Some Interesting Food Quirks from Around the World

Some interesting food quirks from around the world.....

http://www.theepicentre.com/Destinations/customs.html

A fair number of them aren't food, just manners.

What might be a cool list to put together is "What's for Breakfast" around the world:

Belize: Fried eggs with black beans and flour tortillas (mmmmm)
Japan: Rice gruel, miso soup, grilled fish
England: What the heck is that pink stuff? Bacon? Really? And why are those sausages so flavorless? Baked beans?
Canada: Tim Hortons, eh?

Places in Europe I've been, (Milan, Frankfurt), the breakfast buffet at the hotel looks more like a deli: sliced meats and cheeses, bread... if it wasn't a business trip where I'm getting comp'ed anyway, I'd be tempted to pack a lunch.

Add pickles to the Japan list.

I was actually reduced to eating spaghetti with nori on it one morning in Kyoto because the spaghetti house was the only place that seemed to be open. I later found two places in the train station that were open for breakfast. It must be an eat at home meal at least in Kyoto.

And I was reading about a French food camp (their word, not mine) where breakfast was leftover dessert.

Countering the Canadian donut with:
USA Egg McMuffin

Boterhammen/Tartines/Stullen

JoelF wrote:What might be a cool list to put together is "What's for Breakfast" around the world...
Places in Europe I've been, (Milan, Frankfurt), the breakfast buffet at the hotel looks more like a deli: sliced meats and cheeses, bread... if it wasn't a business trip where I'm getting comp'ed anyway, I'd be tempted to pack a lunch.

Living in Belgium for a long time, I came really to love that kind of breakfast. It was a treat to get up early, have a cup of coffee and head out to the neighbourhood baker and the corner store... Fresh bread for the boterhammen,* and on those boterhammen freshly sliced extra young Gouda, a stronger cheese as well (maybe a Trappist), and some meat... jambon de Paris or jambon d'Ardennes, and a little smeerpâté (pork liver)... then finish off breakfast with a sweet boterham... sirop de Liège or Nutella...

Good hotels in Belgium usually offer most of the above and other items to boot.

*****

The first time I visited my relatives in Italy, I was kind of surprised to see very young kids start the day with just a cereal-bowl sized vessel filled with caffè latte... some grown-ups would go that route as well or else just have a cigarette and an espresso...

A

*boterham is Dutch for a single slice of buttered bread, onto which one places meat, cheese, a spread etc. Typically only one item is added. Equivalent of French tartine, German Butterbrot or Stulle.

In Europe, I do admit to preferring the French breakfast of a roll or toast and coffee. And in the low lands, Germany and Switzerland, I still tend towards the Muesli.

I do, however, like Asian breakfasts - Pho in Vietnam (yep, it is usually a breakfast, and sometimes lunch, food) or the Japanese sea food meal.

But I have spent too much time in Holland and suffer from cold cut fatigue. The dirty secret is that they not only eat cold cuts for breakfast, but for lunch as well, and they reappear as an appetizer before dinner. Genug!!!

dicksond wrote:Genug!!!

Nee, hoor, dat is 'genoeg'; 'genug' is Duits.

Ah, yes... Poor Holland... A wonderful country in almost all ways but the culinary...

In Belgium, cold cuts do turn up at other meals (and all breakfasts do not necessarily include them). Obviously, sane people don't habitually eat cold cuts multiple times per day. Indeed, as has always been the case for me in Italy and France, I don't think I've ever spent a day in Belgium that didn't include at least one very good to excellent meal. And usually, all of the food is memorable. That includes eating at home, eating at friends' homes and eating out in restaurants over the course of many years. Belgian cuisine is very well developed and the quality of restaurants of all stripes -- as well as of ethnic and gourmet shops -- there is remarkable.

To put Belgium and Holland together in terms of culinary sophistication is akin to putting Switzerland and Germany together in terms of aggressive militarism.*

A

* In fairness, the situation in the Netherlands, as in the United Kingdom, has improved considerably in recent years. And Germany hasn't started a war in quite some time.

JoelF wrote:What might be a cool list to put together is "What's for Breakfast" around the world:

Add to the list molletes in Mexico. Hollow out a halved bolillo roll, fill with black beans, salsa (optional), cheese on top. Place under broiler to melt cheese. Nothing better than the grease from the cheese soaking into the bread.

In Mexico, it is traditional for there to be 4 meals per day, desayuno first thing in the morning, almuerzo around mid-morning, comida around 2PM, siesta, and then a cena in the evening. But the traditional ways are giving way, as everywhere, to globalization.

Bull wrote: Add to the list molletes in Mexico.

Actually, like much of its cuisine, Mexico offers a diversity of breakfasts that is amazing. The sweet breads and cinnamon coffee or hot chocolate are often taken early, followed by a heavier meal mid-morning in some parts, or breakfast is multiple courses. For the main course, one can have familiar breakfast-type egg preparations, huevos rancheros, etc (mostly a northern tradition, I think), or interesting breakfast-type dishes such as molletes or chilaquiles (fried tortilla pieces in a chile sauce) or cheese in green sauce, etc. Beans in curdled milk is a tasty dish if you run across it.

Or one can have some sort of stew, or stewed meat. The three-lettered one could add a lot to this I am sure, and correct my errors.

Lest I be accused of hiding my affiliation, I hereby admit a great affection to all Mexican food (okay eyeball tacos are not something I plan to sample), and could happily eat a Mexican breakfast each and every day.

Antonius: Obviously, sane people don't habitually eat cold cuts multiple times per day

I certainly have watched business associates do just that during day long meetings. But I generally ate very well in Holland. The first secret is to pace yourself and only take cold cuts or mayonaise salads that look really delectable, because there will be so many more chances.

On the other hand, I admit a great fondness for pickled seafood, and gladly took the eel and herring and other cured seafood each and every time it was offered. In any case, it will be no surprise that I managed to eat well.

As to food in Belgium - once I finished my work in the Netherlands, I would head south, quickly, to visit my Mom and lick my wounds from dealing with the Dutch (famously tough business people). That first meal, whether in Belgium or France, was always a delight.

The difference between a very Calvinist (no, I cannot really explain Amsterdam) and intense country and a more latin-influenced and sensual country. But that is not the case in the northern provinces of Belgium, which really are indistinguishable from the Netherlands.

dicksond wrote:The difference between a very Calvinist (no, I cannot really explain Amsterdam) and intense country and a more latin-influenced and sensual country. But that is not the case in the northern provinces of Belgium, which really are indistinguishable from the Netherlands.[emphasis added]

I have lived, studied and worked in the northern, Dutch-speaking half of Belgium for something on the order of four years, all told, and have spent lots of time in the Netherlands as well. I speak Dutch fluently and, in fact, have spent much of my professional life doing research and writing on things pertaining to the Low Countries. Though there has been some growing together over the past decade, in part as the Netherlands has opened up to the riches of Flanders and as Flemings continue to exult in their relatively new found freedom from and (in certain senses) triumph over Francophone Belgium (French dominated Brussels and the Walloon provinces) and thus feel more confident in their own place in the Dutch-speaking world and the EU, the two remain perhaps more distinct than any two other countries in Europe that share a language. Indeed, whether they like it or not, both Walloons and Flemings and Brusselaars have developed a common culture over the almost four hundred years since definitive political separation and what is most striking is the degree to which the national boundary between Belgium and the Netherlands, with no linguistic significance at the level of the dialects and virtually none at the level of the standard language, is nevertheless such a marked cultural border, with regard to all manner of things, including quite conspicuously food and drink.

The French and the Dutch both have long held a superior attitude toward Belgium in general and toward the Flemings and Flanders specifically (in addition, the French have tradiitonally thought little of the Walloons as well). There is a long history that lies behind such attitudes but at the heart of this one lies at least in part the fact that Flanders was in the Middle Ages the culturally and economically most advanced area in Europe alongside parts of Italy. The rivalry between France and the swampy land to the north was intense and at times openly hostile. As for the Dutch, they are aware too that much of the glory of their Golden Age was due to the influx of the wealthy, cultured urban elite of the southern Dutch provinces (Brabant, Antwerp, Flanders) in the 16th and early 17th centuries when they fled the Spanish fury. That Spanish domination destroyed to a great degree the wealth and cultural flowering of the southern Dutch provinces can't be denied, but I've always thought it bad taste on the part of the Dutch and the French that they have held the grudge born of jealousy for so long.

A

Leve De Vlaamse Leeuw!
Leve De Vlaamse Leeuw!
Leve De Vlaamse Leeuw!

'Long Live the Flemish Lion!'

"Na sir is na seachain an cath."

Antonius!

What does your signature line mean?

Thanks!

"Na sir is na seachain an cath."

A Scots Gaelic saying which means:

Neither seek nor shun the fight.



A

what is most striking is the degree to which the national boundary between Belgium and the Netherlands, with no linguistic significance at the level of the dialects and virtually none at the level of the standard language, is nevertheless such a marked cultural border, with regard to all manner of things, including quite conspicuously food and drink.

After that lead in, and on this board, I was hoping for a discussion of the differences in food and drink. Looking forward to the next chapter in this [very informative] treatise.

Gyoza wrote:I was actually reduced to eating spaghetti with nori on it one morning in Kyoto because the spaghetti house was the only place that seemed to be open. I later found two places in the train station that were open for breakfast. It must be an eat at home meal at least in Kyoto.

In all the times I went to Japan on business I never got used to the Japanese breakfast. In fact I avoided it the best I could, even though I enjoyed almost any other meal there. First I would seek out cheap diners that usually had toast and soft-boiled egg on the breakfast menu. Then I would find the upscale French bakeries, but you have to be in a nice part of town for that. Finally Starbucks arrived in Japan in 2000, along with the previously extinct double-short latte. They even had chocolate chip scones; crunchy and sweet they were a nice little bite of home before going to work in an overheated office bulding.

I never had to find breakfast in Kyoto, but I found a lot of great places to eat around Umeda station in nearby Osaka, early and late.

I realize that Europe packs a lot of history and culture into a small area, and there's certainly some grounds for saying that Belgium and X chunk of the Netherlands are quite distinct, but I still can't help looking at the actual size of those places and thinking that it's sort of like proudly drawing distinctions between the peoples and cultures of Will and McHenry counties.... I guess the difference is that the people of Will county still don't sing songs about their crushing defeat by McHenry county in 1380.

Mike G wrote:I realize that Europe packs a lot of history and culture into a small area, and there's certainly some grounds for saying that Belgium and X chunk of the Netherlands are quite distinct, but I still can't help looking at the actual size of those places and thinking that it's sort of like proudly drawing distinctions between the peoples and cultures of Will and McHenry counties.... I guess the difference is that the people of Will county still don't sing songs about their crushing defeat by McHenry county in 1380.

When working in the Netherlands, I would sometimes drive the 40 minutes into Amsterdam in the evening, or if working over the weekend, I might even drive a couple of hours on Sunday. This amazed my hosts, who considered that I had gone to another country.

As to cultural differences, do you think it qualifies if they have distinct architecture, dialect, and distinctive dishes? The differences between the states of the Netherlands, even though each may be smaller than the counties of Illinois, are real and significant.

And I retract my cavalier comment about the similarities between Holland and Belgium, Antonius. I cannot imagine what I might have been thinking!

Mike G wrote:I realize that Europe packs a lot of history and culture into a small area, and there's certainly some grounds for saying that Belgium and X chunk of the Netherlands are quite distinct, but I still can't help looking at the actual size of those places and thinking that it's sort of like proudly drawing distinctions between the peoples and cultures of Will and McHenry counties...

I don't mean the following statement in a snotty way at all but I believe it is very true: The view given in the above quote is from a decidedly American perspective. I would argue that the norm in most of the rest of the world is for local differences of all manner of cultural expression to have been and in many cases still to be quite marked and that the large-scale homogeneity of the United States is very exceptional, as well as dull, and a depressing model for future developments all over this shrinking globe.

From a linguistic perspective part of the homogeneity seems to be a natural product of colonial expansion and the spread of a single dominant language over a linguistically mixed population. The lack of dialectal diversity in North American English over an enormous expanse of territory is really extraordinary and finds rough parallels only in the Spanish of the New World (which has greater dialectal diversity but also covers more territory and absorbed large alloglot autochthonous populations, whereas the bearers of English for the most part exterminated or displaced relatively much smaller native populations) and the zones to the east of old Russia, into which Russian has expanded (this zone of Russian expansion shows relatively little dialectal diversity, especially in comparison with the quite variegate dialectal landscape of western Russia, which itself fits into a large, broader complex of Slavic).

The differences over short distances in some parts of Europe are quite remarkable, though, alas, in many cases the diversity has been reduced massively over the past 200 years and especially the last 30-50 years. Within the Benelux area, i.e., the Low Countries of the Netherlands and Belgium along with Luxembourg, there is considerable linguistic complexity.* In the Netherlands, Dutch has lost much (though not all) of its dialectal diversity, but the country includes within its borders a sizeable (400,000 speakers) linguistic minority that speaks Frisian, a language historically more closely related to English than to Dutch. In Luxembourg, both standard German and standard French fill various cultural and social rôles but exist alongside the increasingly standardised Franconian dialect (or is it now to be called a language?) of most of the population, Lëtzebuergesch. In Belgium, there are really four languages spoken, two of which show considerable dialectal diversity: standard French, standard Dutch along with several strongly divergent Dutch dialects, German (in a small enclave in the far east) and Walloon, which is related to French but really can be legitimately regarded as a distinct language with its own striking dialectal diversity.

In the Dutch half of Belgium for example, an area smaller than the State of New Jersey, there are four major dialect areas and mutual comprehension of dialect speakers across any two of those borders, without recourse to standard Dutch or an auxiliary language (e.g. French) is minimal; i.e., a dialect speaker from Flanders would not be able to understand a dialect speaker from Limburg without experience or help. Certain local dialects are particularly difficult to understand, such as those of the cities of southern Brabant (Brussels, Leuven), and many Brabanders from other parts of the Brabantish dialect area can't understand the Brussels or Leuvens (alas, almost dead) dialects well at all. The distances involved here are quite small -- an hour or so by car from Brussels to the west (to, say, Gent in East Flanders), north (to Antwerp) or east (to Hasselt in Limburg) puts one — or at least in the not too distant past put one — in a completely different dialect area. Last example: in the small city where I lived (Leuven), there were in the 20th century still three recognisable dialects, corresponding roughly to the three main parishes; this is a city of just some thirty thousand people.

Similar conditions do obtain or until recently have obtained in many other parts of Europe and, for that matter, the rest of the world. Cultural and even dialectal diversity is somewhat more pronounced in those part of Anglophone North America that have been populated the longest, namely on the eastern seaboard, but more and more, with the movement of population, influx of new immigrants, and most perniciously the spread of mass, consumerist culture, real local traditions of all sorts are going the way of the dinosaur. From a linguistic standpoint, the homogenisation process is also well advanced, finding resistance only in certain, lower socio-economic circles in which identity is still local and not yet completely given over to the soulless consumerist beast.

The laser focus on chow will be brought to light when the relationship between the matters discussed here and the geography of cuisine in the Low countries is addressed in a subsequent post (in sha'allah).

ex animo,
Antonius

* Completely ignored in this discussion, for obvious reasons of focus, are all questions of linguistic diversity arising through immigration in modern times.

In Japan you you order a beers for the table and everybody shares them, maybe one to four at a time depending on the number of people in the group, rather than one beer per person. You never pour beer into your own glass, always refill the people next to you. One of them then reciprocates by refilling your glass.

When the beer runs out, you can order a few more bottles from the waitress; "Biiru o kudasai" or something like that. The process is repeated throughout the evening until everyone is feeling no pain.

Kind of fun to try at dinner parties or BYO restaurants here.

-and then the Japanese take you out til the wee hours for whiskey...

You also hold your glass or cup when it is being refilled. I forgot this after being on a plane for 11 hours where they want you to put the cup down so they aren't as likely to spill on you. My Japanese hostess only minimally started when I set the cup down but it was enough for me to remember I was supposed to hold it. Ouch!

Eat! You look so thin. wrote:... You never pour beer into your own glass, always refill the people next to you. One of them then reciprocates by refilling your glass...

In my experience, in a somewhat more formal setting where we were set in pairs across a long table, a proper Japanese businessman will remind his gaijin partner about needing to pour the saki by pounding his cup on the table. Especially after the first five or six drinks.