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Matt Olson's avatar

I love every word of this.

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Julie Moronuki's avatar

I was hoping you would. We've talked about the spurious "authenticity" ideal before, and those conversations were in my mind when I wrote parts of this.

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Matt Olson's avatar

aw, that makes me happy. <3

this puts a more positive spin on the idea, though; it made me realize how much I appreciate food that isn't afraid to be (in internet terms) "cringe" on its way to delicious. I'm thinking stuff like fried bologna sandwiches or griddled spam, and that hot dog salad fits right in. waffle-ironed tater tots? Double Down-style meatwiches? dill pickle bun subs? hell yeah

this is relevant, I think, because a lot of that externally-applied cringe comes from the food-tourist exoticism you identified, which in turn leans on Distant Foreign Ways Of Cooking. but when I think of the foreign foodways that get me excited, it's stuff like cajun and vietnamese cooks taking french food and going "we can improve it, we have the technology", or a mexican melting pot folding spindling and mutilating iberian and levantine recipes and wrapping them up in a snug loving blanket of nixtamalized corn and ancho paste... stuff like that.

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