American food is usually hybrid food based on other cultures, either with american ingredients (potatos, tomatos, peppers) or multiple cultures blending together.
Some that I would think should be considered good american food:
smoked/BBQ, Cajun food, generally Southern Cooking, American Chinese food, Tex Mex, Lobster and sorta all those northeastern cuisines, hamburgers and hotdogs.
I don't know why people think America does food bad, we're not one of the fattest countries because our food sucks.
I love food, I so agree. Honestly if I were rich I would be traveling the world trying as much food from as many places as I could.
In spite of recent events, I'm actually quite glad I grew up American with parents who have friends from all over the world.
I'm 30 now, but the appreciation of foods and cultures was instilled into me from very young, I genuinely believe that sitting down and sharing meals with people might be the ultimate peak of the human experience.
So yeah I get a little salty when people start trashing American food, because American food is hundreds of cultures coming together and making something different but similar and what could be better than that?
Also its like, the only good part of this country anymore .-.
Only if you have insufficient love and respect for Texas (ignore recent fascist bullshit). :D
But I think it works. It takes the best from both to come up with... well... in practice, you can take a few ingredients and make them into a lot of different things...... but they are all very tasty, so there's that. hehe
No no, no disrespect intended by that. It just sounds like a knockoff. Fool's gold, mocktail, texmex, etc.
To anyone unfamiliar, texmex is not some sort of "what if we combined X and Y?" Michelin star fusion. It's the natural evolution of cuisine trade between northern Mexicans and Texans (tejanos). A lot of things people think of as Mexican are actually texmex. Like fajitas. I think queso or nachos?
Lighthearted exhortation - I still love a lot about Texas, but there's a lot going wrong there. Was basically playing with you a little very very very indirectly alluding to the "Don't Mess With Texas" slogan :)
Very well explained, I think. Don't discount the Native American contributions, too!
Some of the dishes of Tex-Mex:
Chili con carne
Fajitas
Nachos
Hard-shell tacos
yellow chile con queso (Mexican uses white cheese, Tex-Mex uses yellow cheese)
Also, interestingly, the entree-with-rice-and-beans is also Tex-Mex.
It's wild that people dismiss the cuisine as some sort of lesser thing. It's just how food works - ideas spread, ingredients spread, people create new things that stick around and BAM you have a new cuisine. :)
I don't know why people think America does food bad, we're not one of the fattest countries because our food sucks.
I would guess this has more to do with your food having tons of sugar and giant portions. Plenty of countries have amazing food. Not all of them struggle with obesity so much.
I think for me I would point to the fact that cheap sugary shit tends to be well, cheap.
For example I had a pack of gummy lifesavers (hard as a rock, rip me) and it was the cheapest thing in my lunch today despite being like, 8 servings of candy? it was cheaper than the water I got??? What the heck is up with that???
Honestly portion size isnt what I would point to, I feel like its custom here to take home leftovers and stuff, even when you visit someone's house for dinner and they make way too much. I'm sure there's some psychological stuff here with portion size, just in my experience I've never felt the need to eat everything and Ive been reasonably healthy all my life.
And yeah shout out to (in no particular order) Mexico, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Canada, Spain, China, South Korea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, India, Vietnam, Thailand, The Dutch, Singapore, Poland, and anyone I forgot y'all are real ones I love your food.
I dunno I've visited a lot of places and seen a lot of people and it's not like Americans are unique in how much food we eat?
I'd point to the fact that sugary/bad for you stuff tends to be cheap first and foremost. It's really easy to fill up on empty calories if you're stuffing your face with candy and fast food.
Secondarily I would point how hard it is to avoid ultra-processed garbage. It's really everywhere and everything here, even things that are "healthy" are pretty terrible usually. Unless you're eating/making everything fresh it's not easy to avoid some of this garbage and it's basically all empty calories.
I also think, far more important than gluttony, there's very little actual food education in the US. Unless you're kinda into fitness and watching what you eat, you don't really know what macros and stuff do and why things are important.
There's also food deserts, the fact that American cities are meant to be driven and basically cannot be walked/biked, and just generally sedentary lifestyles across all of America.
Genuinely I don't think that the fat countries around the world are "extra gluttons" compared to the rest of the world. It's anecdotal of course, but I often hear of Europeans visiting and gaining weight. I doubt they're suddenly becoming gluttons the moment they land in America. I think that's like maybe the 10th most important reason at best. We're all humans and while culture is different and could lead to different eating habits, I don't think that matters that much. I think Canada for example, is quite culturally similar to the US but they have an obesity rate of only 27.1% compared to America's 41.8%
I think one place where portion size might actually be a factor in retrospect is with soda. Our larges are huge and people will down those things like crazy.
So, no credit at all to human behaviour? I agree with most of what you are saying but you at least have to allow that some of it is gluttony. Even one out of one hundred?
Oh yeah I'm sure there's some % of people that are gluttons that would be fat wherever they are assuming they could afford to be, but thats not unique to Americans was my main point.
The giant portions thing is a cultural left over in a lot of ways, food used to be cooked in a far more communal method and often combined supper and lunch then a snack later at night. For example apparently my 2x great grandfather ensured a small feast for him, my great grandfather, his wife (remarried technically not my ancestor), and all the temp workers during harvest. That's not even getting into things like potlucks.
As for sugar I blame the post war period, arguably the amount of sugar in shit has been decreasing slowly since the 90s but it's a slow generational thing.
As American I agree. However, judging by all the Europeans visiting during the World Cup and then being enamored by our food and culture makes me think this person has never visited.
As a European, it really depends where those tourists were from. Austrian traditional food? Abysmal (even Austrians agree). Germany is also petty meh. Meanwhile Czechia has great food. Further east and south, also great food. That's not to say the US doesn't have good food.
Something we, the people in the US, do right, is integrating different cultural foods and ingredients. There’s a mountain of things that can be said about just how long something of higher quality actually lasts here, but many of us are eager to try new things and see the local places near us as part of our home.
Definitely hamburgers. Mostly KC BBQ. US does bbq best, but the origin of seasoning and smoking big tasty slabs of meat this way wasn't an American creation like the hamburger was. The US just perfected it.
We have great food here, honestly, and great wine and also bourbon is American. Great cheeses - Humboldt Fog is my favorite fancy cheese and it's American. It's just a big and diverse place. Italian - American food is its own thing and amazing. Cajun & Creole food are American cuisines.
I don't think there is one food that can represent the whole country because it's sprawling and diverse in every way.
Italian pizza is very different from rest of the world pizza, which is American. Sort of like how hamburgers from hamburg are very different from a McDonald's hamburger.
No, our pizza is way more like Italian than it is American. I don't know where you got your info from, but why would we copy USA if we could copy our neighbour one over?
Because Pizza Hut is ubiquitous while Luigi's Grease Emporium is a local dive. Go to Australia and find pizza. Go to Norway and find pizza. Go to Brazil and find pizza. Its all American.
No? It looks more like this: Da Enzo is a nice quality local restaurant. Da Damiano is a pretty good local restaurant. Al Forno is the best but it's like 2 m² and you can only get a pizza to go. [Those are not chains but pretty standard names or examples of names. You can find these or similar in europe]
I haven't been to Australia. Norway probably has a pizza hut at Oslo airport but it definitely has good Italian pizza.
Argentina has a sizable population of Italian descent. I can imagine they and Brazil have good quality pizza. Thing is, if I were over there, I'd not be trying out different pizzas.
Sure, you can have a pizza hut in a country. Doesn't mean it's the predominant style.
There are McDs in Germany. You can still get a real Fleischbrötchen at any butcher's or any supermarket with a butcher inside.
If you want ACTUAL American cheese, one that is real cheese, try "Land O Lakes White American Cheese". That said, the Kraft Singles flavor carries a lot of nostalgia and acquired taste. It's why some people prefer an Oscar Meyer mystery "meat" hot dog over something like an all choice cut high end dog. That's why I said that it "hits", not that it is best.
Most American cheese sold through the deli will be good. LoL is good brand, Boars Head is good. The "deluxe" versions in the lunchmeat aisle are alright but a bit lower-end.
It's all about the cheese they use since American cheese is cheese with sodium citrate, that's all.
Kraft singles are not cheese........... but even they're fine on a burger or whatever application yu don't really care and just want some sort of melty semi-cheesy thing. :)
American cheese is a combination of Jack and cheddar cheeses that is specifically designed to melt, Kraft singles are basically Velveeta which is just sort of like cheese whiz but harder, that is to say processed cheese like food.
You can usually get American cheese at your deli counter.
American cheese is a combination of Jack and cheddar cheeses that is specifically designed to melt
You just basically described Kraft Singles, the first ingredient of which is cheddar cheese.
Kraft Singles are literally just cheddar cheese, milk, calcium/sodium phosphates, and trace amounts of colorings and preservatives. The phosphates are emulsifiers that allow the cheese and milk to mix, and are what gives it its melty texture. They really aren't any different than the stuff you can get at the deli counter, from an ingredients-list perspective.
Kraft invented American cheese but Kraft singles are not cheese. Traditional American cheese uses sodium citrate, not phosphates and is typically white not yellow. I’m not sure you actually looked at the ingredients list before making this comment because they are very different.
Saying Kraft Singles aren't cheese because the FDA's legal definition categorizes it as something more specific puts you in the same category of people that insist that tomatoes aren't vegetables because botanically they're defined as fruit. Technically correct, but overly pedantic and unproductive when looking at things through a culinary lense.
They aren't cheese simply because they are 48% cheese instead of the FDA requirement of 51%. Kraft could easily tweak it that tiny bit so it would be "real" cheese, but then it wouldn't be as nice in that grilled cheese sandwich.
Kraft cheese is made with standard real cheese ingredients. They add emulsifiers to it in order to lower the melting point to make it better on a burger or grilled cheese. The percentage of emulsifiers and moisture the slices have is the only reason it can't be legally defined as "cheese". But unlike other things, such as fake ice cream having to be labeled as something like "frozen dairy dessert" because it was made cheaper without enough milkfat and ending up with a worse tasting product, Kraft is just because they wanted their cheese to melt easier.
Kraft invented American cheese and then enshitified it to the point that it couldn’t be called cheese anymore. I’m not even sure what you’re trying to argue at this point. If Kraft singles were made of real American cheese they could call it cheese it isn’t so they can’t just like the ice cream.
ETA:
There is a reason this says “American cheese” and not “prepared cheese product”:
The problem is tht Kraft singles are not cheese. They are cheese "product". This is cheese-adjacent. Frankly, it's more like a slice of cheese-type sauce, if you will. Good for some things, don't get me wrong, I'm not a snob.
And yes, you are right, they are American cheese, but........ they are not cheese. But yes, they are also American cheese (while technically not being cheese).
Basically, Flanders used to sell "burger patties' for VERY cheap. I made the mistake of buying some. After I threw the ones I cooked way, I found that they had beef, but also mechanically separated beef, some other sort of 'reclaimed' beef, as well as beef hearts, liver, and maybe other stuff. All technically food and technically beef, but they were REALLY shitty.........
Kraft singles are MUCH better than that, but still...... it's not good in all applicatins. heh.
They're only not "cheese" because they add in more than the allowed percentages of emulsifiers and moisture. It's real cheese made with all your standard real cheese ingredients, but they add in things that make it melty and gooey when heated.
Wonder how you react when you find out that American cheese is usually just cheddar with sodium citrate to allow it to melt better and have a softer texture.
To add to this, a lot of the jokes about it not being able to be called "cheese" also just come down to a misunderstanding of how the US Code of Federal Regulations works. There are American-style cheeses that have a milkfat percentage high enough to be labeled a cheese, but also ones that have to be labeled pasteurized prepared cheese product. This is pretty much the equivalent of saying that American ice cream can't be called ice cream because some of what's available in grocery stores is actually frozen dairy dessert. I'm personally grateful for our slightly burdensome regulatory scheme that allows me to identify certain qualitative differences between similar looking products with similar ingredient lists.
The chemicals are to make it mixable in water or some milk derivate. It can be up to 5% not cheese and still be called cheese, while "pasteurized processed cheese food" can be as low as 51% cheese.
Kraft singles are neither of these. It contains milk protein concentrate, which the FDA doesn't allow in "cheese food", so they call it "pasteurized prepared cheese product".
None of the ingredients in this list are actually scary if you know anything about cheese.
Like, oh no its cheese its got added whey and added milk the horror!
Also what kind of article says "the ingredients aren't clear."
Its on the packaging??? The only non clear thing in here is sodium phosphate and calcium phosphate, and those are the emulsifiers they add to make it super melty! (not sodium citrate, though that is one!).
So, pasta would be better attributable to Italy. But, if you're barring that route and looking for an inherently and uniquely American dish that doesn't ring of other countries' inspiration, the cheeseburger might answer the question. To make it easy though, you wanted something invented in America that is named after the American town it was invented in, go for the Philly cheesesteak.
Have you even read the article? The author did not bother to read the source that claims this. And since they argue about tomato sauce, it leads me to believe this is mostly about the pizza we eat today rather that pizza in general. And the fact that tomato sauce inly became a staple of pizza is not new either. Much like how mashed potatoes with Sauerkraut is very much of German origin, it only came about in the late 18th century. Similarily with pizza. The dish existed way before tomatoes were a thing in Italy. The romans already made dishes that were very close to pizza. And since many countries have something close to pizza, I'd wager it is the recipe for the dough that is unique to pizza, not the fact that there's tomatoe sauce on it.
Also, no where outside of the USA have I seen deepdish pizza. You can claim origin for that for all I care.
97 Comments
nulluser@lemmy.world · 47 pts · 1d
Not going to argue, but people paying a fascist for their blue checkmark should maybe take a long look in the mirror.
Fmstrat@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 1d
"Your money. Nice check mark." was the appropriate answer. Well, an appropriate answer.
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 33 pts · 1d
American food is usually hybrid food based on other cultures, either with american ingredients (potatos, tomatos, peppers) or multiple cultures blending together.
Some that I would think should be considered good american food:
smoked/BBQ, Cajun food, generally Southern Cooking, American Chinese food, Tex Mex, Lobster and sorta all those northeastern cuisines, hamburgers and hotdogs.
I don't know why people think America does food bad, we're not one of the fattest countries because our food sucks.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 1d
I agree, but also - tomatoes and potatoes are from the Americas - so that pizza in Italy? It is ALSO 'fusion' food.
That's just how food works. People eat what's available, and more stuff has become available over the past few hundred years. heh.
I think the whole thing is silly. Enjoy good food! Who cares about the rest?
And sure, I make authentic creole dishes as well as southern, and some legit texmex. But if I didn't, if I made tasty food, who the hell cares? lol.
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 1d
I love food, I so agree. Honestly if I were rich I would be traveling the world trying as much food from as many places as I could.
In spite of recent events, I'm actually quite glad I grew up American with parents who have friends from all over the world.
I'm 30 now, but the appreciation of foods and cultures was instilled into me from very young, I genuinely believe that sitting down and sharing meals with people might be the ultimate peak of the human experience.
So yeah I get a little salty when people start trashing American food, because American food is hundreds of cultures coming together and making something different but similar and what could be better than that?
Also its like, the only good part of this country anymore .-.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
WRONG; You got a little MSG-ey. There was salt, but also the umami of stating true things in there, too :)
also agreed on the end thre :)
But I also think that's why people making fun of UK on food are wrong, too. Similar there - the food culture is vibrant.
Also, nice-looking food is nice, but how food tastes is more important to me.
glimse@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
Tex mex is soooo good but the name makes it sound like "shitty American version of Mexican food" when that couldn't be further from the truth
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 17h
Only if you have insufficient love and respect for Texas (ignore recent fascist bullshit). :D
But I think it works. It takes the best from both to come up with... well... in practice, you can take a few ingredients and make them into a lot of different things...... but they are all very tasty, so there's that. hehe
glimse@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 17h
No no, no disrespect intended by that. It just sounds like a knockoff. Fool's gold, mocktail, texmex, etc.
To anyone unfamiliar, texmex is not some sort of "what if we combined X and Y?" Michelin star fusion. It's the natural evolution of cuisine trade between northern Mexicans and Texans (tejanos). A lot of things people think of as Mexican are actually texmex. Like fajitas. I think queso or nachos?
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 14h
Lighthearted exhortation - I still love a lot about Texas, but there's a lot going wrong there. Was basically playing with you a little very very very indirectly alluding to the "Don't Mess With Texas" slogan :)
Very well explained, I think. Don't discount the Native American contributions, too!
Some of the dishes of Tex-Mex:
Also, interestingly, the entree-with-rice-and-beans is also Tex-Mex.
It's wild that people dismiss the cuisine as some sort of lesser thing. It's just how food works - ideas spread, ingredients spread, people create new things that stick around and BAM you have a new cuisine. :)
glimse@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 9h
See, even I didn't know that about the rice.
I think a lot of cuisines south of the mason dixon get a bad reputation because of the people.
AbsolutelyClawless@piefed.social · 6 pts · 1d
I would guess this has more to do with your food having tons of sugar and giant portions. Plenty of countries have amazing food. Not all of them struggle with obesity so much.
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 4 pts · 1d
ehh its a lot more complicated than it seems.
I think for me I would point to the fact that cheap sugary shit tends to be well, cheap.
For example I had a pack of gummy lifesavers (hard as a rock, rip me) and it was the cheapest thing in my lunch today despite being like, 8 servings of candy? it was cheaper than the water I got??? What the heck is up with that???
Honestly portion size isnt what I would point to, I feel like its custom here to take home leftovers and stuff, even when you visit someone's house for dinner and they make way too much. I'm sure there's some psychological stuff here with portion size, just in my experience I've never felt the need to eat everything and Ive been reasonably healthy all my life.
And yeah shout out to (in no particular order) Mexico, Italy, Germany, Brazil, Canada, Spain, China, South Korea, Ethiopia, Eritrea, India, Vietnam, Thailand, The Dutch, Singapore, Poland, and anyone I forgot y'all are real ones I love your food.
melsaskca@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 1d
You've got to give some credit that gluttony is somewhere in the causal mix.
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 23h
I dunno I've visited a lot of places and seen a lot of people and it's not like Americans are unique in how much food we eat?
I'd point to the fact that sugary/bad for you stuff tends to be cheap first and foremost. It's really easy to fill up on empty calories if you're stuffing your face with candy and fast food.
Secondarily I would point how hard it is to avoid ultra-processed garbage. It's really everywhere and everything here, even things that are "healthy" are pretty terrible usually. Unless you're eating/making everything fresh it's not easy to avoid some of this garbage and it's basically all empty calories.
I also think, far more important than gluttony, there's very little actual food education in the US. Unless you're kinda into fitness and watching what you eat, you don't really know what macros and stuff do and why things are important.
There's also food deserts, the fact that American cities are meant to be driven and basically cannot be walked/biked, and just generally sedentary lifestyles across all of America.
Genuinely I don't think that the fat countries around the world are "extra gluttons" compared to the rest of the world. It's anecdotal of course, but I often hear of Europeans visiting and gaining weight. I doubt they're suddenly becoming gluttons the moment they land in America. I think that's like maybe the 10th most important reason at best. We're all humans and while culture is different and could lead to different eating habits, I don't think that matters that much. I think Canada for example, is quite culturally similar to the US but they have an obesity rate of only 27.1% compared to America's 41.8%
I think one place where portion size might actually be a factor in retrospect is with soda. Our larges are huge and people will down those things like crazy.
melsaskca@lemmy.ca · 1 pts · 40m
So, no credit at all to human behaviour? I agree with most of what you are saying but you at least have to allow that some of it is gluttony. Even one out of one hundred?
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 14m
Oh yeah I'm sure there's some % of people that are gluttons that would be fat wherever they are assuming they could afford to be, but thats not unique to Americans was my main point.
vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 1d
The giant portions thing is a cultural left over in a lot of ways, food used to be cooked in a far more communal method and often combined supper and lunch then a snack later at night. For example apparently my 2x great grandfather ensured a small feast for him, my great grandfather, his wife (remarried technically not my ancestor), and all the temp workers during harvest. That's not even getting into things like potlucks.
As for sugar I blame the post war period, arguably the amount of sugar in shit has been decreasing slowly since the 90s but it's a slow generational thing.
ArmchairAce1944@discuss.online · 1 pts · 16h
This. The sugar in everything probably does more than larger portions.
ArmchairAce1944@discuss.online · 1 pts · 16h
America has a very wide range of cuisines and they are very good and mixing and matching.
Godric@lemmy.world · 16 pts · 1d
Is it really "clever"?
floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 1d
Unironically true is what it is
juice702@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 1d
As American I agree. However, judging by all the Europeans visiting during the World Cup and then being enamored by our food and culture makes me think this person has never visited.
wieson@feddit.org · 2 pts · 17h
All CIA psyops. The real ones boykotted obvs. /j
glimse@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
I don't get it, you agree with the person who never visited? As an American, you should know the food here is diverse and incredible
AbsolutelyClawless@piefed.social · 1 pts · 1d
As a European, it really depends where those tourists were from. Austrian traditional food? Abysmal (even Austrians agree). Germany is also petty meh. Meanwhile Czechia has great food. Further east and south, also great food. That's not to say the US doesn't have good food.
Jankatarch@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 1d
High fructose corn syrup.
ChristerMLB@piefed.social · 8 pts · 1d
For those fumbling for the standard answer: it is hamburgers. The USA has hamburgers.
AeonFelis@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 1d
Named after the German city of Hamburg.
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Hamburgers are named after the Hamburg Steak, which was named after the city of Hamburg
RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
..............we have pizza. Moreso than Italy does. Am I taking fucking crazy pills right now?
wieson@feddit.org · 1 pts · 16h
China brews more beer than Germany, Belgium and Czechia combined. Doesn't mean it's culturally associated with it as much as the other three.
SnarkoPolo@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 16h
McDonald's and guns, puh-raise JEE-zuz-ah!
JasonDJ@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 1d
Coors Light and Diabetus.
frostedtrailblazer@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 1d
In an effort to only be a little annoying, some wines in the US have ranked higher in blind tests when compared with French wines. Albeit it’s an old story nowadays, but France doesn’t have a monopoly on good wine, nor Italy on good ‘pizza’.
Something we, the people in the US, do right, is integrating different cultural foods and ingredients. There’s a mountain of things that can be said about just how long something of higher quality actually lasts here, but many of us are eager to try new things and see the local places near us as part of our home.
NOT_RICK@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
KC BBQ?
Edit: oh and Bourbon
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 1d
Definitely hamburgers. Mostly KC BBQ. US does bbq best, but the origin of seasoning and smoking big tasty slabs of meat this way wasn't an American creation like the hamburger was. The US just perfected it.
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 1d
BBQ
Almacca@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 1d
Heart disease.
mountainRadish@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
Is shitting in your diaper considered shitting yourself?
VelvetPinkOtter123@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
this is just a case of shoving politics into everything and that sucks
We have hamburgers, hot dogs, deep fried Twinkies, etc...
People who have to make everything political are the fucking worst
RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 1d
I don't understand. Did we lose pizza? Did pizza leave the country? Why do we apparently not have pizza anymore?
mister_universe@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 1d
I agree with you.
augustus@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 1d
chicken fried steak
Jax@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 1d
Weird AI generated user profile
jve@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 1d
What’s Weird Al got to do with this?
A404@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 1 pts · 1d
Aren't burgers american?
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Yes
RBWells@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Corn. Cows. Beans, squash, berries.
We have great food here, honestly, and great wine and also bourbon is American. Great cheeses - Humboldt Fog is my favorite fancy cheese and it's American. It's just a big and diverse place. Italian - American food is its own thing and amazing. Cajun & Creole food are American cuisines.
I don't think there is one food that can represent the whole country because it's sprawling and diverse in every way.
wieson@feddit.org · 3 pts · 1d
Pizza is from Napoli specifically. Italy is incredibly diverse food-wise.
KingGimpicus@sh.itjust.works · -1 pts · 1d
Italian pizza is very different from rest of the world pizza, which is American. Sort of like how hamburgers from hamburg are very different from a McDonald's hamburger.
wieson@feddit.org · 4 pts · 1d
No, our pizza is way more like Italian than it is American. I don't know where you got your info from, but why would we copy USA if we could copy our neighbour one over?
KingGimpicus@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 19h
Because Pizza Hut is ubiquitous while Luigi's Grease Emporium is a local dive. Go to Australia and find pizza. Go to Norway and find pizza. Go to Brazil and find pizza. Its all American.
wieson@feddit.org · 1 pts · 17h
No? It looks more like this: Da Enzo is a nice quality local restaurant. Da Damiano is a pretty good local restaurant. Al Forno is the best but it's like 2 m² and you can only get a pizza to go. [Those are not chains but pretty standard names or examples of names. You can find these or similar in europe]
I haven't been to Australia. Norway probably has a pizza hut at Oslo airport but it definitely has good Italian pizza.
Argentina has a sizable population of Italian descent. I can imagine they and Brazil have good quality pizza. Thing is, if I were over there, I'd not be trying out different pizzas.
Sure, you can have a pizza hut in a country. Doesn't mean it's the predominant style.
There are McDs in Germany. You can still get a real Fleischbrötchen at any butcher's or any supermarket with a butcher inside.
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
The U.S. has too many regional dishes to really pick one food to assign as Americas signature dish.
If I were to nominate one it would be the Philly Cheesesteak
shutz@lemmy.ca · -1 pts · 2d
And American "cheese".
JoMiran@lemmy.ml · 8 pts · 1d
Everyone loves to shit on American "cheese" but sometimes a melted Kraft's Singles is what hits just right.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 5 pts · 1d
Kraft singles are trash and their existence gives American cheese a bad name
JoMiran@lemmy.ml · 3 pts · 1d
If you want ACTUAL American cheese, one that is real cheese, try "Land O Lakes White American Cheese". That said, the Kraft Singles flavor carries a lot of nostalgia and acquired taste. It's why some people prefer an Oscar Meyer mystery "meat" hot dog over something like an all choice cut high end dog. That's why I said that it "hits", not that it is best.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 1d
Most American cheese sold through the deli will be good. LoL is good brand, Boars Head is good. The "deluxe" versions in the lunchmeat aisle are alright but a bit lower-end.
It's all about the cheese they use since American cheese is cheese with sodium citrate, that's all.
Kraft singles are not cheese........... but even they're fine on a burger or whatever application yu don't really care and just want some sort of melty semi-cheesy thing. :)
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · -3 pts · 1d
Kraft singles ARE American cheese.
atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 1d
American cheese is a combination of Jack and cheddar cheeses that is specifically designed to melt, Kraft singles are basically Velveeta which is just sort of like cheese whiz but harder, that is to say processed cheese like food.
You can usually get American cheese at your deli counter.
zalgotext@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 1d
You just basically described Kraft Singles, the first ingredient of which is cheddar cheese.
Kraft Singles are literally just cheddar cheese, milk, calcium/sodium phosphates, and trace amounts of colorings and preservatives. The phosphates are emulsifiers that allow the cheese and milk to mix, and are what gives it its melty texture. They really aren't any different than the stuff you can get at the deli counter, from an ingredients-list perspective.
atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works · 1 pts · 1d
Kraft invented American cheese but Kraft singles are not cheese. Traditional American cheese uses sodium citrate, not phosphates and is typically white not yellow. I’m not sure you actually looked at the ingredients list before making this comment because they are very different.
zalgotext@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 1d
What's your issue with using sodium/calcium phosphate over sodium citrate? They all perform the same function in American cheese. Toward the bottom of this page there's a table of ingredients found in American cheese, all three are included in it.
Saying Kraft Singles aren't cheese because the FDA's legal definition categorizes it as something more specific puts you in the same category of people that insist that tomatoes aren't vegetables because botanically they're defined as fruit. Technically correct, but overly pedantic and unproductive when looking at things through a culinary lense.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 1 pts · 1d
They aren't cheese simply because they are 48% cheese instead of the FDA requirement of 51%. Kraft could easily tweak it that tiny bit so it would be "real" cheese, but then it wouldn't be as nice in that grilled cheese sandwich.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 1 pts · 1d
Kraft cheese is made with standard real cheese ingredients. They add emulsifiers to it in order to lower the melting point to make it better on a burger or grilled cheese. The percentage of emulsifiers and moisture the slices have is the only reason it can't be legally defined as "cheese". But unlike other things, such as fake ice cream having to be labeled as something like "frozen dairy dessert" because it was made cheaper without enough milkfat and ending up with a worse tasting product, Kraft is just because they wanted their cheese to melt easier.
atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works · -1 pts · 1d
Kraft invented American cheese and then enshitified it to the point that it couldn’t be called cheese anymore. I’m not even sure what you’re trying to argue at this point. If Kraft singles were made of real American cheese they could call it cheese it isn’t so they can’t just like the ice cream.
ETA:
There is a reason this says “American cheese” and not “prepared cheese product”:
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 1 pts · 1d
The bottom one has a lower melting point and more moisture. "Cheese" has to be 51% cheese per FDA. It is estimated that Kraft singles are around 48%.
That tiny amount difference isn't because it saves money in production. It's just because it works better in a grilled cheese sandwich.
Earthwormjim91@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
No they’re not. They pasteurized processed cheese product.
American cheese is actual cheese. Kraft has a real American cheese. It’s the deli deluxe stuff.
daychilde@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
Well, no.
The problem is tht Kraft singles are not cheese. They are cheese "product". This is cheese-adjacent. Frankly, it's more like a slice of cheese-type sauce, if you will. Good for some things, don't get me wrong, I'm not a snob.
And yes, you are right, they are American cheese, but........ they are not cheese. But yes, they are also American cheese (while technically not being cheese).
Basically, Flanders used to sell "burger patties' for VERY cheap. I made the mistake of buying some. After I threw the ones I cooked way, I found that they had beef, but also mechanically separated beef, some other sort of 'reclaimed' beef, as well as beef hearts, liver, and maybe other stuff. All technically food and technically beef, but they were REALLY shitty.........
Kraft singles are MUCH better than that, but still...... it's not good in all applicatins. heh.
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 1d
They're only not "cheese" because they add in more than the allowed percentages of emulsifiers and moisture. It's real cheese made with all your standard real cheese ingredients, but they add in things that make it melty and gooey when heated.
Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
The fact they're called Kraft Singles because they're not allowed to be called cheese
ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de · 3 pts · 1d
Because they wanted it to melt easy, so it has more moisture than "cheese" is allowed to have. It uses all the right ingredients for cheese.
Rothe@piefed.social · 2 pts · 1d
Never been in a situation like that. A slice of actual cheese has always been better.
BananaIsABerry@lemmy.zip · 10 pts · 1d
Wonder how you react when you find out that American cheese is usually just cheddar with sodium citrate to allow it to melt better and have a softer texture.
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 1d
Its perfect for grilled cheese!
Jhex@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 1d
I think the joke/criticism is that it cannot even be called "cheese", not that it tastes bad.
Tons of really bad-for-you shit tastes delicious hahahaha
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 4 pts · 1d
Its not that much worse for you than regular cheese it is basically cheddar with added chemicals (sodium citrate iirc) to help it melt.
Nick@mander.xyz · 3 pts · 1d
To add to this, a lot of the jokes about it not being able to be called "cheese" also just come down to a misunderstanding of how the US Code of Federal Regulations works. There are American-style cheeses that have a milkfat percentage high enough to be labeled a cheese, but also ones that have to be labeled pasteurized prepared cheese product. This is pretty much the equivalent of saying that American ice cream can't be called ice cream because some of what's available in grocery stores is actually frozen dairy dessert. I'm personally grateful for our slightly burdensome regulatory scheme that allows me to identify certain qualitative differences between similar looking products with similar ingredient lists.
ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 1d
The chemicals are to make it mixable in water or some milk derivate. It can be up to 5% not cheese and still be called cheese, while "pasteurized processed cheese food" can be as low as 51% cheese.
Kraft singles are neither of these. It contains milk protein concentrate, which the FDA doesn't allow in "cheese food", so they call it "pasteurized prepared cheese product".
Jhex@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 1d
https://www.mashed.com/263200/kraft-singles-arent-actually-cheese-heres-why/
I think I'll continue to take my chances with "regular cheese"
Nora@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 2 pts · 1d
None of the ingredients in this list are actually scary if you know anything about cheese.
Like, oh no its cheese its got added whey and added milk the horror!
Also what kind of article says "the ingredients aren't clear."
Its on the packaging??? The only non clear thing in here is sodium phosphate and calcium phosphate, and those are the emulsifiers they add to make it super melty! (not sodium citrate, though that is one!).
Jhex@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 1d
Have to laugh at people downvoting me for preferring another type of cheese that can actually legally be called cheese... oh Muricans
Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
Just like most of American brand "ice cream" isn't allowed to be called ice cream, but instead "frozen dessert"
prex@aussie.zone · 2 pts · 1d
You really shouldn't try heroin.
EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 1d
You don’t need the quotations it’s just cheese.
Sunflier@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 9h
Italy doesn't have pizza. The modern dish, "Pizza", was invented in America. Hell, the deepdish was invented in Chicago at Pizzaria Uno.
So, pasta would be better attributable to Italy. But, if you're barring that route and looking for an inherently and uniquely American dish that doesn't ring of other countries' inspiration, the cheeseburger might answer the question. To make it easy though, you wanted something invented in America that is named after the American town it was invented in, go for the Philly cheesesteak.
RidderSport@feddit.org · 4 pts · 7h
Have you even read the article? The author did not bother to read the source that claims this. And since they argue about tomato sauce, it leads me to believe this is mostly about the pizza we eat today rather that pizza in general. And the fact that tomato sauce inly became a staple of pizza is not new either. Much like how mashed potatoes with Sauerkraut is very much of German origin, it only came about in the late 18th century. Similarily with pizza. The dish existed way before tomatoes were a thing in Italy. The romans already made dishes that were very close to pizza. And since many countries have something close to pizza, I'd wager it is the recipe for the dough that is unique to pizza, not the fact that there's tomatoe sauce on it.
Also, no where outside of the USA have I seen deepdish pizza. You can claim origin for that for all I care.