Honkman

And let’s not forget Californios in SF

Fish stew with potatoes , dill and cucumbers cooked in a mix of vegetable broth, white wine and cream and some briefly seared cod added at the end.

Chicken Enchiladas with a sauce made from tomatillos, Anaheim chilies, onion, garlic, cilantro and chicken broth.

Soba noodles with stir-fried beef, napa cabbage and snow peas

Fettuccine with creamed spinach (using heavy cream and ricotta)

Chicken stew as a fusion dish between Germany and Thai - first made chicken stock with chicken legs , celery root, carrots, onions, juniper berries and leek. Later used the chicken stock and meat with yellow Thai curry paste, ginger, shallots, broccoli, mushrooms, butternut squash, coconut oil roasted rice and Thai basil.

Many al pastor trompos have a pineapple on top

If you explain in more detail we can help you to understand it better. At this point you claim there is confusion without showing any evidence.

There is mo real confusion but different countries use different meats (pork, lamb, beef, chicken etc) with differen “add-on on top but the same “technique” with different names

Stir fried cauliflower and tofu curry from the Myers-Chang cookbook (Asian fusion restaurant in Boston). The curry sauce was quite good and made from red Thai curry paste, Madras curry powder, light brown sugar, lime juice.

Agreed with the characteristics of Greece gyros but what you described at American gyros is unfortunately also quite regularly seen in other parts of Europe - I had such “gyros” in Spain, Portugal, italy and even back home in Hamburg perhaps 20-30 years ago some of the gyros was quite questionable.

What makes it American ?

Casserole with polpette (made from fresh pork sausage and ground beef) and pasta (which was added uncooked to the casserole and cooked in the oven and nicely thickened the tomato sauce)

Quinoa salad with red peppers, romaine, kidney beans, corn, red onion, avocado and crumbled tortilla chips for texture - served with a some sausages

Biryani with lamb (marinated overnight in yoghurt and several spices) and okra with tomatoes (recipe from Indian muslims in Uganda)

Just curious why you can’t eat any curry as there are some many variants, e.g. Thai, Indian, Vietnamese, Burma etc with very different ingredients, spices etc which have hardly any overlap

Burger with freshly ground sirloin steak tips (which were much better, beefier than the regular store bought ground beef)

Quick stir-fry with pork tenderloin, snow peas, mushrooms, scallions and carrots served over rice

Simple pasta salad served slightly warm with roasted peppers, tomatoes, briefly blanched broccoli and carrots and a handful of fresh herbs (parsley, thyme, basil, lemon thyme, sage)

Sauerkraut and kassler (smoked and brined pork chops) stew/casserole with a grated potato crust

I guess it is time for us to make it ourselves - looking over your pics and recipe I have a question about your minced pork - did you use regular store bought ground pork or (double) grind it yourself to have better control over how finely it is ground ?

Poor Man’s Schnitzel - Breaded Leberkaese (literally translates to “liver cheese” even though it doesn’t contain any liver or cheese but is a very finely minced German-style meatloaf/roast available freshly made at good German butchers (at least here in California) with a German-style cucumber salad (cream-cider vinegar dressing) and fries

Yep - even in Germany with much more competition they would be a top place (I really hope they will make it through the pandemic - so far so good but you never know)

Just call it dedication for good food (or a recent move back to California)

Dittmers in Los Altos/Mountain View https://www.dittmers.com