I’m not saying those cuisines are “unamerican”, but if every type of food popular in a particular country is thought of as part of that country’s cuisine, then we might as well just call it all “food”. Because if Chinese dishes become Italian cuisine simply because they’re popular in Italy, it makes no sense to even speak of Chinese dishes or Italian dishes.
My parents grew up in Pennsylvania, in the general area of Philadelphia. The British-German-general northern European style of food we had was often somewhat bland. About the spiciest thing we had was Pennsylvania Dutch scrapple. Macaroni and beef casserole with elbow noodles and tomato sauce was an exotic dish. (Sort of I-talian, you know.) My mom made pretty good spaghetti sauce, but the seasoning was subtle – oregano and a few other herbs – certainly nothing hot. I didn’t have pizza until I was a teenager, and I had never had a bagel until after I married an exotic foreign person. What’s often called traditional American heartland food would include pot roast (or meat loaf), potatoes, a green vegetable. Seasonings might be an herb or two, salt, pepper, onion. Oh, another daring item was devilled eggs, with that exotic red spice, paprika, sprinkled on top.
That said, the current American cuisine has richly benefitted by borrowing the foods and seasonings of a lot of different cultures, the same as English has spiced itself up with the offerings of every other language it ever ran into.
It’s also a fact that to be interesting, food doesn’t have to be “spicy,” as in full of peppers and curry. French food, for example, is often delicately, subtly and deliciously flavored without being “hot.” And it certainly isn’t bland, either. To the extent that American cooks have learned that, too, we are all the better off.
Now I love the fact that I can get not only traditional foods here, but elegant Continental cuisine, spicy Thai, pungent Indian, or sushi with explosive wasabi, among other choices available.
I’m not saying those cuisines are “unamerican”, but if every type of food popular in a particular country is thought of as part of that country’s cuisine, then we might as well just call it all “food”. Because if Chinese dishes become Italian cuisine simply because they’re popular in Italy, it makes no sense to even speak of Chinese dishes or Italian dishes.
Well, just take a look at who’s sponsoring/advertising with Allrecipes: Kraft, Tyson, WeightWatchers, Hershey’s, Nestle- purveyors of crap-from-a-package cooking for generations. Although I did find this for you on Allrecipes-chilies even. Bon appetit! 
The food that I eat now is totally different from what was available when I was a child. About the wildest thing my mother made was deviled eggs. (The added pickle juice sure packed a punch.:dubious:
I never had pizza, shrimp, or even ketchup until I left home.
Now I want spices in everything. Even my cottage cheese has cumin, ground corriander, tumeric and curry added. The same for beef stew. (I add about seventeen different spices.)
We even like saffron ice cream.
My folks had a rule: you don’t have to eat anything you try and then decide you don’t like, but you don’t get to decide that you don’t like something you’ve never tried. You have to try all new foods.
I fell in love with mushrooms when I was about 5. My folks didn’t care for them all that much but I had them at a neighbor’s house when we were over for dinner. Wow.
When I was 8 I had a liking for southern food, Mexican food, Italian food, and a wide variety of vegetables and casseroles. Around 9 I went with my folks to a college faculty dinner hosted by an Indian professor and discovered the joys of Indian food.
The tastiest/spiciest American foods are the southern foods (vegetables spiced up with meat broths especially pork-based, skinny little hot “tabasco” peppers, onions, strongly flavored greens, okra), the southwestern cuisine (heavily influenced by Indian and Mexican) and the northeastern (lots of fish, lots of Italian influence and to a lesser degree French cookery, with other cultural influenced sponged up and added in).
I think it’s logical that the states bordering on another country with a dramatically different “traditional” cuisine are going to have different tastes than the innermost parts of the country.
That said, I’ve lived in Washington my whole life, and grew up on my mother’s bland bland bland cooking. There was nothing remotely approaching “spicy hot” in my mother’s spice rack.
I blame the bland food stereotype on the WWII generation - the generation that grew up during the Great Depression. The only food that their parents could afford was either tasteless, or utterly wretched tasting (my grandmother was telling me about tripe… shudder…). The vile tasting stuff explains the tendency to drench everything with gravy. I also suspect that one reason some people started using spices that just add heat instead of flavor is that they discovered those hot spices can adequately cover the taste of meat that has started to go bad (and some of those highly acidic spices can also inhibit the growth of bacteria.) Why do you think liver is almost always smothered with grilled onions? It’s to cover up the taste of the liver!
My mother grew up with a WWI veteran father whose idea of a good meal was roast beef and potatoes. So that’s what she grew up eating day in and day out. Basically, she never really learned how to cook any differently. So when I was a kid, dinner meant a meat dish, a vegetable, and a bread or potato dish. Part of this was apparently because, as a young wife and mother, she thought this is what she was “supposed” to do. The problem was that her idea of “variety” was “today we’re having broccoli, tomorrow is cauliflower, and the next day will be lima beans” She also experimented with beet greens, brussel’s sprouts, and squash. Her idea of “beef stew” was chunks of stew meat, carrots, and potatoes all boiled together for a few hours, perhaps with some salt in the water.
I had a very difficult time eating my mother’s cooking. It was either tasteless chunks that were difficult to swallow because they wouldn’t activate my salivary glands, or it was grossly bitter vegetables that literally made me throw up. (I’ve since determined that I’m a “super-taster” cite)
I actually looked forward to the weeks when my dad was working swing shift. That meant he wasn’t there for dinner, and my mom didn’t feel compelled to serve a “proper” meal. Those were the days that we got to eat hot dogs, and fish sticks, etc. In other words, foods that I could actually get down, because they actually had more (and more pleasant) flavor than my mom’s regular cooking! Of course, the fish sticks were dipped in plain old mayonnaise, because we never had tartar sauce. In fact, I didn’t even know what tartar sauce was until I was a teenager working in a restaurant.
When I was a young teenager, I discovered Mexican food, and I fell in love with it. But could I get my mom to cook anything like that? Noooooooo! Still, I have to give my mom some credit - her cooking did improve over time. But to this day, she turns up her nose at anything that even hints at “spicy hot”. I think that the cooking I grew up on was a major factor in my decision to be a professional cook. I wanted to do better.
So to sum up, I blame the WWII generation and the Baby Boomers. These two generations have been in control of this country far longer than any generation has a right to do 
Fortunately, my generation is starting to get old enough to take over.
Oh yeah - I also blame America’s heavy British/Germanic roots. As my own origin is heavily Scottish, I got a good belly laugh out of a cartoon I saw a while back:
Caption: Why Scottish takeout will never work.
Picture: a chef stirring a pot with one hand, holding a telephone with the other. Into the phone he is burring, “Aye, we can deliver it, but it’ll take at least thrrrree hours to boil the flavor out!”
I was born in Louisiana, and as a toddler I could be found swilling Tabasco out of the bottle or sucking sauce out of packets from a local Cajun takeout place.
I agree with you that it seems like the majority of people in this country do like their food terribly, horribly bland. I’ve come across only a few ethnic restaurants that satisfy my need for supreme hotness in food. Almost any restaurant I go to I order my dish “extra super spicy” and when I get it it has only the slightest tingle to it. . .then the waiter usually asks if it’s too spicy or if I’m ok. I’m in love with a couple of places here in StL that let me apply my own chili powder and curry, and the staff are always amazed at my ability to create and actually eat such things :D. I had a waiter burst out laughing at me when I told him I ate the little chile peppers whole out of the General Tso’s chicken. He thought I made a mistake, but I just smiled at him.
I picked up a bottle of Dave’s Insanity sauce the other day. . .pretty good, but I still haven’t run across anything too spicy for me to eat yet. I have made the mistake of touching my nose or eyes after slicing habaneros. . .that was pain. Actually eating the peppers is bliss.
As someone else said in another thread, though: fire in, fire out :eek:
My 6 year old brother, thankfully, loves spicy stuff too. He eats all kinds of stuff, and loves broccoli. He can swill hot sauce with the best of 'em.
My idea of comfort food is Mexican food. I did my junior year of college in Israel, and while lovely hot falafel is abundant there, for eleven months I felt a powerful longing for lots and lots of salsa. An intern at our Hillel got someone in America to send her chips and salsa and she put it out on a table in the school lobby as a treat during finals. It took about two seconds before homesick Californians were scarfing it down with tears in our eyes. When I returned to the US, I flew first to LA to spend a couple days with my aunt before heading back to Northern California, and as per my request, my aunt showed up at LAX with burritos. I just moved to Chicago and there is a panadería and a* 24 hour* taquería just down the street. Truly, my life is complete now.
In short, you know your food is good when it makes you cry and wipe your nose. It’s the American way!
troub we might need to hook up soon! Where abouts are you in the area?
I agree that the majority of American cooking is fairly bland compared to most cultures, growing up in northern MN where the standard condiments for spice where ketchup and black pepper. Thankfully my dad was a cayenne addict.
There are areas of the country where flavor is king. But yes, the majority of “merican cooking” is pretty bland. Boiled dinners on the east coast, poached crap on the west coast, anything mixed with cream of mushroom soup in the north and flour battered and cooked with lard in the lower midwest is sort of blah. But it is comfort food in that it feels good. I am a spice addict, love habaneros and am a self proclaimed Cajun and Carribean cook, but one of my favorite meals is hamburger and gravy on mashed taters. I love great food, but sometimes the simple food is the best. It tastes good and sticks to your ribs and just makes you feel happy.
I love watching the tastes of our kids develop. Recently our son decided that Kraft mac and cheese sucks, compared to the good stuff with real cheese. How he slowly developed a taste for spicy food, and likes cayenne or habanero on everything. But he still enjoys a basic bowl of grits and eggs.
It’s all about where you grow up and what your level of adventure is.
For truly bland food, though, you’d have to taste my MIL’s eastern European cooking. She learned to cook during very hard times, of course, but I don’t take that as an excuse. Every piece of meat and every vegetable is boiled unless it’s fried. Well, sometimes meat is steamed, but vegetables are never steamed, they are always either canned or, in the rare case of a fresh one it is boiled. The main criterion is that food must be soft. If it has a coating, it’s a nice soggy one of unflavored breadcrumbs. The main seasonings are salt and garlic. Maybe a bay leaf.
I know that the boiling and steaming bit comes from having only tough cuts of meat to deal with. So once, when I was young and foolish, I took her with me to an excellent local butcher shop. I showed her some nicely-priced Porterhouse steaks. A couple of days later she told me that they were very good. “I fried them in a pan,” she said, “and then I added some water and steamed them for a half hour. They were very soft.” I gave up.
Actually, if you want bland, try Mexican pastries. There is a large population of Mexicans in my town, and I’ve noticed that when somebody sets out a box of maple bars, the Mexicans won’t touch 'em. I’ve sampled some pastries from a local Mexican bakery, and they’re very light on sugar. To me, they tasted like just bread with a little bit of sugar added. That may be more due to the state of dental care in most rural areas in Mexico. Very sweet foods, like frosted donuts, can be painful to eat.
Given a choice between cake and pie, most Mexicans will go for the pie. They seem to prefer desserts filled with fruit rather that sugary treats.
**even sven, ** some more recipe links for you:
http://www.recipelink.com/rcpeth2.html
http://www.russianfoods.com/recipes/ (not just Russian; also includes other formerly Soviet cuisines such as Georgian, Uzbek, etc. Georgia is a food-lover’s paradise! Try lobio if you’re looking for a different twist on chili.)
My favorite Australian link is gone…I’ll try to find it later.
Walk into any Silver Diner or Denny’s and check out the menu (PDF). It’s hard to find anything more flavorful than a patty melt, grilled cheese, burger or a club sandwich. It’s only in recent years that I’ve begun to see such “adventurous” offerings as scampi or cajun, well… anything. Some restaurants are trying to dazzle our taste buds by pouring bleu cheese dressing on a burger. I see Silver Diner is now offering ginger chicken. I wonder how popular it is. Not their best seller, I would wager.
Looking at these menus, I don’t think it’s hard to defend the statement that Americans in general like food that mostly falls into a narrow range of flavors.
I think what the OP is looking for are the really flavorful dishes that make your mouth wake up and you taste buds to run around on your tongue because they think they’ve fallen out of formation. Not recipes that call for a dash or two of paprika or cumin, but something like a nice beef salad with a generous portion of fresh corriander & mint leaves, marinating in a lime juice base. Nothing spicy there, just some very different & intense flavors.
The answer is probably just that something too flavorful is, well, too different. You have to move out of your comfort zone to try these dishes. And people don’t want to move away from their patty melts and grilled cheese sandwiches. That’s why the OP refers to some things as comfort food. There’s no stress or uncertainty in eating those things. We know what hey taste like and they taste basically okay, if that’s all you’ve ever eaten.
If people were more willing to experiment, they’d soon discover what they’re missing. Hence the profusion of Thai & various fusion restaurants that have sprouted up in the metropolitain areas. In my neighborhood you can’t swing your arms without knocking a Thai Tanic* delivery boy off his moped.
*[sup]Yes, it’s a real restaurant. So is “Thai Phoon”.[/sup]
To all of you offering up links to sites that have recipes that will dazzle your taste buds, that’s great. But drive down Main Street, USA and tell me what restaurants you see.
Turbo, I’m around the city and south county most of the time 
My spice shelves are full and the spices have spilled out on to the kitchen counter. I have an herb garden growing in the front window winter and summer. We are always trying new things.
That said, I agree that the palate of many Americans is unrefined. An affinity for spiced foods is an acquired thing, if one hasn’t grown up with it (myself included). My mother made basic dishes and the most exotic thing she used was rosemary, which I still love. I traveled for three decades to all parts of the world, while my siblings stayed in the same place. Our tastes are radically different.
For instance, my sister had me try her (self-proclaimed) ‘famous’ turkey chili. I nearly gagged. I watched her make it the next time and she put one teaspoon of chili powder in about 4 quarts of chili! Somehow, she equates less taste with fewer calories, I guess. I explained to her how my chili has a minimum of six different spices and the quantities that I use and she was shocked. However, when she tried it, she liked it. My niece doesn’t even use olive oil because she thinks it ‘tastes funny’. And my brother is steak and potatoes.
Troub & Turbo, I hope you two aren’t dyslexic otherwise you won’t be able to tell who’s who
My favorite restaurant name was a Kosher Mexican place not far from my apartment, but alas, it closed a few years back. It was called Casa Hadassah. It was located a few blocks from a Domino’s Pizza that claimed to use only halal meat.
I love West Rogers Park!
A few years before my grandmother died at age 89, I discovered that she had a taste for very spicy foods. After she retired, she travelled all over the world, and acquired diverse tastes if food. But when she came back home to my grandfather, it was always back to meat & potatoes because that’s what he wanted.
A few years ago I was acquainted with an Australian woman via the Internet. She had spent time in the USA, and when she found out I was a cook she told me that the one American food she missed most was… hashbrowns. She said she just can’t get them in Australia.