What food is distinctly "American"?

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

17 minutes ago, Scheer said:

I've only ever seen them at the fair, I despise Twinkies so I've never tried them deep fried. The oreos are pretty good, but you can only eat a couple else you would get sick. Its tastes like a milk soaked oreo in the center of a small donut, then chugging a cup of vegetable oil.

 

Last year I saw they even had deep fried candy bars... its getting pretty bad.

 

Is this legit? 

 

Man, I need to go to a fair sometime. 

[yathis]

2 hours ago, Chaos_Sorcerer said:

Just some random thing I thought of. 

 

On a side note, what food is distinctly "Canadian"?

 

EDIT: Okay, so this could be traditional foods, or pretty much anything dish that is associated with the American culture, and not really any other. 

 

Also, what do you guys eat on a day-to-day basis?

 

The Big Mac

French Fries

Pizza

Twinkies

Corn Dog

Hot Dog

Montreal Smoked meat

Hoagie

KFC

Southern Food

 

[Urishima]

This right here:

http://gourdoughs.com/public-house-south-lamar

 

I thought the guy was joking when I was first told about it.

[Volbet]

Well, if by "distinctly" you mean something that could only have originated in America (assuming you're only refering to North America), then you would have to primarily look at corn based food. 

Stuff like cornbread and thick soups made on corn starch were eaten by Native Americans and could only have been eaten by them, since corn wasn't cultivated outside of North and Latin America. 

 

If you mean food that would traditionally be identified with North America, then there's a lot. 

You can't eat shrimp without thinking of the gumbo, cajun cooking and the South, you can't eat pastrami without picturing the greasy 4th generation Italian that sold you a sandwich at 3am and you can't eat a fucking chili pepper without thinking of the latin communities spread across the nation. 

Going for a stroll in any major city in the US or Canada is like walking through the world. You can litterally taste the world in one city. 

North America is a melting pot of cultures, including food culture. 

 

Also, now I crave a pulled pork sandwich with coleslaw. 

[TheKDub]

[kaiju_wars]

20 hours ago, Princess Cadence said:

The world is a gigantic place, in Portuguese for instance we call someone from the United States as "estado-unidense" instead of "americano" since "americano" is someone from the American continent.

 

Part of the deal with globalization is not guessing without really knowing what "most people" should know or not, it is simply answering a simple question without trying to sound condescend.

 

Cheers.

Actually, a good portion of the world refers to people from the United States of America as Americans.

When talking about the one of the two continents, they refer to them as North America and South America.

When talking about a region, such as Central America, they use that.

Of course, this is assuming said hypothetical person isn't being extra facetious.  

 

Hell, people in Spain and Germany don't refer to Americans as "United Statiens," they just say "Americans." (I was born in Germany and still have family there and in Spain)

(At least according to her, as she's from China, grew up there) my ex has even stated most people from China refer to people from the US as, "Americans."  (Granted in these respective countries' languages).

 

 

[kaiju_wars]

As for OT, it really depends.

When I think of food that's distinctively American, they aren't thinking of food of the Native Americans.  They're thinking of a cold beer on a Friday night, a pair of jeans that fit just right, and the radio up....

 

They're thinking of grilling in the back yard, maybe fast food.

 

It's also a hard question to answer.  We are a giant melting pot of a country, so in a way, a lot of immigrants have come here, brought their food with them, and they've made it "American," in a way.

You can make an argument that burgers, hot dogs, fries, pizza, is all American.

But you can also say McDonalds, KFC, Whataburger is all American.

It also depends on the region of the country you're from.

 

For example, in Texas, the breakfast burrito was invented there.  Yes, it's undeniably Texan, but to a lot of us, it's also American.

But that might not be true for North Dakota.  From living here, a lot of North Dakotans consider lefse to be American, it's part of their cultures and they add their own twists to it.

 

Keep in mind, when I'm saying something is American, I'm not saying it was invented here.  I'm simply saying that is has become a main staple to the entire country or at least a certain region of the country.

For example, you can't go through Texas without stopping at Whataburger at least once.  But you can't live in North Dakota without at least half your neighbors making lefse come that time of the year.

[Monkey Dust]

Peanut butter, you guys seem a little obsessed with the stuff.

 

And Jack Daniels I know being British I should prefer a Scottish or Irish malt, but clearly my taste buds did not get the memo.

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

1 minute ago, Monkey Dust said:

Peanut butter, you guys seem a little obsessed with the stuff.

 

And Jack Daniels I know being British I should prefer a Scottish or Irish malt, but clearly my taste buds did not get the memo.

 

[jmart604]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regional_dishes_of_the_United_States

 

You are welcome.

[Ithanul]

22 hours ago, shawn_the_cow said:

I'd say Southern foods like gumbo, grits, and jumbylya, barbecue, and bourbon whiskey as American   

gumbo, jumbylia more Louisiana Southern.

Grits pretty much universal Southern.

Barbecue and bourbon whiskey.  I find that in a lot of States, even the Western States have that.  Though, one can argue of over the quality of said barbecue.

 

Corn meal fried catfish with hushpuppies I say is pretty Southern style food.

 

21 hours ago, Chaos_Sorcerer said:

Are those absurd deep-fried foods a normal fair food in the states? Or are they only available at certain events?

Fair food.  I never really see any Southerners from the area I am from do such crap food at the house.

Someone would get a sever odd look at a pot luck for bringing crap like that.

 

59 minutes ago, Monkey Dust said:

Peanut butter, you guys seem a little obsessed with the stuff.

 

And Jack Daniels I know being British I should prefer a Scottish or Irish malt, but clearly my taste buds did not get the memo.

Hehe, obsessed.  Come to the deep south Alabama.  You have not seen obsessed with peanut butter and peanuts until you see the peanut festival (no joke, we have a festival for peanuts)

 

You remind me of the Russians who come inspect the bases.  Stinkers would buy all the Jack Daniels up (like no joke, clear all the bottles out).

[Bleedingyamato]

3 hours ago, Ithanul said:

You remind me of the Russians who come inspect the bases.  Stinkers would buy all the Jack Daniels up (like no joke, clear all the bottles out).

Why would we let Russians on our military bases?

 

That seems like a security risk.  

 

Funny they'd prefer Jack to stuff from Russia.  

[IczerOne]

   To me Southern food is like anything greasy or that has BACON on it.

[Gale]

Doughnuts/donuts, hamburger, sloppy joe, crab cake, son-of-a-bitch stew, reuben sandwich.

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

28 minutes ago, Gale said:

Doughnuts/donuts

Is it donut or doughnut?

[Gale]

14 minutes ago, Chaos_Sorcerer said:

Is it donut or doughnut?

Both spellings are considered correct.

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

Just now, Gale said:

Both spellings are considered correct.

Is it just me or did Tim Hortons start labeling them donuts only a few years ago? I swear they used to be spelled doughnuts back in the 2000s and the early 2010s.

[Seamonster420]

Cheeseburgers. As for Canada, I dunno, poutine?

[Ithanul]

5 hours ago, Bleedingyamato said:

Why would we let Russians on our military bases?

 

That seems like a security risk.  

 

Funny they'd prefer Jack to stuff from Russia.  

The Nuclear Arms Control agreement between USA and Russia.

Plus, the Russians are not allowed to go without an escort on a base.

 

Though, overseas US bases can have a wide variety of other countries' military.  The one I am at got like over three to four different countries (the different flags I seen so far).

[Mooshi]

I'm dissapointed the first mention wasn't the hamburger. Like seriously.

[Nuluvius]

On 13/07/2017 at 2:34 AM, Chaos_Sorcerer said:

Fat fat fat, superize the fatness.

[Thunderpup]

As mentioned earlier most foods in the U.S are essentially inspired by some traditional food in another country that changed a bit when immigrants introduced it over here.

 

That being said here are some food items i think of when i think of american cuisine.  

Pizza

Biscuits and gravy

Sweet Tea

BBQ

Hoagies/Grinders

Burgers

Boiled Peanuts (though i am not a fan of these)

Corn bread

Waffle cones

On 7/12/2017 at 7:50 PM, valdyrgramr said:

Ya, but only the US refers to themselves as American.

As mentioned by others this is inaccurate. America(n) has been synonymous with the U.S and her peoples both internally and globally for about 2 centuries. It has only been recently folks are getting picky about it without even providing an alternative. 

 

5 hours ago, Ithanul said:

Though, overseas US bases can have a wide variety of other countries' military.  The one I am at got like over three to four different countries (the different flags I seen so far).

I live near NATO HQ here in the states; so i understand what you mean by the flag thing.

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

6 hours ago, Mooshi said:

I'm dissapointed the first mention wasn't the hamburger. Like seriously.

A little too stereotypical? 

 

 

[Chaos_Sorcerer]

2 hours ago, Thunderpup said:

As mentioned by others this is inaccurate. America(n) has been synonymous with the U.S and her peoples both internally and globally for about 2 centuries. It has only been recently folks are getting picky about it without even providing an alternative. 

I think you have the wrong context. The guy was trying to say that the U.S. was the only country in the Americas that refers to themselves as "Americans". I don't think he was saying anything about what other countries call things/people from the U.S. 

[Thunderpup]

3 minutes ago, Chaos_Sorcerer said:

I think you have the wrong context. The guy was trying to say that the U.S. was the only country in the Americas that refers to themselves as "Americans". I don't think he was saying anything about what other countries call things/people from the U.S. 

after re-reading it i believe you are correct.