• YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
    11720·
    22 days ago

    I mean, I’ve had German and British food and I can confidently say it doesn’t seem like they love food, lol.

  • Armand1@lemmy.world
    685·
    22 days ago

    I have met people in Britain who genuinely seem to hate food. They have a plain cheese sandwich, the worst imaginable bread or eat Huel every day.

    That doesn’t necessarily reflect all Britons, but I do think they genuinely care about food less on average than other cultures.

    • NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone
      10·
      22 days ago

      Nah, ask us about savouries and you might hear about pies and curries and chippies - the stuff you’ve heard a million times before. But ask a Brit about their favourite pudding or cake and you might want to book some time off for the reply.

      • tetris11@feddit.ukEnglish
        5·
        21 days ago

        carrot… carrot cake? That’s my quick answer, but I’ll take the day off just to be safe

      • abbiistabbii@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        61·
        21 days ago

        Agreed. People think British food is dull because they’ve not seen what British people have as a treat. Cases in point:

        England

        • Roast Dinner with Yorkshire Pudding.
        • Melton Mowbray pies
        • Cornish Pasties.

        Scotland

        • Haggis (yes, I’m citing this, Haggis is actually fucking delicious and versatile).
        • Cullen Skink
        • Shortbread

        Wales

        • Welsh Cakes
        • Bara Brith
        • Glamorgan sausage

        Northern Ireland

        • Fifteens
        • Paris bun
        • Gravy ring

        That’s not even getting into the weird shit like Scottish Fast Food or what we’ve done with immigrant cuisine. Fuck, if you want a tour of Britain, try a fry up in every home nation because other than Sausage and Bacon, there’s a different spin on it in every home nation. People shit on British cuisine because they shit on Working Class food, or food people have when they’ve just come home from work and need something in their stomach. Beans on Toast is what people have for Lunch when they need something quick and filling, Mince and Tatties is what people have when they have mouths to feed. I don’t see Americans having home-fried chicken every day or making Clam bake or something, why would we have full on roast dinners every night?

        • idefix@sh.itjust.works
          2·
          21 days ago

          The dishes you listed are not really exciting to me, I’ll be honest. The one type of food English (not sure about other British parts) people can be relatively proud of are deserts. I really appreciate an Eton mess for example.

        • NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone
          2·
          21 days ago

          I thought I’d worked out my favourite, and then you spring that shit! (It’s obviously rhubarb and apple crumble though) (or cream teas)

    • lobut@lemmy.ca
      3·
      21 days ago

      lol I was gonna make that joke (I am British too)

      I do think it’s overstated about how bad British food is, at least nowadays but at the same time, we’re self-deprecating so lines up.

    • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
      176·
      22 days ago

      British food is unironically great, and the stereotype is based on experiences during WW2 rationing. It’s made funnier that the people who say it comes from a country where people spray cheese from a can…

      There’s so many good pies, pastries, puddings, roast dinners, breakfasts, etc that are very good. British-Indian food is often excellent. Even a basic dish like macaroni cheese can be lovely if you make it right.

      To be honest unless you include northern France, I’d argue nowhere in northern Europe has better food.

      • rumba@lemmy.zipEnglish
        103·
        22 days ago

        I was in London for a couple of days, Ate at a hotel, a couple cafes, two pubs, a chip shop with one hell of a line. I must have missed something; flavors were low-key, under-seasoned, and under-spiced. The closest thing I got to flavor was breakfast; the sausage was decent, I think you fully understand sausage there. The beans and eggs were just kinda meh.

        Then you have places like this catering to local tastes. https://www.oldelpaso.co.uk/products/extra-mild-super-tasty-fajita-kit

        I think things are changing. People are starting to crave a little more spice. There’s no lack of curry shops with plenty of spice, but they’re not strictly British food.

        • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
          31·
          21 days ago

          Chip shops in London are always shit, I’ll grant you that. It’s rare you get good fish and chips outside of seaside towns.

          As for Brits not liking spice… Lmao. Brits like spice more than anywhere else in Europe, how else would Indian food be so popular there?

          • NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone
            2·
            22 days ago

            A good chippy is non-negotiable in a northern town. Dunno why but Londoners can’t even seem to get the basics like skinning and boning the fish, never mind getting the batter crispy and not wet.

      • Johnmannesca@lemmy.world
        1·
        22 days ago

        We don’t all obviously spray cheese from a can, some of us are from or near Wisconsin, the place where Monroe cheese is from, which is to say very well regarded in the international community. Whatever bad things Americans did to cheese is basically either a Republican’s doing or the interests of companies like Kraft or Nabisco who are cheap and want to can a product that lasts without refrigeration. See also, Old English cheese spread.

      • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.mlEnglish
        44·
        22 days ago

        Look I have been to Britain and the best British food I had was Indian. “Indigenous” British food is rarely anything special. It isn’t usually god awful but I’ve never had British food that made me want to eat it again

        • undergroundoverground@lemmy.world
          64·
          22 days ago

          Yeah, I’m not taking the “that’s not indigenous food” from an American who im sure will unironically attempt to claim pizza and the hamburger steak as American.

          Sad to hear you don’t like apple pie though. I thought you guys loved that one.

          • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.mlEnglish
            33·
            22 days ago

            I was referring to like, shephards pie when I said indigenous but honestly I have no idea if that’s even the case. Regardless the cuisine of the colonizer is usually mid at best

            • Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz
              2·
              22 days ago

              I’ve never had shepherd’s pie, but I can’t imagine mutton in a pie is easy to get wrong. I eat something similar most days for breakfast. Sometimes there’s different seasoning and veggies and some organ meats added in, but it’s never bad, except for the time it was testicles.

              • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.mlEnglish
                11·
                21 days ago

                Yeah I’ve honestly never had it be bad. My partner regularly makes a vegetarian shephard/cottage pie that I find very comforting though it doesn’t exactly conform to british standards of the dish. British food just isn’t interesting or spectacular in the way a lot of many other cuisines are. It is comforting and I can appreciate that but its doesn’t excite me.

            • undergroundoverground@lemmy.world
              21·
              22 days ago

              Tbf, some people just throw mash potato over mince beef they’ve cooked with chopped tomatoes and soggy carrots. I used to think I hated it too, until I made it properly.

              However, I feel thats like deciding how good American food is based on next door’s poor attempt at a dry meatloaf. We have plenty of bad cooks here who panic and make poor food that they take no time over. Maybe more than our fair share.

              Also, we don’t cover up the taste of spoiling, poor quality, food by drowning it in sugar syrup and seasoning powder. That can take some time for palettes to adapt to.

              • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.mlEnglish
                11·
                22 days ago

                Idk why you are making this a competition i don’t even like american food man. Shit’s kinda ass and I don’t eat meat or cheese so most of it is off limits.

                • undergroundoverground@lemmy.world
                  1·
                  22 days ago

                  Pointing out that I think someone is being a bit unfair and overly generalising isn’t making something a competition.

                  It genuinely does take time for people to adapt. That’s not point scoring.

        • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.worldEnglish
          22·
          21 days ago

          Americans always try to paint British Indian food as not being British, but they’ll happily claim Tex-Mex as American. Same goes for pizzas and such.

          Funny that.

          • ComradeSharkfucker@lemmy.mlEnglish
            2·
            21 days ago

            I don’t think creole cuisine necessarily belongs to either culture but I generally tend to like them 👍

            Didn’t realize British indian food was particularly different from indian in general tbh

  • AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space
    31·
    22 days ago

    The alternative to loving food is to eat as a necessity and seek to optimise it. Various combinations of industrialisation, the Protestant work ethic/disdain of unproductive hedonism, neoliberal financialisation of food production/distribution (hence the flavourless “water bomb” tomatoes that last longer in the supply chain, for example) and possibly endemic low-level depression could do this, to the point where the norm is just to get the necessary calories and a dopamine hit from some sugar/salt/fat and anything else seems suboptimal.

  • halfsalesman@piefed.socialEnglish
    221·
    22 days ago

    People say that about food, music/dancing, and stories because they are the least antagonistic thing they could bring up while boasting about their culture. Its the least likely to get attacked as well, its a non-controversial aspect they can sing the praises of and its something easily shared

    If they bring up their cultural religion, values, politics, philosophy, or social dynamics, suddenly things can become an area of controversy and even ethical debate. Most people are too fragile or cowardly to investigate that stuff.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      22 days ago

      If they bring up their cultural religion, values, politics, philosophy, or social dynamics, suddenly things can become an area of controversy and even ethical debate

      Italians will go three rounds in the ring over which neighborhood has the best ice cream shop. I wouldn’t even say its uncontroversial. But these also tend to be attributes that vary heavily even at relatively short distances in older communities. A certain meal prepared a certain way or a dance/music style that originated in your neighborhood becomes a unique touchstone to your community.

      I might note that this is something “Planned Communities” tend to lose out on. Everyone gets a Chilis. Everyone gets a radio station franchise that plays the same six songs on a loop. Everyone gets an AMC that shows the same ten movies as everywhere else. Everyone gets a Catholic Church and a Methodist Church book-ending the local elementary school.

      Then you leave your provincial cookie-cutter suburb and visit London, a city where the dialect of the language changes by intersection. Or you do a road trip in Italy and find out how every tiny township has this one kind of dish they’re all really proud of. Or you just drop into inner city Houston and get an earful of Chop’n’Screw music played by guys with spinners on the wheels of their lowered Cadalliacs. Then you find some weird old bookshop in Montrose that sells pagan bumper stickers.

    • ѕєχυαℓ ρσℓутσρє@lemmy.sdf.org
      6·
      22 days ago

      Yeah, like I can tell you about our communist history, or our surrealist poetry. But then you’ll call me an extremist, or even worse, a nerd.

      So I keep those for when I get drunk and overshare, and just talk about fish recipes and desserts.

  • DagwoodIII@piefed.socialEnglish
    191·
    22 days ago

    I once saw a post where the guy said he was from Minnesota and he thought ketchup was too spicy.

    I wanted to burn the heretic.

    • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
      131·
      22 days ago

      It’s definitely too strong a (sweet) flavor for me, but I just dislike adding sweet sauce to savory things. I also find barbecue and teriyaki sauce unpleasant for the same reason.

      Chilies and spices are fine by me though, and tbf, I wouldn’t ever describe ketchup as spicy.

        • buttnugget@lemmy.worldBanned
          1·
          22 days ago

          Maybe it is spicy ketchup or something? I don’t know. People who judge others’ spice tolerance belong in prison.

          • howrar@lemmy.ca
            1·
            21 days ago

            I agree. But if I give you table sugar and you tell me it’s spicy, then that’s not a question of spice tolerance. You just don’t know what the word spicy means.

            Although, come to think of it, if you think ketchup is spicy, you may want to check if you’re allergic to one of the ingredients. Regular ketchup is absolutely not spicy.

            • buttnugget@lemmy.worldBanned
              1·
              20 days ago

              I mean, yeah, obviously sugar isn’t spicy, but that’s because there are no spices in it. Ketchup is made with spices and is tangy from vinegar. So you never know how people perceive it.

      • DagwoodIII@piefed.socialEnglish
        42·
        22 days ago

        Yes, people in my culture often speak about the foods they enjoy.

        Funny story. As a kid I’d laugh at my father, because he put black pepper on everything.

        Today I have about nine different hot sauces on my spice rack.

        • buttnugget@lemmy.worldBanned
          3·
          22 days ago

          If only it were actually “people often speak about the foods they enjoy” and not “you’re a weakling I love spicy everything’s spicy fuck not spicy” which is the reality for most morons.

          • DagwoodIII@piefed.socialEnglish
            11·
            21 days ago

            That’s an unexpected bonus from living in a multicultural area.

            The Asian and South American places serve truly hot food. The posers know not to ask for it ‘extra spicy.’

      • merc@sh.itjust.works
        11·
        22 days ago

        How do you know people don’t like spicy food? Don’t worry, they’ll tell you.

  • TrickDacy@lemmy.world
    247·
    22 days ago

    Some cultures value food more than others. Pretty obvious there’s a spectrum between “we eat for sustenance” and “holy shit taste this recipe I’ve been honing for decades”. This is a shit post, not a shitpost.

  • smoker@lemmy.zip
    192·
    22 days ago

    I feel like a lot of people are taking the post too literally (or maybe I’m not). I once knew a girl who posted a photo of her dad watching football on a plane captioned “Persian dads really need their football lol” and it’s like. That’s just a universal dad thing. Lots of dads in every culture do that.

    Some people just do not think about cultures outside their own. Like, at all.

  • The Quuuuuill@slrpnk.netEnglish
    205·
    22 days ago

    i mean. have you encountered soylent culture? white people get marketed to like eating sucks and all your nutrients should come in a tube

    • Deceptichum@quokk.auEnglish
      81·
      22 days ago

      I loved that shit, saves me so much more time to do things I enjoy. But it’s expensive, so I don’t have it any more.

      Eating is a chore to get nutrients into my body, and I often forget to eat for large periods. A quick drink is so much better (except during winter when it’s cold).

    • Droggelbecher@lemmy.world
      7·
      22 days ago

      This is not meant to be a counter, I’m curious: have you? Cause I haven’t, and I’ve always wondered who the target audience for that stuff is. Everybody I know thinks it’s stupid, and I’ll at most use drinkable food for health reasons (as in, if they have really sore teeth and can’t chew or sth like that, or can’t keep solids down) or if they’ve misplanned and can’t have real food (like between two appointments).

      • Agent641@lemmy.world
        7·
        22 days ago

        I used to make my own soylent because it was dirt cheap and I couldn’t be bothered to spend all that time in the kitchen every day. I still cooked once a week, did meal prep and whatnot, but breakfast would be a carrot, lunch would be a nap and dinner would be a cold oaty soylent most weeknights. I just enjoyed not cooking and cleaning more than I enjoyed food. And because it was diy, I could make the soylent powder the way I liked it.

      • The Quuuuuill@slrpnk.netEnglish
        3·
        22 days ago

        that’s where i’m at, too, but i’ve known a few people who view their body’s need for nutrition as an impediment to their ability to be productive. they’re very sad people…

        • Droggelbecher@lemmy.world
          1·
          22 days ago

          I mean, I sometimes view nutrition as an impediment to my bed rotting, but that’s because I have depression Also, I would kinda like to be able to skip lunch, because meal prepping is tough when you work til 0930 and takeout add up, cost wise

      • alternategait@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        22 days ago

        I don’t often feel hungry or have a drive to eat, until I am literally dizzy from low blood sugar. I have found in my life that the need to prepare food can often be a stumbling block to me actually eating. For a while my go-tos were instant oatmeal or cup of noodles. I also have no problem eating the same thing repetitively (see my hummus and cheese sandwich lunch for over a year).

        Soylent was bland, but pretty much instantaneous. I could notice that it was after a certain point in time, have a soylent shake ready to go in less than a minute and sip on that while doing other things.

        I’m not still doing it because now I have a partner who will (sometimes) ensure that food ready to eat is shoved in front of me in a semi regular basis. (Additionally sometimes it is easier to think “I need to prep food for partner” and then there’s dinner for me too, than trying to make the time to make dinner for myself).

        • WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world
          2·
          22 days ago

          Did you ever find anything that tasted like food and wasn’t just sugar or protein powder for weight gain? I never did and dirty bulking makes me feel gross but adding the things to protein supplements to make them more foodlike increases volume so much and then I’d just end up with worse versions of regular food.

    • howrar@lemmy.ca
      2·
      22 days ago

      I rely pretty heavily on meal replacement shakes (not Soylent; they taste like ass, and not the good kind). It’s part of what allows me to actually enjoy solid food. I’m sure you can imagine that force feeding yourself something that you normally enjoy would quickly make you form negative associations with that food.

    • YappyMonotheist@lemmy.world
      4·
      22 days ago

      They eat raw salted fish over there regularly (not like the French eating frog legs, which is rare and mostly just a meme today) and it does NOT look appetising… but who can deny stroopwafels and oliebollens? 😅

      • zout@fedia.io
        9·
        22 days ago

        The fish is not raw, it’s gibbed and cured. It’s also eaten a lot in Germany and Scandinavia.

        Also, we have vla in the Netherlands, and mustard soup! And we frown at people calling kale a super food, because it is considered one of the most generic winter foods over here.

        • tino@lemmy.world
          4·
          22 days ago

          I frown at people eating kale mixed in mashed potatoes or calling white bread with peanut butter a lunch.

          Joke aside, the Dutch like good food and are way more open to other cuisines than most European countries.

          • idiomaddict@lemmy.world
            2·
            22 days ago

            Colcannon is food of the gods and while you need to cook kale a little longer than standard cabbage or other greens for it, it’s a perfectly valid variant.

  • TriangleSpecialist@lemmy.world
    174·
    22 days ago

    I’ve moved to England 5 years ago. I can confirm a worrying amount of people don’t care for food at all here.

    Instead of a nice meal, when they want to enjoy a convivial moment, they burn shredded black leaves in boiling water, add milk to it to cover the terrible taste, and call that tea. And if you don’t ruin it in the exact specific way that they designed, they get angry (but they don’t understand why e.g. Italian and French people are so particular about their traditional recipes).

    Send help.