Perhaps one of the greatest things about the United States of America is the seemingly endless variety of cuisine that can be enjoyed here. Authentic foods from all over the world have come the the U.S. and have established their own places in the realm of American eateries. From Mexican to Chinese, Italian and Jamaican, citizens of the states have the opportunity to taste the world and enjoy its culture through a huge selection of culinary creations.
When people immigrated to the United States after the country opened its doors to the world, they brought with them their values and cultures, and a very important part of any nation’s culture is its food. The Italians brought many great pasta dishes, the Chinese introduces noodles, the Japanese showed us that raw fish can be served in many different (and delicious) ways.
There are those people out there who would presume that cuisine is nothing more than a method of serving up necessary subsistence and that it isn’t particularly reflective of culture itself. This couldn’t be farther from the truth. First of all, as we see in the most American of our holidays- Thanksgiving, food is a way to bring together family and friends. It can stimulate conversation and keep people talking long into the night, conversing over turkey and potatoes and then chatting over pie and coffee. Food absolutely reflects the traits of certain countries. Many types of dished came about because the people who created it had a very limited means of production and resources. Other foods are specific to cultures because they only grow in one region or country.
Now, here’s a question: Does America have any authentic cuisine of its own? Most of the foods that we enjoy here in the United States are derived from other countries, from other cultures, but is there any meal that is singularly unique to America? It seems as if there are no foods that have originated here in any of our fifty states, however, America has through such sharps twists on classic dishes that, today, they are seen as being American. Hotdogs and hamburgers for example are originally from Germany, but have been so influenced by American culture that they are now considered an American food.
So, while America may not have exactly developed any notable cuisine of its own, it has adapted an changed many different foods from other countries and made them its own. This seems to be the American way: to take something that has been done before and alter it in ways to (hopefully) make it better.
I was curious as to how many dishes out in the world are actually purely American so after looking it up online, I read this in a wikipedia article: “One characteristic of American cooking is the fusion of multiple ethnic or regional approaches into completely new cooking styles…American cooks and chefs have substantially altered these dishes over the years, to the degree that the dishes now enjoyed around the world are considered to be American.” So while i’d say a majority of our foods aren’t purely American. They’re American cuisine in that we’ve put our own spin on them enough to brand them as “American Style” and in that way we’ve essentially developed our own cuisine. Things like New York or Chicago style pizza and TexMex is all part of our American culture despite coming from other countries, which is pretty cool because we get to discover parts of other culture’s on a regular basis though food which is not an opportunity many other countries have in the same abundance as us.
One of the things I think America has been able to do is change the way we look at food. Like you said, the hamburger or hotdog may not have originated in America, but we’ve surely made it an American image. One of the many forces in this process I believe is the power American restaurants have. We probably have more restaurants in the world, and if you take a big city like New York, its one of the places where you can get just about any kind of food in the world. Another force I believe was the creation of the fast food industry. Chains like McDonald’s pump out probably the most hamburgers everyday more than anywhere else in the world. The industry has basically changed what it means to ‘grab a bite to eat.’ With this much power, no wonder the hamburger, hotdog, and fries, have become such an American image! How do you think the fast food industry has changed the role food plays in our culture? Many argue that it is taking away the conversational/social consequences that fall out of sharing a meal with the presence of others.