appetizer - Tostones - fried green plaintains - with a garlic dipping sauce

Main dish - Pernil - roast pork shoulder - marinated overnight with lots of garlic and other spices

Side dishes - Arroz con Gandules - yellow rice with pigeon peas - and Arroz Blanco con Habichuelas - white rice and kidney beans

Dessert - Arroz con Dulce - a Puerto Rican style rice pudding with coconut - and Flan - custard.
I haven’t attempted Pasteles (basically Puerto Rican tamales) yet, but someday I hope to. My aunt and uncle make them a couple of times a year for the holidays. Since I don’t live near them anymore, I miss out. They sent me their recipe, but damn, they’re a lot of work.

5

I love any and all ethnic foods. I seriously can’t think of a style I don’t particularly like. They’re all good to me. Variety is the spice of life as they say and any opportunity to experience authentic homecooked ethnic food is welcomed by me. I live for new and unexpected flavors.

If I had to absolutely pick one favorite, I might have to pick Thai. And give it to me hot. Every time I go into a Thai place I have to ask for it not just hot, but Northern Thai hot. And yet they still go gentle on me the first time. The second meal, though, that’s when I start to love it. :slight_smile:

I also love classic and country-style French cooking. Coq au vin. Duck confit. Foie gras. Give me butter, give me cream, give me fat!! drools

For slightly off-the-beaten path cuisines, I love Georgian (as in former Soviet Union Georgia) food with its bright palette of herbs—cilantro, basil, summer savory, mint, and dill.

If I were to prepare an ethnic meal for guests, I would stick with what I know best: Hungarian. It’s a cuisine that’s absolutely safe with mainstream American palettes and yet is different enough to be distinguished from typical mid-Continental European meat and potatoes fare. It’s generally comfort food at its best, yet exotic enough for most people to be intriguing. Outside of perhaps Cleveland, Toronto, and New York, how many people are really familiar with Hungarian food? But what meateater would be offended by a plate of chicken paprikash with homemade galushka dumplings?

6

I am from Louisiana. You are painting Louisiana food with way to broad a brush. Louisiana has its own huge range of food that surpass the variety of most countries. Famous types include Creole, New Orleans (which also has its own other unique foods that do not fall into the Creole category, and Cajun (which isn’t like the pseudo-copies that they make all over the country). I always point out that Cajuns are a distinct culture and their location and culture do not really overlap New Orleans.

Example Louisiana foods could be: Seafood Po-Boys, New Orleans Bananas Foster, gumbo, and boiled crawfish. There are many others. I have never met anyone that didn’t think at least a few of the dishes were great.

All of these types of foods can be done poorly or badly just like any other. In fact, most Louisiana dishes are fairly difficult to cook well in my experience and quality versions are rare even within the state. However, they are definetly there in many places in New Orleans and on some of the back roads of the remaining cajun country. It would be foolish to write it off Louisiana food from one meal just like it would be to say that all Italian food sucks because someone made you a bad pot of spaghetti.

Strangely enough, my wife is the finest amateur Louisiana cook that I have ever met and she is from Massachusetts and we live in Massachusetts. My family from Louisiana goes crazy over her dishes when they visit and get recipes to take home.

7

Nope, I haven’t met one yet, and I’ve tried a lot.

I’d probably fix Indian, Mexican or Japanese dishes, because they’re cuisines in which I excel, somewhat.

Same here.

8

I haven’t ruled out any entire cuisines yet.

The raw fishies don’t ick me out but don’t do much for me either, but if you can get the Japanese to actually cook something, they’ve got some pretty good ideas when they do :slight_smile:

There’s a lot of bland blah food in Hawaiian and some Caribbean cuisine, but many entirely sufficient exceptions.

The Scottish, Swedes, and Norwegians all have a handful of horrid things they do with fish…come to think of it, so do the Jews, and similarly at that… but all four cuisines shine if you don’t try to embrace every acquired-taste item they might be known for.

The Southerners sometimes do some questionable and slimy things with okra and there exists an item known as the chit’lin which I would neither eat nor recommend, but you can’t disparage Southern cooking for that alone.

Among American hippie vegetarians, there are some macrobiotic offerings that resemble the coagulated clumps of grass that stick to the bottom of your lawn mower and probably don’t taste quite as good, but you’d be missing a lot of good food if you used that to give up on hippie-vegetarian.

So far I love Mexican, Cajun, Italian, French, German, Southern / “Soul Food”, Indian, Brazilian, Chinese, Puerto Rican, Polish, Portuguese, Ukrainian, Thai, American hippie-veg, Jamaican, Ethiopian, Burmese, Armenian, Afghanistani, Navajo, Kosher Moroccan, Creole, Russian, Greek, Algerian, Australian… dang, I’m hungry now!

9

I can’t think of any ethnic food I won’t eat. In fact, I can’t think of many things that I eat or restaurants that I go to that arn’t “ethnic food”. I’m vegetarian, so I do better some places than other (and “American food” kind of sucks for me), but I can always find something to eat and I think I seek out a wider variety of foods than someone who sticks to meat and potatoes, or chicken and salads.

At home I cook mainly Mexican, for reasons I can’t begin to fathom. I make killer green enchiladas. Tonight it’s black bean burritos and fried potatos. I try Indian sometimes, but I just don’t have the knack.

10

Wow. New Orleans is the place I convinced several people who adamantly hated seafood into seafood lovers. It’s nigh impossible to get a bad meal in that city and for me, it’s the culinary Mecca, or at least Medina, of the US. Shagnasty is right—the food is quite varied and has so much to offer that it’s a little disheartening to hear it dismissed because of one homecooked (possibly objectively bad) “Creotex” (?) meal. Trust me on this: Even if you have the most mainstream American tastes, you will find something you absolutely love in New Orleans cooking. At the very least who doesn’t like blackened catfish or blackened chicken (I know, I know…not really traditional NO eatins, but no doubt originated there.)

11

So. Got some sort of hostility towards Indonesian cuisine then? Don’t like a nice nasi goreng or rijstafel? Picky eater, eh? :smiley:

Of the ethnic cuisines you list, I don’t think I’ve ever had burmese. I may have accidentally made kosher Moroccan by cooking up some chicken with cous-cous and pickled lemons.

It’s all an adventure! I would never write off a single cuisine due to a bad experience.

12

Ugh. In mine too. My father is from Louisiana. He is absolutley one of the best cooks I have ever met. I grew up eating Cajun food (and Puerto Rican), but I’ve yet to master the Cajun cuisine.

I’m still perfecting the Puerto Rican, so one step at a time, I reckon.

I’ve attempted jambalaya and gumbo with mild success. They were edible. That’s all I’ll say. My husband makes them both better than I do. Red beans and rice is a little easier for me as it’s not a terrible stretch from rice and beans.

Practice makes perfect I suppose.

13

I’m not much of a chef, so I don’t know what I would do if I had to prepare a meal. Probably something vaguely Asian, since my most reliably tasty dish is stir-fry.

I can’t think of any ethnic food I hate, although I am least experienced and feel most out of place with Eastern European food - I have no idea what anything is. Here in Chicago, a lot of my coworkers are Eastern European or of E. European descent and fondly discuss their mothers cooking things I have never heard of. (I’m actually an Ashkenazi Jew, but the culinary heritage got lost somewhere along the line.) And they’ve never had curry or sushi and don’t know how to use chopsticks. Just kind of funny.

My most favorite ethnic food is Indian. I could eat Indian food every day. Maybe someday I’ll learn to cook it and then I will!

14

Pork. Potatoes. Cabbage. That’s sums up a good portion of it. :wink: But seriously, a good portion of Eastern European cuisine is based around those ingredients. If you want to sample some decent and cheap Polish food in Chicago, go to Bobak’s. There’s one in Naperville somewhere, and another one on the Southwest Side at Archer just east of Cicero (if you’re in the neighborhood, I can even accompany you there.) On weekdays for under $10 you can get an all-you-can eat dinner with soup. On Sundays, they have a special meal which is like $13. If you get there for lunch it’s something like $7. One of the best bargains in the city.

Typical soups: Borscht (beet soup), Krupnik (chicken soup with barley), Zurek/White borscht (sour soup made with lactic acid fermentation)

Entrees: Stuffed cabbage (with ground beef/pork & rice), breaded pork chops, kopytka (Polish gnocchi), pierogi (pasta stuffed with meat, vegetables, or fruit. The best IMO are the potato and fresh cheese ones, aka ‘Ruskie pierogi’ or Russian pierogi"), white sausage, smoked Polish sausage, roast pork, bigos (Hunter’s stew—basically a stew made of sauerkraut and whatever meat you can find), beef with mushroom sauce, etc…

If you’re in the northside, you can also try the Red Apple at 6474 Milwaukee, near Devon.

15

I do live on the North Side, but not quite as far as Devon. Besides, if I got my ass up there you know I’d be distracted by all the pretty, pretty Indian restaurants.

I’m a vegetarian. I don’t know if I’m meant for Eastern European food.

16

Chinese is my favorite. Then Mexican.

Not crazy about Italian, though. Too big of a wus to try Japanese or Indian but I’m fairly sure I wouldn’t like either. I despise Cajun food.

If I had company, I’d take them to the local Chinese joint; no need for them to be subjected to my cooking.

17

And while you’re there, if you see a large pile of pierogi walking toward you, it’s a safe bet that I overloaded my plate again and I can’t see where I am going.

Nummy nummy nummy.

I’m very timid about trying new foods, thanks to an excessively creative mother whose goal in life was to come up with the most possible uses for offal. On the other hand, I have had exposure to wonderful ethnic and regional foods, so I’ve found something to eat and enjoy on Greek, Italian, Puerto Rican, Mexican, Thai, German, Polish, American Southern, Chinese, Japanese, Swedish, French and Cajun menus. I want to try Indian food next, but I’m a bit put off by the dusty smell of some of the sauces. When I cook ethnic, it’s usually Italian all the way (although I’ve pulled off one or two really decent Mexican menus, too.)

18

Well, you left out a key piece of information.

Yeah, you’re not meant for most Eastern European food. If you’re not vegan, though, you can enjoy pierogi, one of the Comfort Foods of the Gods. You can find them frozen in most supermarkets in Chicago. Look out for Potato & Cheese, Mushroom, Potato & Dill, and all the varieties of fruit pierogi. Christmas Eve dinner is traditionally pisco-vegetarian. White and red borscht are often vegetarian.

But, yeah, if you’re near Devon and a vegetarian, Indian food is the way to go. (There’s also a decent Thai place further down near Loyola called Thai Spice on the north side of the Street at something like 1200 or 1300 W).

19

I don’t think I’d write off the food of an entire region because of one home-cooked meal in a sub-style most people have never even heard of. (I can only guess that Creotex is a fusion of Creole and Tex-Mex, which are two styles that I really have a hard time imagining would work well together. ) It would be like completely writing off Mexican food because you had a burrito at Taco Bell one time and it was gross.

For the record, what you were served sounds nothing at all like what you’d get at a restaurant in New Orleans. Gumbo doesn’t typically have beans, black or otherwise. Dr.J tells me it can have beans, but I’ve never seen any versions that have them. Can’t say that I’ve ever seen stew dishes served with sides of fried okra, either, just rice and bread.

Personally, I can’t think of any particular ethnic cuisine I’ve tried that I don’t like. Now, there are certain dishes in any given cuisine that I think are pretty foul, but not enough of them that I could say that I don’t like ___ food. I like most Chinese food, and while I’m not that impressed with sushi I’ve really liked the few cooked Japanese dishes I’ve had. I luuuurrrvvvee Indian, Thai, Vietnamese, Cajun, Creole, and Caribbean.

As for what I’d fix for guests, I suppose it would depend on what counts as ethnic food. If traditional Southern food counted, I’d probably go with that. I fry up a mean mess of catfish.

20

I have yet to find an ethnic food I don’t like. Having said that, brit food (aside from pub grub) tends towards the bland end of the scale.

I have no desire to try thousand year eggs, but that’s really the only thing that I can think of that I don’t think I’ll ever try. Heck, after hearing all about lutefisk, I wanna try it. Oh, and I’m a little scared of gefiltefish, but that’s because the first time I saw it, it was green. In the jar. And my father assured me, as we threw out the jar, that it’s not supposed to be green.