# Ugly American cuisine **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 16, 2013, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812 "2013-04-16T04:18:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2013, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/281 "2013-04-20T13:48:28Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > “Cream” gravies are usually just a roux. It’s a sauce made from a roux, but it is not a roux. > [@Lukeinva](#): > > The Chinese don’t consume dairy… milk, cheese, butter, etc. > > For thousands of years, through evolution, has caused pretty much the entire population to be unable to process dairy products. > [@simple\_homer](#): > > Not true. > > I have spent the past four years in China, and all the large supermarkets have a large selection of milk, cheese, and yogurt. Milk and yogurt are so popular that they are found in almost all small convenience stores. I can confirm that most of the Chinese folks I’ve worked with loved yogurt. One guy would leave the single-serve packs sitting on his desk for a week before eating them, which grossed me out a little. Many yogurts and cheeses have reduced lactose content. ---
**Author:** ![SCAdian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scadian/32/3292_2.png) [@SCAdian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCAdian)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/282 "2013-04-22T04:00:14Z")
> [@Missy2U](#): > > Great. Thanks to **Athena** and **pulykamell** , I’m craving pickled beets. THANKS, you two! 😃 Beets are good, but I’d much rather have Harvard beets. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/283 "2013-04-22T06:48:09Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Here’s a question for Europeans: Turnips, yes or no? In Spain the smallest ones are sometimes found in salads, but it’s pretty rare. My mother likes both beet salad (just the beets and a dash of oil) and turnips; the rest of the family appreciates her keeping them away from our own salads. > [@Acsenray](#): > > I thought that “salad” for a wide range of cold dishes was not a specifically American usage. _Ensalada aragonesa_ (Aragon-style salad) is chorizo, penne pasta and a light dressing. Any green is there by mistake. I was going through my cookbooks this past weekend. The two American ones use pre-made stuff for _everything_: a can of this, a can of that… never “leave lentils in water for 24h before cooking them in that same water (or substitute canned lentils)”, but “a can of lentils”. ---
**Author:** ![Surok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@Surok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surok)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/284 "2013-04-22T08:59:06Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Or go Polish style if you want a clear, pure peppery beet broth type of thing (often served poured over _uszka_, little Polish tortellini stuffed with meat or mushrooms. Regular tortellini will substitute fine. Kind of like a Polish tortellini al brodo.) Got a recipe? ---
**Author:** ![Missy2U](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3bc359/32.png) [@Missy2U](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Missy2U)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/285 "2013-04-22T15:01:00Z")
**Balance** , you made my day. I think I might be a little bit in love with you. 😃 **Little Nemo** and **pulykamell** , I’ve done a “salad” you could call it with mayo, shredded cheddar cheese, finely chopped onions and garlic (sometimes if I’m feeling wacky I add chopped olives) on top of cocktail rye and then broiled until ilt’s bubbly. I call it cheese bread - they were an appetizer my mom used to serve years ago. Husband was very skeptical about it the first time I made it for him, but he snarfs it up like crazy now. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/286 "2013-04-22T16:51:46Z")
> [@Surok](#): > > Got a recipe? [This is close to how I make it](http://writeangled.hubpages.com/hub/Barszcz-with-Uszka-Polish-Soup). The main difference is that I mix pickled beets with their pickling liquid along with the fresh beets. Traditionally, what you would do is make a “beet sour” by fermenting beets over the course of a few days, but my family would substitute the pickled beets and juice in for the beet sour. You want the soup to have a decent sour tang to it. My mother would sometimes even add plain white vinegar if it wasn’t sour enough. Vegetable stock is used in the Christmas Eve preparation of this dish but, otherwise, you can just use a decent, light beef stock or chicken stock. The beef stock for this dish (when made separately) is not a heavy brown stock. We don’t roast the bones or vegetables for it, just cook as we would a standard white chicken stock. It’s also usual to soak 1-3 Polish dried Polish mushrooms (which are the same as porcini) overnight in a cup of water and use this “mushroom water” as part of the stock for flavoring. In our family, we are fairly generous with the black pepper, so adjust to your own tastes. ---
**Author:** ![Stoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stoid/32/272_2.png) [@Stoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stoid)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/287 "2013-04-22T17:10:58Z")
> [@sisu](#): > > Is that like Yorkshire Pudding? > [@SanVito](#): > > Ewww, I’m voting for this one. > > Not remotely like yorkshire pud, which is food of the gods. > [@Aspidistra](#): > > I don’t know if this is just my issue, but … peanut butter cups, anyone? I think they’re pretty foul, but I know they’re considered food of the gods by some in the US. > > Also, PB&J. I don’t know if most Australians would find it exactly _awful_ (my weird-ass spouse and kids go for peanut butter and honey - the horror!), but it’s definitely not a popular foodstuff. > [@stui\_magpie](#): > > Sorry mate, you can stick your yorkshire pud where the sun doesn’t shine. Bloody horrible stuff. > [@terentii](#): > > Did you eat it hot, with roast beef and savory gravy? :dubious: > [@stui\_magpie](#): > > Yep. Horrible doughy lumps of crud. Maybe I just had badly cooked ones. > [@terentii](#): > > I’d say so. The Yorkshire puddings I had in England were slightly crunchy on the outside and light and eggy on the inside. I wouldn’t particularly want to eat them all by themselves, but they were a good complement to roast beef and gravy. > > They also have to be eaten hot, fresh out of the oven. Otherwise they tend to be chewy, in my experience. Yorkshire pudding ＝ popovers ＝ yummmmmmm! The only difference is that YP is made in a flat pan of hot beef fat and popovers are made in a narrow,deep muffinish pan with hot butter. The shape change makes popovers more “popped” - more hollow and crisp. But YP should properly be nicely puffed up and crispy as well. ---
**Author:** ![Wolf333](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf333/32/3460_2.png) [@Wolf333](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wolf333)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2013, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812/288 "2013-04-22T17:22:13Z")
> [@LC\_Strawhouse](#): > > Carnival food (fried dough, etc.)? > > I’ve also heard that East Asians cannot abide cheese and think it’s impossible to escape in Western food which is constantly slathered with cheese. (That surprised me, considering that Asian cuisine can be notorious for consuming every part of the animal) I know I’m late to the party on this, and I can only speak to what I saw in Japan and South Korea, but there are a lot of East Asians that seem to have no problems whatsoever with cheese (or dairy in general). Pizza (with cheese), yogurt\* and ice cream\*\* were popular in both countries. I never shopped at a full grocery in Korea, but the large grocers I visited in Japan did have dairy sections. \*I only saw one yogurt shop in Japan, but yogurt drinks were common in convenience stores in both countries. \*\*They did, of course, tend to have different flavors than in the US. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ugly-american-cuisine/655812.md?page=14)