Well, I’m the OP from the other thread. I didn’t go into my reasons for not being well versed in Chinese cuisine because, quite frankly, that wasn’t the point of my question. I asked for assistance and most people here were very considerate in offering that help.
I take exception to your assumption that I have no intellectual curiosity simply because I have no interest in trying food that is thoroughly unappetizing to me. My Masters degree, my interest in music, books, antiques and theatre do not make up for the fact that I don’t want to eat foods that, to me, appear to be made up of scrapings from last night’s dinner plates? (I don’t mean to offend anyone who loves Chinese food, but I look at most of it and my reaction is “blecch”).
If I am going out for the evening, there are dozens of restaurants to choose from that offer choices I love - I can’t see wasting hard earned money on a meal that just doesn’t appeal to me. So I go somewhere else.
But, when my friends had chosen the Chinese restaurant, I would have rather gone somewhere else (seafood, anyone?). But I was willing to make the best of it and take the opportunity to try something new (as you suggest we should all do to be intellectually curious). That’s why I asked for help; I wanted to try it without being mocked for not being open-minded enough to give it a chance.
And I did try it. My reaction is still “Meh”. If I never went to a Chinese restaurant again, that would be okay with me. My feelings about Mexican are the same. So now that I have gone there, do I qualify as intellectually curious?
What, is different about Chinese Chicken and rice and vegetables and American Chicken and rice and vegetables? I’ll tell you what- nothing… you are the one applying mythological, cultural, and prejudiced standards.
It isn’t completely unrealistic. For example, my wife and I make anything and everything on a regular basis - meatloaf, enchiladas, yukka, lamb souvlaki, hot dogs, beef tongue[sup]1[/sup], curries, jambalaya, corned beef & cabbage, sushi…the other night we had pizza and tom kha. Which, presumably, is why my kids are completely agnostic about “ethnic” foods. There’s no such thing as ethnic, there’s only food.
Sure, they’ve found they don’t like things, but they sure as hell don’t pitch a fit just cause whatever we’re having for dinner is new. They’ll give anything a whirl because “anything” is the norm. That, and they know they have to at least try whatever is for dinner or else we’ll have an “eat it til you love it” marathon…
OK, not “completely” unrealistic. But your average American doesn’t know how to cook those “exotic” foods, or might not have access to a good take-out place. With everything folks have to worry about these days, expecting parents to have the knowledge, time and $$ to teach their kids to like ethnic foods is unrealistic for many, if not most, Americans.
It’s pretty common where I live, but I live in a pretty uncommon place.
Well, I mentioned in that other thread that I had never tried Chinese food until I was almost 25, and why. I just hadn’t had much opportunity. I grew up in the 60s and 70s, and to tell you the truth, I just don’t remember there being a lot of ethnic restaurants in my area. Maybe there were some in the city, but we didn’t go there to eat.
My mother, however, did encourage my brothers and me to try new foods, whether it was some kind of ethnic food, or just something"regular" that we didn’t eat at home (or perhaps had always thought of as “adult food”). After all, I did try tongue for the first time when I was 13, on a rare meal at a restaurant.
As for Mexican food, I don’t remember hearing anything about it until the 80s, when Mexican/Tex Mex made a big splash. When a Mexican restaurant went in in downtown in Hartford, I went with folks from work. Since I’ve been on my own, I’ve been to restaurants featuring, besides Chinese and Mexican, Vietnamese, Japanese, Thai, Ethiopian, and Lebanese foods, in addition to more familiar cuisines such as French and Italian, and Jewish. I’ve been to tapas restaurants, eaten at Greek festivals and restaurants, and when I went to Scotland I tried haggis.
A lot of the time it isn’t that people aren’t adventurous, it’s more that depending on where and when they grew up, they may not have had much chance to be adventurous.
Here’s a simple and delicious ‘chinese’ dish that I bet any would enojy…
Chinese Chicken and Snowpeas
1 Chicken breast cut into bite sized pieces
1 pound of Snowpeas
3 tablespoons of vegetable oil
1 garlic clove, crushed
1 finger of ginger, peeled and crushed
3 tablespoons of soy
1 tablespoon of cornstarch
1/4 cup chicken stock
Wash the snowpeas or use a frozen bag, chunk the chicken, sauteee the garlic and ginger with the hot oil in a wok… strifry the chicken- then the snowpeas. Add the remaining soy, chicken stock and cornstarch slurry. Bring to the simmer. Cover, and braise a minute until thickened. Serve steaming hot with rice.
While I was still in America there were several people that expressed concern that I would not find anything to eat in China, and that I should make sure that China has a McDonald’s before I considered going. These are the people that have tried maybe one Chinese dish, and then declared that they hate all Chinese food.
Now that I am here in China, I am meeting people that tell me that they could never leave China because there would be nothing that they could eat. These are the people that have eaten at a KFC in China once, and then have declared that they hate all western food.
Of course I explain to the Chinese that there are Chinese restaurants almost everywhere in the world, but that they may not taste the same as in China.
When I was a freshman in college, one of my professors was in the habit of bribing his classes with food so we’d give good evaluations. We made field trips into the city for food, and our “final exam” was at a local Italian restaurant. One of my classmates decided that he’d be adventurous and order something exotic he’d never tried before…
Spaghetti and meatballs.
Apparently, for the entire time up until he went to college, his family never ate anything whatsoever but pizza, burgers, and cheesesteaks.
That said, it’s certainly possible to develop a taste for something you never had as a child. I love Indian food, and the first time my mom ever even tried it was when I was nearly 30. Now if only we had an Indian restaurant around here…
I grew up eating the same basic meals every week. When I got my first apartment in the city I fell in love with Chinese food, Indian Food, Falafels!
I discovered I liked broccoli and brussel sprouts and some other veggies I had never tried. I tried Mexican and it’s ok. I like hummus on pita bread.
My fav though is Lobster and Steamers. I also like fried clams once in a while.
I have gotten sick of a lot of foods in adulthood also. I don’t know why perhaps too much of a good thing? I no longer eat Chinese, Fast food, very little Italian food, subs, hot dogs, hamburgers, even potato chips are boring. Really anything greasy just doesn’t agree with me like it used to?
You should also explain that they have a special “Passport” to and an advantage in nearly any Chinese restaurant in the West that we as westereners don’t even have… they have the power of language and the “secret” menu. Hell, even Chinese Cooks in the West don’t believe that there is any food in the West that they can eat. They serve us the most generic shit possible, even as freakin’ customers. Sometimes I wonder why the Chinese are so prejudiced as to even deny us their best dishes that they feed their families.
The thing is, you’ve actually tried those foods to decide you don’t like them, and you didn’t wait until you were well into adulthood before doing so.
It really does amaze me the weird things on this board that people will rush to defend and act all indignant about (Come on folks, really, living in somewhere like the US and never trying Chinese food until you’ve graduated from University just isn’t normal and we all know it).
Now, obviously the availability of certain cuisines will vary by region (There’s very little Mexican food in Australia or NZ due to a lack of Mexicans, for example) and it’s not necessarily a personal criticism or accusation of failure on someone’s part to observe that, well, it’s a bit odd that someone hasn’t tried something as common as Chinese or Mexican food.
The thing is that the SDMB has some rather interesting board demographics that make this sort of thing more common here than it would appear to be in the “real world”, and because no-one (understandably) likes to admit they’re wrong or in the minority viewpoint about something, you get threads like this where most of the people reading it are probably either agreeing with the OP or at least not disagreeing with the “That’s a bit odd” assertion, they’re not taking up keyboards to defend or lambast the situation.
Which means you end up with a vocal minority making something appear more “common” and “accepted” than would first appear to be the case, and it’s not just things like this… there have been several threads on how the SDMB differs from reality and they make… interesting reading, IMHO.
Well, not really, I have lived the past 3 years in toto in an old folks park in Florida filled with elderly Midwesterners. You’d be surprised what is normal or new to my own special provence.
One of my married friends has a kid about 12 years old. They are cool people, but very trendy and appearance concerned. They are always on the latest food trend, and have pulled the kid along with them.
Anyway about 2 years ago he was talking to Grandma, and she asked how he was eating. He told grandma in a whisper that a couple days ago he had been over at a friends house and had his favorite meal ever, noodles and balls. When the very Italian Grandma finally figured out the kid didn’t even know what to call Spaghetti and meatballs, because he had never seen them before, she was about ready to call child services for neglect.
I have been invited to dozens of banquets here in China, so I have probably tasted their best foods. The biggest difference that I have seen is that there are many more vegetables offered, and the quality of the meat is not as good as is available in the West.
In my opinion, the only thing being denied to us in Chinese restaurants in the West is that menus possibly list lower prices for Chinese people and offer foods like chicken feet that we would probably not eat anyway.
My Chinese colleagues in Malaysia thought it would be an amusing game to try and get the gwailo to eat chicken feet, pig organs, fish heads, and other such things that are not traditionally associated with “Food” in my part of the world.
Even here in Australia I’ve eaten at some outstanding Chinese restaurants, and a Chinese friend of ours sometimes orders stuff that’s not on the English menu. I asked him about it one time when we were all out for dinner, and he said “Basically it’s weird stuff you wouldn’t eat anyway”, but said that if we wanted to order chicken feet or whatever then the restaurant would be only too happy to cook and serve it.
C’mon, for an extra $40 or $50 dollars- $100 dollars I could make any Chinese Buffet/carryout positively gourmet for the day. It seems like a positive willingness to keep their food subquality.
My guess is that it is a matter of quantity or quality.
It is probably cheaper and easier to produce mass quantities of “subquality” food.
Same as with almost any western buffet or carryout that serves instant mashed potatoes.
It’s a fuckin’ myth… you think I’ve been putting myself on the chopping block for this kind of retort. Buffet does not have to equivocate neglect of technique nor ingredient in cost. The ingredients can be got… don’t worry about the bottom line. Worry about the freakin’ food and people that eat and will want to eat it, and come back and eat it.
A quality buffet does not equal expensive. A cheap buffet costs you more.
Please explain. I am not doubting you, just would like to know how cheap buffets cost more.
Regarding cheap buffets, I believe that many people just do not appreciate quality food.
Also, I grew up in Georgia in the 60’s and 70’s, and we often had Chinese food.
Forty years later it cannot be that hard to find “ethnic” food anywhere in America.
(general comment not directed at devilsknew)
I took the statement to mean that intellectual curiosity and culinary curiousity are the same to him in that he doesn’t understand either of them, not that they are the same thing.
