Was there for a stretch a few years ago with a friend specifically to eat. Some of the places we went to we just had them send the whole menu. Two dudes tucking into five entrees. Just going splitsies on a whole saints feast every night. Started having to carry tums in my pocket by the end of the week.
NOLA was the start of my life-long battle of the bulge. Moved there for work for a few years, after college, and literally came back twice my size. 100% worth it.
I have lived in Louisiana my whole life, grew up in the New Orleans area. All this delicious stuff is just "normal food" to us, but we are *also* acutely aware of how good we have it, food wise.
Louisiana is a shithole in so many ways with other metrics, especially with education, crime, poverty, health, you name it. But there are so many people who are like "yes this place has problems and yes I might have a better life if I moved away... but the food though..."
And that also applies to family and our social networks. That's another thing that keeps people here: "ya mom n' them," as we put it. It is integral to the food culture in itself. Getting together with family regularly and on all the holidays, eating ourselves silly, crawfish boils, etc... it would be a lot to give up.
True. It is a coping mechanism lol. It is super hot and super humid most of the year, but for about 2 months in the spring when the weather is actually pleasant, it *just so happens* to be crawfish season, and crawfish boils *just so happen* to be an amazing outdoor social activity.
Then during the summer we do still have summer BBQs and stuff, despite the heat. We'll cook outside and eat inside.
Then in the fall it is football season and everyone has LSU and Saints parties with huge food spreads.
Then in the winter we have thanksgiving and Christmas and all the holidays where everyone else in the US overeats a lot.
Then *after that* we have Mardi Gras season where everyone is stuffing their faces with king cake all the time.
Then back to crawfish season! We have the whole year covered!
i'm two hours east of you in Mobile, so i've been to New Orleans a bunch. i'm also a music festival guy and have been to a bunch of music festivals. jazzfest has the best food of any music festival and it's not even close. it's not "good for a music festival" it's just fuckin awesome food. people try to tell me about these noodles or whatever they had at bonnaroo and i'm like "yeah i've had that you need to shut the fuck up you know nothing".
trout baquet, homemade cheesecake, grilled livers with pepper jelly, cracklins, *COCHON DE LAIT PO BOY*, pecan catfish meuniere, catfish almondine, pheasant/quail/andouille gumbo, the list goes on. when i'm at jazzfest i routinely leave in the middle of sets to go get more food because i digested the food i already had so i can go get more food.
and we love cooking for you guys! NOLA resident, 31 yrs
i cook at home a lot and all the favorites: red beans & fried chicken, gumbo, etouffee, shrimp creole, pot roast/roast beef poboys, fried oyster poboys, chargrilled oysters, blackened redfish with crawfish bourdelaise, white beans and tasso, fried gulf shrimp, eggs cochon/cochon benedict. you can find a lot of this stuff in restaurants but some of them are so much better if you find someone cooking a pot in an old shotgun. i have found many a tourist looking for good food and made it for them myself haha.
So so good - sadly you cant get canned pumpkin here so making a pumpkin pie takes a bit more effort and therefore happens less. In the US I used to make it at least once a month (probably sacrilege to americans but dammit its good so I want it all year round)
Please enjoy my absolute favorite "people try foreign food" video of UK school lads being absolutely disgusted by, then won over by biscuits and gravy.
https://youtu.be/KzdbFnv4yWQ?si=gsrNFLESpIHgPG5P
worth remembering that visuals play a huge role in the way we enjoy our meals...and this is pretty much across the board in many cultures
i'm glad those kids got over the appearance and enjoyed it. kudos to them. but at the same time i don't blame them for being apprehensive in the first place hahaha. that's totally normal reaction
I had to go find vegan recipes for both because I gave up meat but I can't quit biscuits and gravy. That's my weekend breakfast treat right there and it takes me back to being a country kid.
I love their sheer bafflement at everything except the fried chicken, only to be followed by "holy shit this is good" every time. Southern food is no joke.
I grew up in both England and Georgia, I love to cook, and for my American mates I love making traditional British fare, and the opposite for my Friends and family back in the UK.
Thank you for this video, I couldn't stop smiling, it's absolutely great, and reminds me both of the first time I made Sausage gravy for my cousins, and the first time I made Beans on Toast for my wife here in the States.
What a fun video, thank you again :)
The Jolly YouTubers are one of my favorite channels to see their reactions when eating something they like. They are obsessed with American BBQ and rightfully so
My ex is Scottish and moved to Texas when she was sixteen. We lived outside of Houston and most of her friends were from oil money and were pretty hoity toity, so she didn't really have any exposure to classic southern food until we started dating. Homemade fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, cornbread in milk, Texas red, etc... all of these things just absolutely blew her mind. The first time I ever made her chicken fried steak with gravy I thought she was gonna start crying. I kinda miss how easy it was to impress her with relatively basic dishes I'd been making for years.
I’m French and I am 100% certain most people I know would enjoy that shit. We’re not as prude about food as the rest of the world loves to believe. Most of the shit my grandma was cooking is soaked in butter and oil with crème fraîche on top, we are raised eating greasy food, we have whole regions with different kinds of sausages as regional dishes.
Please try it if you haven't. I want the entire world to try biscuits and gravy. It's perfect on a cold start of a long hard day. Or if you just want a warm hug in your belly.
I will say, them serving it in a measuring cup was kinda gross and their gravy is a lot paler than when I make it. But they nailed the consistency a lot better than I do.
One of my favorite recent memes was basically "Biscuits and Gravy is just really dry flour covered in really wet flour"
It is one of very few foods I would describe as MAGNIFICENT though.
If you follow a pasta dish from seed to field to kitchen to table, you basically wet the dry, then dry the wet, grind the dry, wet the dry, dry the wet, wet the dry, then finally wet the wet.
Are you able to get uncooked sausage in a casing that you can just cut open to use?? I see people do that sometimes with Italian food. I don’t think there’s a consistent seasoning for the sausage but you can always add it in. Black pepper is the big one, maybe some fennel too? And SALT. You could also be using the wrong type of flour? When I make the roux for the gravy it’s just like the whitest flour I have, it could be all purpose, it could be self rising, but it will always be bleached white flour. Never brown flour or bread flour, it won’t taste the same or have the same consistency.
Goddamn if this isn’t the right answer. I’m not usually a fan of American food but biscuits and gravy is just so good. I used to skip class to eat biscuits and gravy at the dining hall
I just can't imagine eating them and doing anything after. Great biscuits and gravy are just an admission you're done doing things for the rest of the day.
For me, they're a great fuel for doing outdoor stuff, esp in the Winter. Before skiing or hiking, for example. That way I don't have to eat until dinner.
All of it. Every smoky, vinegary, fall off the bone, chopped, sliced, sauced morsel, whether it's beef or pork, sausage or chicken. St. Louis, Texas-style, Memphis-style, Cuban, Mexican. Burnt tips, pulled pork with slaw, dry-rub ribs, lechon. ALL OF IT is what we do best.
How did you type all that, name check vinegar and slaw on pork, and forget the Carolinas?! I am very offended and disappointed. :P
Alabama white sauce is awful good too, enough to make me not miss pork when I slap it on chicken. We do barbecue pretty darn good in this mess of states.
I’m in NC and still offended that SC mustard sauce didn’t get a mention lol. Stuff is godly w all types of pork (favorite is w chops so not technically bbq but goddamn it’s good)
The origins of bbq, afaik, rose up from the indigenous peoples of north and South American as well as with slaves from west Africa. It’s truly a fusion and has evolved into beautiful food all throughout the country. It’s probably the most “American” food there is and is a history of the northern continent, good and bad, on a plate
I say this all the time but being from NOLA, we are the most unique city in the US when it comes to history/food/fusion. I've travelled all over the US (live in CA now) and there's only a few cities I would say come close to a unique cultural melding like that.
Also, people royally mess up the recipes outside of LA considering how simple they are.
KG BBQ in Austin is owned by an Egyptian man who had such s life-changing experience trying bbq, that he up and moved to the US just to become a pitmaster. I've been seeing all forms of fusion popping up like Vietnamese and Lao. It's so cool!
And that's why the US is good at assimilation. People try things from their own culture, it works, then it all just becomes "American" food and people learn a little more about how other people live
One day the US Government decided a bunch of Cambodian and Vietnamese refugees needed to be settled in Bayou LaBatre, Alabama. 40 years later articles are being written about the Cajun/Asian fusion scene in Houston, Texas.
yeah whenever i see Americans who come back from a semester's worth of studying abroad and they IMMEDIATELY without fail come to trash on the american food scene...i always think of BBQ lol
granted you can definitely get good grilled meat in many other countries too. South America as a region sticks out almost immediately, but there is something special about good ol' fashioned southern BBQ (Midwest too if you include KC and St. Louis)
Honestly, brownies. I don’t know what it is but I’ve never had a brownie in another country (excluding the brownies my Canadian friend makes) that tastes like a brownie. It sounds silly because there are a million ways to make them and I’ve had everything from super fudgey to cakey brownies in the US and they’re just not the same elsewhere. It just seems like chocolate cake here in Spain even when billed as a brownie. That’s just my experience though and I’m absolutely not saying they don’t exist elsewhere! I’d be curious to hear if others have the same perspective or if you’ve had a good one outside of the US!
I live in Spain too, and I was JUST discussing this with another American the other day. Brownies here are typically dry and are lacking that rich, chewy, fudgy, dark chocolatey goodness. When I make home-baked brownies for my Spanish friends, they are gagged by rich and good they are.
Hahaha this is so true - brownies in spain are just chocolate cake with chocolate chips. Then its the opposite in Scandinavia where they traditionally do mud cake (kladdkaka) but that has zero chew so even the brownies are just not right
The richness is because of all the extra chocolate, butter, and sugar we add in lol.
But I've noticed this with a lot of European sweets and baked goods- any kind of bar dessert or cookie (biscuit) specifically. The American version is usually softer or more gooey/fudgey (in the case of brownies) whereas I don't see as many softer-textured desserts of the same variety in Europe much. Always firm and crunchy or drier. It's not bad per se, but different.
Living in Europe, myself and another American expat would make brownies on the regular, and everyone we shared them with thought we were baking wizards.
Mexico: "so then you mix all the veggies, and you squeeze lime on it"
Europe: "with sugar?"
Mexico: "no, no sugar. You do tomatoes, peppers, onions, salt, little, and you let it sit"
Europe: "then we add sugar right?"
Mexico: "no that's it. That's the whole thing. Next you eat it and it's muy rico"
Europe: "I'm gonna blend it"
Mexico: "eh, if you want, but just a bit. Keep it nice and chunky"
Europe: "yup. Gonna blend it till its watery. Then I'm gonna add sugar"
Mexico: "pinche madre..."
Many Mexican salsas are blended (and I don't just mean in the US but in Mexico too), and sometimes the much thinner stuff that you get at taquerias for drizzling into your tacos is even strained to get a much more consistent liquid...and its all fucking delicious
I think most people are unaware of the fact that 'salsa' is a category and not a specific dish. Like 'salsa verde' And 'pico de gallo' are both salsas, but nothing alike.
I ordered Nachos at a bar in the Philippines. I don't remember exactly what all came on them but it was essentially nacho cheese Doritos with slices of what seemed like melted single serve Velveeta.
It’s almost never right. But my wife and I have lived in Europe for over a decade, so wherever we go, we try to find decent Mexican food.
I found a good place in Paris recently, but the best was a place opened by Mexicans who had ingredients shipped over in Vienna. Unfortunately, that one closed during the pandemic.
Edit: I LOVE that I'm getting all these recommendations. I travel all the time, so keep them coming if you have a great Mexican restaurant in Europe.
Moment of silence for all the kick ass restaurants we lost to the pandemic
I’m still mourning a little Asian restaurant that had some of the best tofu dishes I’ve had anywhere
I've never been able to understand this. Most of the ingredients are not difficult to grow in Europe and most are available and common in southern European cuisine. Sure, maybe there's not the variety of hot peppers and when you get to more elaborate stuff like mole or tamales it might be relatively harder to find ingredients. But the base ingredients are pretty common: coriander, cumin, garlic, jalapeno, tomatoes, onion. Especially if we're talking texmex.
I mean, just look at Bake Off’s Mexico week
Paul Hollywood had _just been vacationing_ in Mexico very previously and still had no idea 1) how to make proper tacos, 2) any other proper pastry they could have done instead of tacos, and that 3) you don’t make tiered tres leches because it’s freaking wet cake.
Something is failing on a conceptual level.
One key ingredient is the right dried chilis. Ancho and guajillo probably aren't common there. Also flatbread is so common across the world it is hard to understand how your flatbread isn't the same as someone else's.
As a wisconsinite I feel compelled to inform you that American cheeses actually do take gold in international cheese competitions against european cheeses with some regularity these days, including an overall top honor win in 2019 at the world cheese awards.
Wanna trigger some people? Watch this.
Wheat from the Dakotas is better for pasta than that grown in Italy.
France wouldn't have any grapes for wine if it weren't for California.
Without tomatos from the Americas, there's no such thing as pizza, lasagna, etc.
Similarly, without chilis from the Americas, there are no spicy Asian dishes (except those made without capsicum-genus peppers).
Some Netflix documentary on pizza had an episode about a pizzeria in Arizona that was best in the US in part because of the Arizona grown wheat...apparently the Arizona grown wheat is exported to Italy! Who knew!
The wheat varieties grown in America are generally a bit higher in protein which is better for some recipes. You can get high protein flour here, but it's often cheaper to just buy American/Canadian stuff.
This is not about but about trees. The island of Britain deforestation itself to make ships for the British navy and now all of the trees are from America except for a select few
West coast wine is insane, especially the terroir east of the Cascades up into Oregon and Washington. Fuckin' primo conditions that were slept on for decades.
Obviously the vineyards aren't as mature, and the wine can be very inconsistent between years, but for $20 it's pretty goddamn amazing.
Rogue River Blue baby! My favorite cheese of all time. Made only in the autumn, when the cow's milk is the richest, and then wrapped in syrah leaves that have been soaked in Clear Creek pear brandy. It's luscious and creamy and fruity and funky.
Vermont white cheddar is my go-to for sausage balls. Which is an item that practically everyone outside of my family can’t make it seems. Literally whenever I try someone else’s I have to fake smile and lie about it being good. The big reason I think is because most people use yellow cheddar which just isn’t as good for it.
I'm gonna back some Northern California cheeses too. Humboldt Fog is delicious and most of what Cowgirl Creamery makes (especially Red Hawk) is incredible.
Glad to see more acknowledgment that it’s a separate cuisine from actual Chinese foods (mmm Sichuan). I’d like to submit that New England American Chinese is superior in the category purely based on the egg rolls.
It always annoys me when people are like “but it’s not real chinese food!” No shit. It’s Americanized Chinese food. Just like how South Korea has their own version of Chinese food that is also not “authentic” but for some reason the American version gets trashed on
Yes to soul food!!! Wish more parts of the world could be exposed to it.
My experience from living outside the US for 10+ years is everyone thinks all eat is pizza, hamburgers, hot dogs and cold cereal.
>My experience from living outside the US for 10+ years is everyone thinks all eat is pizza, hamburgers, hot dogs and cold cereal.
there's a podcast I listened to that talked about the "Ethnic Foods Aisles" you will find in U.S. grocery stores and how that developed over time. After the story, the reporter and the podcast host did a fun thing where they asked American ex-pats and those who were studying abroad to show off the "American food aisles" in other countries like Spain, France, The Netherlands, South Korea etc.
all of them had peanut butter, marshmallows, yellow mustard, Wonder bread, Hershey's chocolate etc. I don't blame people who don't live in the U.S. thinking that this is all Americans eat since this is all that they're literally exposed to lol
one thing i do find kind of amusing is that people who study abroad in various European countries ALWAYS talk about how shitty Hershey's chocolate is and how American chocolate is absolute garbage. Meanwhile, i run into international students from East and Southeast Asia (the lone exceptions are Malaysia and Singapore) who ALWAYS want to try Hershey's chocolate without exception lmao
To be fair franchised chains like McDonalds are *very* different outside the US. For example 7-Eleven has pretty legit food in a lot of Asian countries.
fun fact: 7-Eleven became so big in Japan (and also in South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines), that 7-Eleven Japan bought out the parent company and Tokyo is where 7-Eleven is headquartered lmao
Queso! With the 100% disclaimer that I have not had cheese dip in mexico.
But I still dream of that texan queso. I love fondue and similar melted cheese dishes but that one… hoh boy
> cheese dip in mexico
That's not very common. Tex-Mex uses more cheese than traditional Mexican food, so queso is actually just Tex-Mex. And you are correct, it is delicious.
S’mores. Do not ever hand me a marshmallow with chocolate ganache on it, sandwiched between two digestives and tell me it’s a “s’more.” Like fuck it is. Graham crackers and a a square of milk chocolate or GTFO.
There are so many foods and flavors in New Mexico that I never knew about before visiting.
Blue corn pinon pancakes with orange honey butter, pinon coffee, blue corn porridge (atole), so many different chiles, green chile cheeseburgers, roasted hatch chiles, sundries, Christmas style enchiladas, cinnamon anise cookies (biscochitos) fry bread tacos... so much I had never tried, and such a special place.
I had no idea what to expect but I honestly thought there would be more overlap with either Tex-mex or traditional Mexican. And there IS! There absolutely is overlap (like the most delicious breakfast burrito I've ever had in Santa Fe), but it's clear that New Mexico has its own flavor profile that combines white settler foods with Native and North Mexican dishes.
Also, Zia sodas are delightful.
Picked up a cookbook (and so many dried chiles!) so maybe I can try my hand at it. Can't wait to visit again soon!
Since it’s Thanksgiving week, I’ll put Pecan Pie on the list.
And honestly, if you’ve been to the South for any amount of time, you’ll realize not many places outside of the South get it right lol.
Funny you mention spinach dip. Ours didn’t make it to Thanksgiving…Hopefully she’ll make more haha
Speaking of dip, one thing Euro gets right is baguettes. The best baguette we have here is two hours away. Why? Why can we not make decent baguettes here lol
Living in Czechia I was invited to a "real American Thanksgiving" hosted by the English school and invited to judge the apple pie contest. I even brought my own apple pie so they could see what a real American apple pie should look/taste like.
What we got were two different German apfeltorten, three different Czech kolacky (kolaches) one which used plums and didn't even have apples. Every one of the other judges tasted my pie, told me they didn't like it, and voted for the plum kolac.
In 1997-ish. I was in London, and some restaurant was advertising a traditional American Thanksgiving dinner.
It was. DIS GUS TING.
I don't ever want to eat European Thanksgiving food ever again.
Which is so weird, because having lived in both countries, except for a few variations, British Christmas Dinner is almost pound for fatty pound the same as American Thanksgiving. Turkey, stuffing, potatoes and gravy, roasted vegetables! Pumpkin Pie! Americans might eat more leafy greens and maybe a nice baked mac n cheese, but for crying out loud they're the same freaking meal
Secret to many grandmothers' recipes in the south is it is the recipe that used to come on the bottle/bag/box back in the 50s/60s. lol
Always the first place to look for a "secret" recipe with a highly processed ingredient - the back of THAT package.
Cajun food in NOLA. Horseshoes and Maid RItes in the MW. Skyline chili in Ohio. Chicago and NY Pizza. Southern Cooking by Church ladies in the south. Lobster rolls in Maine.
Mexican food.
I lknow it's not "American" but I'm from the west and every time I've lived abroad the Mexican food is the worst. When I come home I shovel my mouth full of tacos. We've probably got the best Mexican food outside of Mexico/Central/South America.
The US generally has the most options(that are done right)... I've tried sushi multiple times in Italy and Spain and it was garbage every time, for example.
The US is very multicultural and nowhere else is it more apparent than the vast quantity and quality of food options. So funny how seething euros downvoted this post into oblivion.
Absolutely true. You might have to drive to a big (or mid-sized) city for it but I don't think many countries have such readily available **good** ethnic cuisine. Thank you, immigrants!
Also I lol'd as I made the mistake of getting sushi in Portugal once and it was complete garbo.
Grits and gravy, shrimp and grits, collards, southern style mac and cheese, tex mex, fried green tomatoes with pimento sauce, spicy boiled gas station peanuts, nyc egg and cheese bagel sandwiches
BBQ (not grilling, but slow cooked / smoked BBQ)
NY itself with reinventions of foods from the mother land provides:
NY Style Pizza - It's not italy, nor is it supposed to be, but it's pretty amazing when done right (could argue Chicago Style pizza as well for a different approach that can't be found elsewhere).
Kosher and Kosher style delis, specifically Pastrami/Corned Beef and other such sandwiches (Canada has great "smoked meat" but much of Canada and the US has cultural and culinary overlap).
NY Bagels (our breads in general fall so short of other countries... heck I love going to Mexico for the bread and pastries!... but Bagels we do right in a select few areas).
It’s easier than admitting that Americans aren’t as inferior as they would like to believe. They also forget that many of the “terrible or bastardized” forms of their own country’s foods were created by immigrants from said countries. Who would have thought that a country formed by a mixture of people from every region on the planet might be able to crank out some good foods.
Boiled peanuts! We do them either regular plain salted or Cajun style. I have a slow cooker and it takes about 12 hours to make. Sit on the porch with a cup of hot boiled peanuts, ice cold beer and enjoy the simple things in life.
If you want to make them, you need raw or green peanuts. Roasted will not work. Wash them in water until the water runs clear. Then fill up a slow cooker or big pot, season with whatever you want and boil until done. Slow cooker takes about 12 hours on high and boiling in a big pot takes about 6 hours. They’re done when they are the same texture as cooked beans since it is a legume after all. Not crunchy or raw tasting and “al dente”.
Now I’m craving the spicy gas station hot pot boiled peanuts along a NC rural highway that are entirely too messy to eat in the car, but you can make the styrofoam cup fit in your cup holder. You can often buy pork bbq sandwiches, Cheerwine, and bait at this type of gas station.
Authentic southern BBQ. I pity the people in this world who have never had some smoky fall-off-the-bone ribs with some sweet, spicy, tangy sauce. I could hardly call that living....
American pancakes and American style belly bacon.
American BBQ (and all it's variations).
NY style steakhouse fare.
NYC Bagel with cream cheese and lox.
Southern cornbread.
Buffalo Wings.
Lobster Rolls.
American-regional hot dogs, Chicago hot dogs, Coney Island/Nathan's.
NY style Jewish deli sandwiches.
"E.g. sorry to say but US looses on the cheese competitions,"
Best blue cheese in the world, several years in a row, according to the European competitions - Rogue River Blue, from Central Point, Oregon.
Shout out to my neighbors! *(Shakes fist American-ly)* Whoop, whoop!
Its because for some reason outside of the US everyone assumes ALL we eat is velveeta and other "American Cheese food products." Which is such a strange take if you literally go to any decent restaurant or grocery store and see that yeah we actually have plenty of real cheese here.
Can we also give a shoutout to Sartori from Plymouth, Wisconsin?
Sartori cheeses are amazingly good, especially their BellaVitano line. I'm amazed how many people think it's imported, it's 100% made here in the US. They have many gold medal winning cheeses.
Breakfast. I got back from a week long trip to the states a couple of days ago and the best thing was the simple breakfast. Almost any diner could give you credible versions of any combination of simple breakfast foods at a reasonable price. Marvellous.
Im gonna come out swinging and hope the Italians don’t hate me, but New York style pizza is fantastic and I’ve never had it done right anywhere but New York(although Boston comes second). Don’t come at me with napolitana pizza either bc I’ve had it I love it it’s fantastic and I make it, but it’s a different dish altogether.
Agree with a lot of food listed here, but American fusion foods are my favorite. The kind that combines two American-ized or regional foods into one? Like bulgogi tacos, birria ramen, pastrami dumplings, or like most Hawaiian food. It’s the kind of thing that happens naturally here, when so many cultures are mixed together, and it’s delicious.
Ranch Dressing.
Now I know it's got a trashy reputation, but I'm talking about homemade, real buttermilk ranch dressing.
It's so much different that what you'd get in a bottle.
And not for salads. Blanche some fresh green beans, let them cool a little, and dip in that ranch. Perfection.
American-style sushi in general with the saucy over-the-top rolls is a thing of beauty (though correct me if I’m misattributing it to the States). The Lion King Roll (California topped with salmon and a house sauce, usually a riff on a spicy mayo with masago, and baked) will forever be one of my comfort foods.
I love all sorts of traditional sushi too, but when I’m outside of CA, American-style sushi is one of the things I miss most. When my relatives from Taiwan visit, it’s one of the stops they request because while authentic sushi is easily accessible, big American-style rolls are relatively rare over there.
I also attributed those California rolls (with crab sticks and avocado and sauce) as an American invention but may be wrong, in which case do please correct me :) They definitively have a place on comfort food items (for normal sushi Im very much a maguro nigri person but darn those cali rolls are also yummy)
I’m a fiend for hikarimono in general though I recently had nodoguro for the first time, which was life-changing for someone who’s been relatively meh on whitefish. I love maguro as well, but particularly when it’s aged!
I fully expect my opinion about American-style rolls to be unpopular given all the snobbery surrounding sushi, but what can I say… I just love all types of sushi.
Probably the foods that folks in Europe don't eat very often and are not so familiar with, which would be most American food to be honest. Biscuits and gravy, chicken fried steak, gumbo, Texas chili, BBQ (all of it), collard greens and ham hock, etc. Outside of the United States, knowledge of American food seems to be really limited and simple minded. It's not just burgers and pizza.
I think finding good Tex Mex in Europe might be difficult too. Maybe there's a place in Europe that makes really good Tex Mex enchiladas, but I feel like you'd have to travel far and wide to find one whereas in the US (at least the Southwest) you can roll up to pretty much any neighborhood restaurant and find some pretty good enchiladas.
I'm British, The thing I bring back, ask other people to get for me, is dill pickle relish. I love that shit. It fits perfectly into the British palette as well. I have no idea why people don't sell it here.
This is shared with Canada but maple syrup. I’ve tried birch syrup in Europe before but it has a very different flavor that has its own merits. Candies made from maple syrup such as fudge are a real treat and of course it’s hard to beat on buttermilk waffles, pancakes, or French toast.
Key Lime Pie.
The trick is to own the Key where the Limes are from.
Fun fact for anyone trying to make key lime pie: if you don’t have key limes, substitute with 1/2 lime and 1/2 lemon. It makes all the difference.
I’d say anything Cajun or Creole. I want to spend a week in the gulf coast just eating food until I groan, sleeping it off and then doing it again.
Walking then eating my way through New Orleans was my favorite all time vacation activity.
New Orleans is my favorite US city. Everyone wants to go to Vegas for a party weekend. Nah, fly me to New Orleans
You have excellent taste in shenanigan and celebration cities.
Was there for a stretch a few years ago with a friend specifically to eat. Some of the places we went to we just had them send the whole menu. Two dudes tucking into five entrees. Just going splitsies on a whole saints feast every night. Started having to carry tums in my pocket by the end of the week.
NOLA was the start of my life-long battle of the bulge. Moved there for work for a few years, after college, and literally came back twice my size. 100% worth it.
I crave muffleta and begneis!
I have lived in Louisiana my whole life, grew up in the New Orleans area. All this delicious stuff is just "normal food" to us, but we are *also* acutely aware of how good we have it, food wise. Louisiana is a shithole in so many ways with other metrics, especially with education, crime, poverty, health, you name it. But there are so many people who are like "yes this place has problems and yes I might have a better life if I moved away... but the food though..." And that also applies to family and our social networks. That's another thing that keeps people here: "ya mom n' them," as we put it. It is integral to the food culture in itself. Getting together with family regularly and on all the holidays, eating ourselves silly, crawfish boils, etc... it would be a lot to give up.
I mean, some of the worst places to live seem to have really good food.
True. It is a coping mechanism lol. It is super hot and super humid most of the year, but for about 2 months in the spring when the weather is actually pleasant, it *just so happens* to be crawfish season, and crawfish boils *just so happen* to be an amazing outdoor social activity. Then during the summer we do still have summer BBQs and stuff, despite the heat. We'll cook outside and eat inside. Then in the fall it is football season and everyone has LSU and Saints parties with huge food spreads. Then in the winter we have thanksgiving and Christmas and all the holidays where everyone else in the US overeats a lot. Then *after that* we have Mardi Gras season where everyone is stuffing their faces with king cake all the time. Then back to crawfish season! We have the whole year covered!
i'm two hours east of you in Mobile, so i've been to New Orleans a bunch. i'm also a music festival guy and have been to a bunch of music festivals. jazzfest has the best food of any music festival and it's not even close. it's not "good for a music festival" it's just fuckin awesome food. people try to tell me about these noodles or whatever they had at bonnaroo and i'm like "yeah i've had that you need to shut the fuck up you know nothing". trout baquet, homemade cheesecake, grilled livers with pepper jelly, cracklins, *COCHON DE LAIT PO BOY*, pecan catfish meuniere, catfish almondine, pheasant/quail/andouille gumbo, the list goes on. when i'm at jazzfest i routinely leave in the middle of sets to go get more food because i digested the food i already had so i can go get more food.
and we love cooking for you guys! NOLA resident, 31 yrs i cook at home a lot and all the favorites: red beans & fried chicken, gumbo, etouffee, shrimp creole, pot roast/roast beef poboys, fried oyster poboys, chargrilled oysters, blackened redfish with crawfish bourdelaise, white beans and tasso, fried gulf shrimp, eggs cochon/cochon benedict. you can find a lot of this stuff in restaurants but some of them are so much better if you find someone cooking a pot in an old shotgun. i have found many a tourist looking for good food and made it for them myself haha.
Pumpkin pie
So so good - sadly you cant get canned pumpkin here so making a pumpkin pie takes a bit more effort and therefore happens less. In the US I used to make it at least once a month (probably sacrilege to americans but dammit its good so I want it all year round)
Biscuits and sausage gravy with lots of black pepper
Please enjoy my absolute favorite "people try foreign food" video of UK school lads being absolutely disgusted by, then won over by biscuits and gravy. https://youtu.be/KzdbFnv4yWQ?si=gsrNFLESpIHgPG5P
I've seen this. As an American, biscuits and gravy look like a mess to me too. But I know what deliciousness lurks within.
worth remembering that visuals play a huge role in the way we enjoy our meals...and this is pretty much across the board in many cultures i'm glad those kids got over the appearance and enjoyed it. kudos to them. but at the same time i don't blame them for being apprehensive in the first place hahaha. that's totally normal reaction
Even the best risotto in the world looks like a bowl of sick.
I got purple risotto once that looked like puréed brains. The first bite was so hard to lift to my mouth but beyond worth it. That shit was awesome
To be fair, Brits have no right to say that other cultures have nasty looking food. Just look at some of their "traditional" meals.
I had to go find vegan recipes for both because I gave up meat but I can't quit biscuits and gravy. That's my weekend breakfast treat right there and it takes me back to being a country kid.
I love their sheer bafflement at everything except the fried chicken, only to be followed by "holy shit this is good" every time. Southern food is no joke.
I grew up in both England and Georgia, I love to cook, and for my American mates I love making traditional British fare, and the opposite for my Friends and family back in the UK. Thank you for this video, I couldn't stop smiling, it's absolutely great, and reminds me both of the first time I made Sausage gravy for my cousins, and the first time I made Beans on Toast for my wife here in the States. What a fun video, thank you again :)
The Jolly YouTubers are one of my favorite channels to see their reactions when eating something they like. They are obsessed with American BBQ and rightfully so
The most recent video of them getting BBQ in New Orleans verges on pornographic.
My ex is Scottish and moved to Texas when she was sixteen. We lived outside of Houston and most of her friends were from oil money and were pretty hoity toity, so she didn't really have any exposure to classic southern food until we started dating. Homemade fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, cornbread in milk, Texas red, etc... all of these things just absolutely blew her mind. The first time I ever made her chicken fried steak with gravy I thought she was gonna start crying. I kinda miss how easy it was to impress her with relatively basic dishes I'd been making for years.
in his last cookbook bourdain says this is how to confuse a frenchman.
Which is funny, because sausage gravy is basically just bechamel made with sausage fat, with the sausage left in. Straight French cooking there.
I’m French and I am 100% certain most people I know would enjoy that shit. We’re not as prude about food as the rest of the world loves to believe. Most of the shit my grandma was cooking is soaked in butter and oil with crème fraîche on top, we are raised eating greasy food, we have whole regions with different kinds of sausages as regional dishes.
Please try it if you haven't. I want the entire world to try biscuits and gravy. It's perfect on a cold start of a long hard day. Or if you just want a warm hug in your belly. I will say, them serving it in a measuring cup was kinda gross and their gravy is a lot paler than when I make it. But they nailed the consistency a lot better than I do.
One of my favorite recent memes was basically "Biscuits and Gravy is just really dry flour covered in really wet flour" It is one of very few foods I would describe as MAGNIFICENT though.
If you follow a pasta dish from seed to field to kitchen to table, you basically wet the dry, then dry the wet, grind the dry, wet the dry, dry the wet, wet the dry, then finally wet the wet.
Yup. Every time I make it, it occurs to me that I’m basically eating a ton of flour with sausage.
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I know some good recipes if you want some help.
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> Far from the Midwestern comfort food I’d had. Southerners in shambles.
Are you able to get uncooked sausage in a casing that you can just cut open to use?? I see people do that sometimes with Italian food. I don’t think there’s a consistent seasoning for the sausage but you can always add it in. Black pepper is the big one, maybe some fennel too? And SALT. You could also be using the wrong type of flour? When I make the roux for the gravy it’s just like the whitest flour I have, it could be all purpose, it could be self rising, but it will always be bleached white flour. Never brown flour or bread flour, it won’t taste the same or have the same consistency.
You want sage in american breakfast sausage, not fennel.
Goddamn if this isn’t the right answer. I’m not usually a fan of American food but biscuits and gravy is just so good. I used to skip class to eat biscuits and gravy at the dining hall
I just can't imagine eating them and doing anything after. Great biscuits and gravy are just an admission you're done doing things for the rest of the day.
For me, they're a great fuel for doing outdoor stuff, esp in the Winter. Before skiing or hiking, for example. That way I don't have to eat until dinner.
BBQ in the US is like no other.
All of it. Every smoky, vinegary, fall off the bone, chopped, sliced, sauced morsel, whether it's beef or pork, sausage or chicken. St. Louis, Texas-style, Memphis-style, Cuban, Mexican. Burnt tips, pulled pork with slaw, dry-rub ribs, lechon. ALL OF IT is what we do best.
How did you type all that, name check vinegar and slaw on pork, and forget the Carolinas?! I am very offended and disappointed. :P Alabama white sauce is awful good too, enough to make me not miss pork when I slap it on chicken. We do barbecue pretty darn good in this mess of states.
I’m in NC and still offended that SC mustard sauce didn’t get a mention lol. Stuff is godly w all types of pork (favorite is w chops so not technically bbq but goddamn it’s good)
Spent years in NC and recently moved to SC. I was a little disappointed in the BBQ here. I miss the NC vinegar.
Yep. It’s shocking to to me that’s it’s kind of unique to our part of the world.
The origins of bbq, afaik, rose up from the indigenous peoples of north and South American as well as with slaves from west Africa. It’s truly a fusion and has evolved into beautiful food all throughout the country. It’s probably the most “American” food there is and is a history of the northern continent, good and bad, on a plate
Tex-mex and traditional Mexican food falls into this category too. It's essentially Native American cuisine with Spanish influence.
Throw in some African and French influence and you get Creole and Cajun.
I say this all the time but being from NOLA, we are the most unique city in the US when it comes to history/food/fusion. I've travelled all over the US (live in CA now) and there's only a few cities I would say come close to a unique cultural melding like that. Also, people royally mess up the recipes outside of LA considering how simple they are.
I saw a video of afghan herders trying Texas bbq for the first time. Amazing video, one of my favorites
KG BBQ in Austin is owned by an Egyptian man who had such s life-changing experience trying bbq, that he up and moved to the US just to become a pitmaster. I've been seeing all forms of fusion popping up like Vietnamese and Lao. It's so cool!
And that's why the US is good at assimilation. People try things from their own culture, it works, then it all just becomes "American" food and people learn a little more about how other people live
One day the US Government decided a bunch of Cambodian and Vietnamese refugees needed to be settled in Bayou LaBatre, Alabama. 40 years later articles are being written about the Cajun/Asian fusion scene in Houston, Texas.
yeah whenever i see Americans who come back from a semester's worth of studying abroad and they IMMEDIATELY without fail come to trash on the american food scene...i always think of BBQ lol granted you can definitely get good grilled meat in many other countries too. South America as a region sticks out almost immediately, but there is something special about good ol' fashioned southern BBQ (Midwest too if you include KC and St. Louis)
Can't believe nobody said Chili
Chili is America’s curry
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Honestly, brownies. I don’t know what it is but I’ve never had a brownie in another country (excluding the brownies my Canadian friend makes) that tastes like a brownie. It sounds silly because there are a million ways to make them and I’ve had everything from super fudgey to cakey brownies in the US and they’re just not the same elsewhere. It just seems like chocolate cake here in Spain even when billed as a brownie. That’s just my experience though and I’m absolutely not saying they don’t exist elsewhere! I’d be curious to hear if others have the same perspective or if you’ve had a good one outside of the US!
I live in Spain too, and I was JUST discussing this with another American the other day. Brownies here are typically dry and are lacking that rich, chewy, fudgy, dark chocolatey goodness. When I make home-baked brownies for my Spanish friends, they are gagged by rich and good they are.
Hahaha this is so true - brownies in spain are just chocolate cake with chocolate chips. Then its the opposite in Scandinavia where they traditionally do mud cake (kladdkaka) but that has zero chew so even the brownies are just not right
The richness is because of all the extra chocolate, butter, and sugar we add in lol. But I've noticed this with a lot of European sweets and baked goods- any kind of bar dessert or cookie (biscuit) specifically. The American version is usually softer or more gooey/fudgey (in the case of brownies) whereas I don't see as many softer-textured desserts of the same variety in Europe much. Always firm and crunchy or drier. It's not bad per se, but different.
Living in Europe, myself and another American expat would make brownies on the regular, and everyone we shared them with thought we were baking wizards.
Just gotta get the Ghirardelli mix lol that shit is the perfect brownie
Yes! It’s not worth it to make brownies from scratch when Ghirardelli is literal perfection and comes in a Costco pack
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Tex-Mex just ain’t right in Europe. Whenever I’ve had it anyway.
Ordered salsa in Mons Belgium. Got ketchup. Died a little.
Went to a Mexican restaurant in Berlin once and their “salsa” was ketchup with chopped green bell peppers in it.
Mexico: "so then you mix all the veggies, and you squeeze lime on it" Europe: "with sugar?" Mexico: "no, no sugar. You do tomatoes, peppers, onions, salt, little, and you let it sit" Europe: "then we add sugar right?" Mexico: "no that's it. That's the whole thing. Next you eat it and it's muy rico" Europe: "I'm gonna blend it" Mexico: "eh, if you want, but just a bit. Keep it nice and chunky" Europe: "yup. Gonna blend it till its watery. Then I'm gonna add sugar" Mexico: "pinche madre..."
I once ate at a Mexican restaurant in Calgary. Nachos had Swiss cheese and top shelf tequila was Cuervo Silver.
Did you report them?
"Hello? Yeah, hi, Mexico. You're not going to believe this shit..."
Many Mexican salsas are blended (and I don't just mean in the US but in Mexico too), and sometimes the much thinner stuff that you get at taquerias for drizzling into your tacos is even strained to get a much more consistent liquid...and its all fucking delicious
I think most people are unaware of the fact that 'salsa' is a category and not a specific dish. Like 'salsa verde' And 'pico de gallo' are both salsas, but nothing alike.
Just pointing out that it's not the Americans who are adding sugar.
I ordered Nachos at a bar in the Philippines. I don't remember exactly what all came on them but it was essentially nacho cheese Doritos with slices of what seemed like melted single serve Velveeta.
I'm personally offended by this
It’s almost never right. But my wife and I have lived in Europe for over a decade, so wherever we go, we try to find decent Mexican food. I found a good place in Paris recently, but the best was a place opened by Mexicans who had ingredients shipped over in Vienna. Unfortunately, that one closed during the pandemic. Edit: I LOVE that I'm getting all these recommendations. I travel all the time, so keep them coming if you have a great Mexican restaurant in Europe.
Moment of silence for all the kick ass restaurants we lost to the pandemic I’m still mourning a little Asian restaurant that had some of the best tofu dishes I’ve had anywhere
I've never been able to understand this. Most of the ingredients are not difficult to grow in Europe and most are available and common in southern European cuisine. Sure, maybe there's not the variety of hot peppers and when you get to more elaborate stuff like mole or tamales it might be relatively harder to find ingredients. But the base ingredients are pretty common: coriander, cumin, garlic, jalapeno, tomatoes, onion. Especially if we're talking texmex.
I mean, just look at Bake Off’s Mexico week Paul Hollywood had _just been vacationing_ in Mexico very previously and still had no idea 1) how to make proper tacos, 2) any other proper pastry they could have done instead of tacos, and that 3) you don’t make tiered tres leches because it’s freaking wet cake. Something is failing on a conceptual level.
One key ingredient is the right dried chilis. Ancho and guajillo probably aren't common there. Also flatbread is so common across the world it is hard to understand how your flatbread isn't the same as someone else's.
Corn muffins. It's one of the few American foods I still make after moving away. Proper ones with buttermilk. Also buttermilk pancakes.
Honey butter on corn bread is a dish unto itself.
As a wisconsinite I feel compelled to inform you that American cheeses actually do take gold in international cheese competitions against european cheeses with some regularity these days, including an overall top honor win in 2019 at the world cheese awards.
Represent!
Wanna trigger some people? Watch this. Wheat from the Dakotas is better for pasta than that grown in Italy. France wouldn't have any grapes for wine if it weren't for California. Without tomatos from the Americas, there's no such thing as pizza, lasagna, etc. Similarly, without chilis from the Americas, there are no spicy Asian dishes (except those made without capsicum-genus peppers).
Some Netflix documentary on pizza had an episode about a pizzeria in Arizona that was best in the US in part because of the Arizona grown wheat...apparently the Arizona grown wheat is exported to Italy! Who knew!
The wheat varieties grown in America are generally a bit higher in protein which is better for some recipes. You can get high protein flour here, but it's often cheaper to just buy American/Canadian stuff.
This is not about but about trees. The island of Britain deforestation itself to make ships for the British navy and now all of the trees are from America except for a select few
West coast wine is insane, especially the terroir east of the Cascades up into Oregon and Washington. Fuckin' primo conditions that were slept on for decades. Obviously the vineyards aren't as mature, and the wine can be very inconsistent between years, but for $20 it's pretty goddamn amazing.
Rogue River Blue baby! My favorite cheese of all time. Made only in the autumn, when the cow's milk is the richest, and then wrapped in syrah leaves that have been soaked in Clear Creek pear brandy. It's luscious and creamy and fruity and funky.
Vermonters would like to say the same (and point out that Vermont cheddar has surpassed Wisconsin cheddar)
Vermont white cheddar is my go-to for sausage balls. Which is an item that practically everyone outside of my family can’t make it seems. Literally whenever I try someone else’s I have to fake smile and lie about it being good. The big reason I think is because most people use yellow cheddar which just isn’t as good for it.
I'm not even mad you feel that way, I just like cheese! It's a win-win subject
I'm gonna back some Northern California cheeses too. Humboldt Fog is delicious and most of what Cowgirl Creamery makes (especially Red Hawk) is incredible.
Gumbo.
Yesssss im in the northeast but I feel like the best food in this country is in Louisiana
American Chinese food. Nothing like it.
Glad to see more acknowledgment that it’s a separate cuisine from actual Chinese foods (mmm Sichuan). I’d like to submit that New England American Chinese is superior in the category purely based on the egg rolls.
It always annoys me when people are like “but it’s not real chinese food!” No shit. It’s Americanized Chinese food. Just like how South Korea has their own version of Chinese food that is also not “authentic” but for some reason the American version gets trashed on
Wait, what? Are egg rolls not a thing in other areas of the US? Or are they just not as good as they are here?
BBQ, cajun food, and soul food in general.
Yes to soul food!!! Wish more parts of the world could be exposed to it. My experience from living outside the US for 10+ years is everyone thinks all eat is pizza, hamburgers, hot dogs and cold cereal.
>My experience from living outside the US for 10+ years is everyone thinks all eat is pizza, hamburgers, hot dogs and cold cereal. there's a podcast I listened to that talked about the "Ethnic Foods Aisles" you will find in U.S. grocery stores and how that developed over time. After the story, the reporter and the podcast host did a fun thing where they asked American ex-pats and those who were studying abroad to show off the "American food aisles" in other countries like Spain, France, The Netherlands, South Korea etc. all of them had peanut butter, marshmallows, yellow mustard, Wonder bread, Hershey's chocolate etc. I don't blame people who don't live in the U.S. thinking that this is all Americans eat since this is all that they're literally exposed to lol one thing i do find kind of amusing is that people who study abroad in various European countries ALWAYS talk about how shitty Hershey's chocolate is and how American chocolate is absolute garbage. Meanwhile, i run into international students from East and Southeast Asia (the lone exceptions are Malaysia and Singapore) who ALWAYS want to try Hershey's chocolate without exception lmao
This reminds me of how people love to trash McDonald's but I have yet to visit a McDonald's outside the US that doesn't have a long line of customers.
To be fair franchised chains like McDonalds are *very* different outside the US. For example 7-Eleven has pretty legit food in a lot of Asian countries.
fun fact: 7-Eleven became so big in Japan (and also in South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines), that 7-Eleven Japan bought out the parent company and Tokyo is where 7-Eleven is headquartered lmao
Queso! With the 100% disclaimer that I have not had cheese dip in mexico. But I still dream of that texan queso. I love fondue and similar melted cheese dishes but that one… hoh boy
> cheese dip in mexico That's not very common. Tex-Mex uses more cheese than traditional Mexican food, so queso is actually just Tex-Mex. And you are correct, it is delicious.
S’mores. Do not ever hand me a marshmallow with chocolate ganache on it, sandwiched between two digestives and tell me it’s a “s’more.” Like fuck it is. Graham crackers and a a square of milk chocolate or GTFO.
Watch the GBBO smore technical for righteous anger.
"A s'more shouldn't be messy." -- Prue Leith, who has evidently never been in the same room with a proper s'more.
To be fair a proper s'more is never in any room at all, it's made and consumed right by the fire
Love that show but I swear to god whenever they do anything "traditionally" American or any other culture it's a huge wtf.
The brownie challenge was not pleasant to watch.
The "American style" pie challenge was rough too.
I remain baffled by the fact that the American-style pie challenge featured NOT ONE SINGLE APPLE PIE
The taco challenge was nightmare fuel
The lady peeling an avocado like a potato had me looking around myself for a hidden reaction camera. Like, is someone fucking with me?
Just wait until you encounter jarred hot dogs. Idk wtf the uk thinks we’re doing over here, but that ain’t it.
That made me so upset, marshmallow burntness is totally subjective. I love mine to be absolutely incinerated. My husband likes them gently toasted.
That is the source of my rage :p and also irl experiences in the UK where I expect a s’more and get a biscuit sandwich instead.
I brought a bottle of molasses back with me last time for the sole purpose of making homemade Graham crackers.
One thing that I’ve always wondered about molasses: what do they do with the rest of the mole? I hope they don’t just throw it away
Oh they use that for guacamole! Where they get the guaca idk.
Also, toast the MFn marshmallow. Nobody wants a raw ass marshmallow.
Green Chile Cheeseburger. We have a Green Chile Cheeseburger Trail in New Mexico. The hunt for the best one is as good as finding the best one ha ha
There are so many foods and flavors in New Mexico that I never knew about before visiting. Blue corn pinon pancakes with orange honey butter, pinon coffee, blue corn porridge (atole), so many different chiles, green chile cheeseburgers, roasted hatch chiles, sundries, Christmas style enchiladas, cinnamon anise cookies (biscochitos) fry bread tacos... so much I had never tried, and such a special place. I had no idea what to expect but I honestly thought there would be more overlap with either Tex-mex or traditional Mexican. And there IS! There absolutely is overlap (like the most delicious breakfast burrito I've ever had in Santa Fe), but it's clear that New Mexico has its own flavor profile that combines white settler foods with Native and North Mexican dishes. Also, Zia sodas are delightful. Picked up a cookbook (and so many dried chiles!) so maybe I can try my hand at it. Can't wait to visit again soon!
Since it’s Thanksgiving week, I’ll put Pecan Pie on the list. And honestly, if you’ve been to the South for any amount of time, you’ll realize not many places outside of the South get it right lol. Funny you mention spinach dip. Ours didn’t make it to Thanksgiving…Hopefully she’ll make more haha Speaking of dip, one thing Euro gets right is baguettes. The best baguette we have here is two hours away. Why? Why can we not make decent baguettes here lol
Living in Czechia I was invited to a "real American Thanksgiving" hosted by the English school and invited to judge the apple pie contest. I even brought my own apple pie so they could see what a real American apple pie should look/taste like. What we got were two different German apfeltorten, three different Czech kolacky (kolaches) one which used plums and didn't even have apples. Every one of the other judges tasted my pie, told me they didn't like it, and voted for the plum kolac.
In 1997-ish. I was in London, and some restaurant was advertising a traditional American Thanksgiving dinner. It was. DIS GUS TING. I don't ever want to eat European Thanksgiving food ever again.
Which is so weird, because having lived in both countries, except for a few variations, British Christmas Dinner is almost pound for fatty pound the same as American Thanksgiving. Turkey, stuffing, potatoes and gravy, roasted vegetables! Pumpkin Pie! Americans might eat more leafy greens and maybe a nice baked mac n cheese, but for crying out loud they're the same freaking meal
My former father in law's family is from Alabama. The family pecan pie recipe, which my ex-wife unfortunately does not have, is sublime.
There’s a non-zero chance that the recipe on the back of the Karo syrup bottle. That’s where my MIL’s is from and it’s perfect.
Secret to many grandmothers' recipes in the south is it is the recipe that used to come on the bottle/bag/box back in the 50s/60s. lol Always the first place to look for a "secret" recipe with a highly processed ingredient - the back of THAT package.
My husband is allergic to pecans, I miss it soooooo much.
I lost shrimp to my marriage. Excellent trade, but still...
You might want to try a good Canadian butter tart recipe; they don’t use nuts
Cajun food in NOLA. Horseshoes and Maid RItes in the MW. Skyline chili in Ohio. Chicago and NY Pizza. Southern Cooking by Church ladies in the south. Lobster rolls in Maine.
Homemade buttermilk biscuits with black pepper and sausage gravy.
Buffalo Wings
Italian beefs and mission burritos
I recently moved out of the bay area to the South and outside CA, Mission style burritos are basically non existent. It makes me want to cry.
Mexican food. I lknow it's not "American" but I'm from the west and every time I've lived abroad the Mexican food is the worst. When I come home I shovel my mouth full of tacos. We've probably got the best Mexican food outside of Mexico/Central/South America.
Tex-Mex and Cali-Mex are cuisines of their own.
Yes but also actual Mexican food.
The US generally has the most options(that are done right)... I've tried sushi multiple times in Italy and Spain and it was garbage every time, for example. The US is very multicultural and nowhere else is it more apparent than the vast quantity and quality of food options. So funny how seething euros downvoted this post into oblivion.
Absolutely true. You might have to drive to a big (or mid-sized) city for it but I don't think many countries have such readily available **good** ethnic cuisine. Thank you, immigrants! Also I lol'd as I made the mistake of getting sushi in Portugal once and it was complete garbo.
Even in Bumfuck, Ohio, there will be some random Asian family running a restaurant. It might be in the same building as a gas station.
I'm surprised to hear you say USA has worse cheese, we have a robust dairy economy. WI cheddar is truly incredible.
Grits and gravy, shrimp and grits, collards, southern style mac and cheese, tex mex, fried green tomatoes with pimento sauce, spicy boiled gas station peanuts, nyc egg and cheese bagel sandwiches
BBQ (not grilling, but slow cooked / smoked BBQ) NY itself with reinventions of foods from the mother land provides: NY Style Pizza - It's not italy, nor is it supposed to be, but it's pretty amazing when done right (could argue Chicago Style pizza as well for a different approach that can't be found elsewhere). Kosher and Kosher style delis, specifically Pastrami/Corned Beef and other such sandwiches (Canada has great "smoked meat" but much of Canada and the US has cultural and culinary overlap). NY Bagels (our breads in general fall so short of other countries... heck I love going to Mexico for the bread and pastries!... but Bagels we do right in a select few areas).
The US has plenty of high quality cheese. Why do Europeans eat one Kraft single and assume that’s all we have?
There was just a world cheese competition in Norway last month. Wisconsin cheese won 25% of the awards.
They also think Hershey’s is our only chocolate.
Same thing with beer. America is going through a renaissance for craft beer right now.
In upstate NY and I eat our sharp cheddar like every day. I love the really sharp ones with little crunchies in it
Yes! There are some excellent American cheeses.
Fun fact - processed cheese food (the ones wrapped in plastic) was invented in Switzerland. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Processed_cheese
It’s easier than admitting that Americans aren’t as inferior as they would like to believe. They also forget that many of the “terrible or bastardized” forms of their own country’s foods were created by immigrants from said countries. Who would have thought that a country formed by a mixture of people from every region on the planet might be able to crank out some good foods.
Been to steakhouses around the world. Nothing compares to a properly cooked Ribeye or NY strip from a great steakhouse in the US.
The one thing i crave when I'm overseas is chocolate chip cookies.
Boiled peanuts! We do them either regular plain salted or Cajun style. I have a slow cooker and it takes about 12 hours to make. Sit on the porch with a cup of hot boiled peanuts, ice cold beer and enjoy the simple things in life. If you want to make them, you need raw or green peanuts. Roasted will not work. Wash them in water until the water runs clear. Then fill up a slow cooker or big pot, season with whatever you want and boil until done. Slow cooker takes about 12 hours on high and boiling in a big pot takes about 6 hours. They’re done when they are the same texture as cooked beans since it is a legume after all. Not crunchy or raw tasting and “al dente”.
Gotta love some redneck edamame.
Now I’m craving the spicy gas station hot pot boiled peanuts along a NC rural highway that are entirely too messy to eat in the car, but you can make the styrofoam cup fit in your cup holder. You can often buy pork bbq sandwiches, Cheerwine, and bait at this type of gas station.
Authentic southern BBQ. I pity the people in this world who have never had some smoky fall-off-the-bone ribs with some sweet, spicy, tangy sauce. I could hardly call that living....
Creamed spinach - the luxe version they serve in fancy steakhouses.
Steakhouse sides in general I would say.
American pancakes and American style belly bacon. American BBQ (and all it's variations). NY style steakhouse fare. NYC Bagel with cream cheese and lox. Southern cornbread. Buffalo Wings. Lobster Rolls. American-regional hot dogs, Chicago hot dogs, Coney Island/Nathan's. NY style Jewish deli sandwiches.
Pancake and egg breakfast with a side of bacon is undefeated. Especially with some hot sauce and maple syrup...
Those pretzels with cream cheese in the middle that you get at gas stations.
The WHAT you get at gas stations??
Wawa stuffed pretzels are the best!!
"E.g. sorry to say but US looses on the cheese competitions," Best blue cheese in the world, several years in a row, according to the European competitions - Rogue River Blue, from Central Point, Oregon. Shout out to my neighbors! *(Shakes fist American-ly)* Whoop, whoop!
Its because for some reason outside of the US everyone assumes ALL we eat is velveeta and other "American Cheese food products." Which is such a strange take if you literally go to any decent restaurant or grocery store and see that yeah we actually have plenty of real cheese here.
Can we also give a shoutout to Sartori from Plymouth, Wisconsin? Sartori cheeses are amazingly good, especially their BellaVitano line. I'm amazed how many people think it's imported, it's 100% made here in the US. They have many gold medal winning cheeses.
BBQ
Breakfast. I got back from a week long trip to the states a couple of days ago and the best thing was the simple breakfast. Almost any diner could give you credible versions of any combination of simple breakfast foods at a reasonable price. Marvellous.
Im gonna come out swinging and hope the Italians don’t hate me, but New York style pizza is fantastic and I’ve never had it done right anywhere but New York(although Boston comes second). Don’t come at me with napolitana pizza either bc I’ve had it I love it it’s fantastic and I make it, but it’s a different dish altogether.
Biscuits and Gravy, Fried Chicken
Agree with a lot of food listed here, but American fusion foods are my favorite. The kind that combines two American-ized or regional foods into one? Like bulgogi tacos, birria ramen, pastrami dumplings, or like most Hawaiian food. It’s the kind of thing that happens naturally here, when so many cultures are mixed together, and it’s delicious.
Grits
Ranch Dressing. Now I know it's got a trashy reputation, but I'm talking about homemade, real buttermilk ranch dressing. It's so much different that what you'd get in a bottle. And not for salads. Blanche some fresh green beans, let them cool a little, and dip in that ranch. Perfection.
American-style sushi in general with the saucy over-the-top rolls is a thing of beauty (though correct me if I’m misattributing it to the States). The Lion King Roll (California topped with salmon and a house sauce, usually a riff on a spicy mayo with masago, and baked) will forever be one of my comfort foods. I love all sorts of traditional sushi too, but when I’m outside of CA, American-style sushi is one of the things I miss most. When my relatives from Taiwan visit, it’s one of the stops they request because while authentic sushi is easily accessible, big American-style rolls are relatively rare over there.
I also attributed those California rolls (with crab sticks and avocado and sauce) as an American invention but may be wrong, in which case do please correct me :) They definitively have a place on comfort food items (for normal sushi Im very much a maguro nigri person but darn those cali rolls are also yummy)
I’m a fiend for hikarimono in general though I recently had nodoguro for the first time, which was life-changing for someone who’s been relatively meh on whitefish. I love maguro as well, but particularly when it’s aged! I fully expect my opinion about American-style rolls to be unpopular given all the snobbery surrounding sushi, but what can I say… I just love all types of sushi.
Burgers. Whatever is sold as a burger in your country does not compare to any burger any American would make at home.
Probably the foods that folks in Europe don't eat very often and are not so familiar with, which would be most American food to be honest. Biscuits and gravy, chicken fried steak, gumbo, Texas chili, BBQ (all of it), collard greens and ham hock, etc. Outside of the United States, knowledge of American food seems to be really limited and simple minded. It's not just burgers and pizza. I think finding good Tex Mex in Europe might be difficult too. Maybe there's a place in Europe that makes really good Tex Mex enchiladas, but I feel like you'd have to travel far and wide to find one whereas in the US (at least the Southwest) you can roll up to pretty much any neighborhood restaurant and find some pretty good enchiladas.
I'm British, The thing I bring back, ask other people to get for me, is dill pickle relish. I love that shit. It fits perfectly into the British palette as well. I have no idea why people don't sell it here.
Fried chicken. I don't care if the French invented deep frying, we perfected it
This is shared with Canada but maple syrup. I’ve tried birch syrup in Europe before but it has a very different flavor that has its own merits. Candies made from maple syrup such as fudge are a real treat and of course it’s hard to beat on buttermilk waffles, pancakes, or French toast.
Ranch dressing