Some choice bits
they interviewed the chef who invented california roll. He put the rice on the outside because his customers found seaweed too scary.
In reply to
I was reading about this earlier today, sushi in the States is assembled rice-side-out because back in the day, Americans would peel off the nori before eating because seaweed was too scary for them. Absurd.
The lack of spices in Japanese food suggests Japanese are the white people of Asia
My argument is more that european cooking is fine the way it is. That it does not need to be indian cuisine to taste well. It's not about moralizing or something, but the inherent quality of the cuisine not being lesser.
I'm pretty sure we're on the same page. European cooking was developed to take advantage of what the climate/ecology of Europe offered, and that turns out to be plentiful, high quality produce but relatively few spices and herbs. My message was more shit than post, I feel like the "mayo no flavor" joke is funny the first few times, but only really has one note to play and goes stale quick.
Older European cooking traditions had plenty of spices, problem was, those spices (sometimes called hedge spices) were wild, and grew in the areas between farmland or in uncleared brush. As production intensified, farmers were displaced through enclosure and there was more a focus on monocultures and cash crops, those wild areas disappeared, and with them the native spices.
Medieval cooking in Europe had sharp peppers and horseradish, spicy ginger, wild garlic, and plenty of now-extinct leafy greens and herbs with flavors that would fit right into a curry or noodle dish. Through extensive trade networks established by the Romans, they had access to cumin, saffron, galangal, cinnamon and other exotic spices, they were just very expensive usually, more so the further you were from the Mediterranean trade hubs.
Another big factor was war-time deprivations when supply lines were cut, and people had to make do with canned, unseasoned food and salt, basically. Children growing up under these conditions would never have been exposed to strong flavors early on, and their food culture would be bland as a result.
Can you recommend any reading on older European cooking traditions?
Oh, my mistake. I agree with you completly. The joke got stale like a year ago.
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