What type of food do you eat in your country?

[Zardnaar]

Since a good chunk of the world is represented on these forums I thought I would find out what type of food people tend to eat. Note this isn't a competition otherwise Marla would probably win. Maybe give a variety of food for snacks, everyday meals, fast food etc

Anyway in New Zealand we tend to eat alot of meat with salads, rice, and vegetables. Our diet isn't probably to different from the USA, Oz, and the UK. Most weeks in our house we will cook something ethnic or go to a restaurant. There are several things more or less unique to NZ though that you may not get around the world. So here goes.

The Hangi (Hung- E)
Basically a Maori (polynesian native of NZ) earth oven. Traditionally a hole is dug in the ground and filled fire heated rocks. Damp cloth or leaves are put over the rocks and a basket of food is lowered into the pit, covered and buried for a few hours. Normally its chicken, pork and fish along with kumara (sweet potato), corn, potato and any other vegatable that you can steam cook. The earth traps the heat and steam cooks the food. An interesting way of cooking it and its often a social occasion- more or less a feast alot of the time. Although not a typical meal very often, sometimes white trash like me gets invited to a hangi.

Fish and Chips. More or less limited to NZ, Oz and England its basically battered fish, sausages, and chips of potato deep fried. Sauces are usually added- tartare, tomato, barbeque, or vinegar or lemon juice. Alot of the fish and chip shops are run by chinese so you can get a chinese meal as well. Cheep and nice but not very healthy. Some of them do deep fried chocolate bars.

The Pavlova.
The Australians claim they invented this. Anyway its a light and fluffy desert similar to a merangue. Generally topped with whiped cream and strawberries or sliced kiwifruit. Every christmas we have one and my mother normally serves it up to tourists at christmas (she runs a backpackers).

Christmas.
For christmas anything goes. Turkey usually isn't served except in families with American ties. Could be a traditional English style meal or a BBQ down at the beach. Our christmas is in summer and alot of beer generally gets drunk. For our christmas dinner last year we had inch thick hamsteaks cooked on a BBQ with pineapple slices and a Korean style beef also BBQ'd served with a middle eastern type salad and beer. Random.

 

[stormbind]

Fish & Chips, with malt vinegar, is probably the one uncommon food I consume but it's rare for me.

One of the foods I miss from the Netherlands were these cookie-like things made of waffle & toffee. These were sold in stores (cold) or at travelling stands (hot).

Marmite (UK) or Vegemite (Oz) among other similar products are extremely rare in the USA. They probably wouldn't like those, but why don't they have Trifle!? How primitive!!

From my experience, you cannot buy Vimto, Pot Noodles* or Chocolate Digestives in the USA. On the other hand, we have no Twinkies in the UK.

* Yummy! I tried something similar is the USA it was disgusting, so I know a product description will not be appreciated by Americans.
Chocolate Digestives are not just cookies with chocolate coating. Do Americans have Jaffa Cakes?
Overall, and from the nations in which I have lived: I feel the UK has the wider selection of quality foods

 

[kmad]

Canada, I guess would be native to poutine. That's french fries with cheese melted on them, and then gravy poured on top of it. Sounds great, looks disgusting, tastes good.

 

[stormbind]

Actually, that sounds disgusting, but I'm going to give it a try at the earliest convenience

Erm... what kind of cheese?

 

[kmad]

cheddar, most likely

 

[stormbind]

Most likely? I didn't think cheddar was that common over there. My bad... is there a difference in American cheddar and British cheddar?

The only stuff I remember from the US were these rubbery slices that burned under the grill, and I didn't like the taste much either. I don't know if this is what is called cheddar?

It's all quite confusing when you think of how the same vocabulary is used to describe completely different products. Same with biscuits etc..

 

[allhailIndia]

Well, our menu is too vast and complicated to describe, but I can briefly say that the food on our campus, at least in the canteen/mess, comprises of an even mix of North Indian and South Indian cuisines (which by themselves stand as individual cuisines) with spiciness ranging from rather bland (to most Indians) to red, hot "My mouth is on fire, my face is burning" kind of food. Most of it is vegetarian, though there is enough non-vegetarian on certain days( I wouldn't know, I am a hardcore veggie anyway).

As far as general Indian cuisine goes, a few volumes, each the size of you standard Oxford dictionary will be needed to just touch upon the subject, let alone a single post

 

[kmad]

Originally posted by stormbind
Most likely? I didn't think cheddar was that common over there. My bad... is there a difference in American cheddar and British cheddar?

The only stuff I remember from the US were these rubbery slices that burned under the grill, and I didn't like the taste much either. I don't know if this is what is called cheddar?

Cheddar's the most common in US/Canada..

The rubbery slices that you ate were probably processed cheddar. I don't care much for that stuff either. It tastes pretty good in grilled cheese sandwiches, but it's so bad for you.

 

[stormbind]

Thanks. I tried to look it up but there's so many, it's daunting. This is an incomplete list for the British cheeses and that's just one tiny corner of the globe

http://www.provender.net/provender/ukcheese.html

 

[Stefan Haertel]

Usually just very plain and normal western-styled stuff. Typical "German" fast food would be Currywurst (sausage with a curry sauce), Bratwurst (I think you all know what that is) Pizza and Turkish or Greek stuff, mostly Kebab (it's the no.1 fast food in Germany).
Then of course there's very much with pork (much to my dismay- I HATE pork, I hate it so much that people tend to ask me if I'm Jewish). The rest is mostly regional. In southern Germany, they eat quite fatty stuff, like, of course, Schweinebraten (pork roast) and stuff like that, in northern Germany, potatoes seem to be extremely popular.
It's very hard to give a full-lenght description of the German cuisine, because they really eat different things in each region.

 

[Lifeblood]

Sausage, (mostly rye) bread, potatoes and porridge are the foundations. Lots of sausage, meat and bread basically. Also lots and lots of berries that we (and those dirty commies) pick in the autumn. Blueberries, lingonberries and raspberries can all be found in my freezer. Real men also eat lots of karjalanpiirakoita. Oh yeah and lots of apples too.

Finnish cuisine is kinda basic. Much like the average Finn!

 

[stormbind]

I love blueberries but can't find them anywhere in the UK (except in muffins)

 

[Stapel]

Boerenkool! (Farmer's Cabbage).

Another typical Dutch habit, is eating Indonesian food, but refering to it as Chinese food.

Babi Pangang, Nasi Goreng (not Nazi Goering), Sateh, Krupuk, Pisang Goreng, Gado Gado, Daging Rudjak come to mind.

 

[Stapel]

Oh: Raw Haring of course!

Only Japanese seem to understand this typical Dutch habit.

There is story about the Marshal plan after WWII. The Netherlands got relatively much help. One of the reasons mentioned is that there was a report stating that the situation was terrible, as people were even eating raw fish...

 

[stormbind]

It should be pointed out that the raw herring is not pickled, is small, and is eaten in bread with onions which contribute the biggest part of the flavour - in the humble opinion of a foreign observer

Another note is that I had to travel from the Netherlands to a tiny village in Belgium (called Pom, I think) to find a decent selection of British foods. Weird huh?

 

[chancellor_dan]

Here in the UK we eat foods from india, china etc mostly.....because these people control our food chains.

 

[MrPresident]

As a British student I live on:

+

 

[crystal]

Today I'm going to eat a pizza (how imaginative ).

 

[Grisu]

well basicly it's a mix of french, italian and german cuisine

and of course cheese: LOTS of cheese, preferably as raclette or fondue

 

[Marla_Singer]

Since both me and my boyfriend leave in our parents place, we have no other choice than to go to the restaurant to eat together about three to four times a week. As we tended to always go to the same restaurants, we now vary a lot : pizza/pasta, tex/mex, chinese, indian, russian, thai, vietnamese, japanese, lebanese, tunisian (north african), greek/turkish, provençal, norman, breton, savoyard/swiss, alsacian, corsican, auvergnat, traditional etc...

However, at home, I eat a lot more casual stuff. Dishes based on rice, pasta, potatoes, salad, with different preparation of veal, pork, beef, chicken, etc... I don't like fish or seafood personally.