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Ethnic/Regional Foods
So the dinner thread has me thinking about food and I started thinking about all the things I'd like to eat right now. My mom is Greek so I was raised on Greek cooking (usually cooked by my american dad interestingly enough.)
Greek Cuisine
An entire page of delicious. Greek cooking is generally very simple. Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X. X can be anything, but common things are pork, chicken, lamb, rice, potatoes, etc.
Anyway this got me thinking about what sort of ethnic or regional foods you take a lot of pleasure in.
For me:
1. The cheesesteak (Philadelphia, and I've heard you can get one in Pittsburgh)
2. Greek chicken and potatos - Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X where X is chicken and potatos
3. Greek Souvlaki - Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X where X is grilled pork on a stick
4. Greek Lamb Giouvetsi - read for yourself, I'm making it this week, it's full of yum
5. German Schnitzel - breaded pork chops fried, and I'm working on awesome mashed potatoes to accompany these.
6. Grilled Cheeseburger - gotta give a shout out to ground beef on two pieces of bread covered in fat.
Greek Cuisine
An entire page of delicious. Greek cooking is generally very simple. Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X. X can be anything, but common things are pork, chicken, lamb, rice, potatoes, etc.
Anyway this got me thinking about what sort of ethnic or regional foods you take a lot of pleasure in.
For me:
1. The cheesesteak (Philadelphia, and I've heard you can get one in Pittsburgh)
2. Greek chicken and potatos - Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X where X is chicken and potatos
3. Greek Souvlaki - Olive oil + lemons + oregano + X where X is grilled pork on a stick
4. Greek Lamb Giouvetsi - read for yourself, I'm making it this week, it's full of yum
5. German Schnitzel - breaded pork chops fried, and I'm working on awesome mashed potatoes to accompany these.
6. Grilled Cheeseburger - gotta give a shout out to ground beef on two pieces of bread covered in fat.
Comments
And I have to give a shout out to kielbasa, one of the best perks to being Polish.
I think I already posted something on a similar topic, but here is the rundown:
1-Gallo Pinto (black or red beans, rice, cilantro, onions and lizano sauce, all fried together, almost always served for breakfast, with fried fresh cheese, fried plantains, sour cream, scrambled eggs and a tortilla or some bacon)
2-Rice n Beans (same as above, only with the addition of coconut milk and habanero peppers, served with fried plantains and some curry chicken)
3-Black Bean Soup (bean liquor, poached eggs, small chopped green plantains (boiled aside, rinsed and then added when cooked) rice, onions, cilantro, bell peppers)
4-Caramelized ripe plantain (with cinnamon, cloves and honey)
5-Baked ripe plantains (with fresh cheese or curds and sour cream)
6-Patacones (double fried green plantains, you fry it once, smash it, then fry it again until golden crisp and delicious, with either refried beans, guacamole, pico de gallo (tomato, cilantro, onions, lemon) or sour cream (we love that stuff down here, we even eat it with toast)
7-Tamales (usually only prepared for x-mas, made from masa (kinda like corn flour), stuffed with rice, vegetables, pork, chicken, capers, and lots of stuff, all wrapped inside a plantain leaf and boiled, served with a bit of Lizano sauce)
8-Bigoron (chicharrones (deep fried pork skin), cabagge, tomatoes and boiled cassava and lemon, served inside a plantain leaf)
9-Ceviche (raw fish, cilantro, onions, and a ton of lemon or lime juice)
10-Cassava chips, green plantain chips and ripe plantain chips are quite popular down here, dunno if you have them over there
11-All kinds of picadillos (to my experience most US citizens dislike them and kinda look down upon them as poor peoples food)
well, you get the general idea...
Filipino:
Adobo: My favorite Filipino dish. Basically slow cook chicken in a marinade of soy sauce, vinegar, crushed garlic, black pepper, bay leaves, and onion. Served with rice. It's best when you put some of the marinade on the rice.
Pancit: My best way to describe it as a Filipino version of chow-mein. There are many different ways too cook this. My favorite is bihon style with clear rice noodles, cabbage, pork, carrots, celery, and chinese sausage cooked with patis. If you add fresh squeezed lemon on pancit, it enhances the flavor tremendously.
Lumpia: Filipino egg rolls. There are also many ways to make the filling. I prefer ground pork, carrots, & green beans.
Longanisa. Tasty red sausage links. Great for breakfast with rice and over easy eggs.
Sinigang: A soupy dish eaten with rice. My favorite version is when it's cooked with ox tail or beef soup bone along with bak choy, onion, and tamarind.
Guamanian:
Kelaguen: a side dish of a meat served cold. It's great served as tacos. My favorite version is with chicken.
Guamanian BBQ: Take any meat and soak it in a marinade of soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, pepper, onion, lemon slices for at least 24 hours then grill.
Red rice: white riced cooked with achote seeds, onions, and oil.
Finadene: All purpose sauce to add to whatever. Guamanian equivalent to ketchup.
My mom always cooked a lot of Indian food when I was young, and we'd have a lot of curries and biryani. I was raised in a household that was adventurous as far as food was concerned. I'd be surprised when my friends would come over and would be like "I've never had Tofu/Indian food/Japanese food/etc.etc...I've eaten a good variety of good stuff.
Lately my big thing has been Bento. If I had more time, I'd like to make nice little lunch boxes every day.
Here, longaniza is just plain old chorizo, so its probably the same. I finally had poutine at a Canadian/Irish pub they opened down here not so long ago, as soon as I saw it in the menu, I remembered Anthony Bourdain and the other food thread in the forum and instantly ordered 2 types... it was soo good...
I could add Filipino & Guamanian desserts, but I need to make dinner now. Warning: This thread should not be read on an empty stomach.:P
The one meal I have been loving lately and is pretty much a must at any bbq my Croatian parents have, chicken thigh with a sprinkle of Vegeta (not the dragonball z character but the seasoning). Do some of them on the BBQ and you'll be surprised at how many people will comment on the tastiness of the chicken. From wikipedia "Vegeta was conceived in 1958 in Podravka's laboratories. Professor Zlata Bartl was head of the team that invented it, and the company later established a Foundation for graduate and postgraduate students named after her in 2001." It almost sounds like an attempt at biological warfare turned into a tasty seasoning. I think it is all the MSG and salt but it works on just about any meat perfectly, if you can find it, give it a shot.
My mother is Italian, and my father was Norwegian, so I've had some interesting cuisines growing up. My mom is probably the best goddamn cook on the face of the planet (and this has been verified by other people), so growing up on her Italian food was great; I had all the staples, prepared in a somewhat more traditional fashion, though she did like to use a lot of sauce.
She'd also make a lot of more traditional Norwegian dishes: fiskepudding and Norwegian meatballs top the list as being the best. I've experimented with making gravlaks myself, and I must say, it turned out quite nicely. Norwegian pancakes are also awesomely tasty. I have a cookbook from Andreas Viestad, and I've taken to making a lot of stuff from it.
I've also tried some more adventurous foods, namely head cheese, blood-and-tongue, and a locally produced black pudding. The black pudding was actually pretty tasty, when cooked with some tomatoes. My general rule is that I'll try pretty much any food once, and if I like it, I'll go back for more.