touaregsand

Those huge modern Korean restaurant emporiums can serve very good food, BUT I hardly ever go to them, unless it's with non-Koreans who want to be introduced to Korean food. LA's Korea town has the best selection of specialty Korean restaurants compared to the rest of America, hands down, no contest. What are your favorite dishes? Can you read Korean?

Great idea. . .both for a small-business owner and for the neighborhoods it would be part of. I remember. . about twenty years ago in Brooklyn Heights there was a little old Italian guy who came through the neighborhood with his cart full of vegetables actually pulled by a small horse! Now that horse really sold those veggies. At a pretty penny, too. ← I don't know if they are selling produce from farmer's markets, but there are lots of trucks filled with produce and some packaged foods that set up shop in poorer neighborhoods in LA, usually predominantly hispanic neighborhoods. There is also a large Mexican market that offers free shuttle service for customers.

Mexicans and Asians have a long history in California. More than 30 years. Wow it took us a long time to come such a short way in the eyes of the mainstream. This thread really shouldn't go further on a food only forum. (Ludja, I hope you know that I respect your point of view and have always enjoyed your posts. You've always stuck me as an intelligent, thoughtful and fair person. ) ← No harm taken and of course I don't disagree with anything you said--I'm tripping over my words trying to make the one small point that I stated first. Regarding my statement re: Asian and Mexican immigration to the US I only meant that overall in the US there has been a huge increase in immigration from those groups as a *whole* to the US in the last 30 years not that it hadn't existed before in certain parts of the country. I will stop trying to clarify though--this is going off topic as you mention above! ← (Immigration patterns and ethnic food in the U.S. rather than France might be an interesting topic in itself) Not to get too deep into demography here, but to the extent that immigration affects the spread of ethnic cooking but census data shows a more than tenfold increase in the number of Asian-Americans between 1960 and 1999, from 878K to 10.2 million, with their percentage of the U.S. population jumping 700%, to 3.7%. For Hispanics, the population jumped from 6.9M to 31M, and percentage of population from 3.9% to 11.5%. ← Yes it is an interesting topic. Please start the thread. Look where most Asian-Americans live.

LOndon and paris have the most ethnic food in europe. Indian and lebanese food is 1st rate in london.Indian food in london is much better than in Paris for obvious reasons.Lebanese food however is better in Paris. ← I've been to London only once for a week. I did notice alot of 'ethnic' restaurants from around the world, but did not get the impression that any of them were represented with any depth. Indian maybe the exception (again for obvious reasons) but as I understand it the food is more Anglocized curries with heavy onion gravies, certainly not representative of Indian cuisines (plural is intentional). There are threads here and elsewhere that discuss this. Whereas in France, where I've been a dozen times, there is more of a range of North African restaurants from the local coucous joints, touristy belly dancer staffed disco-Riyad, large more 'upscale' places that cater to customers from the source culture, pastry shops, halal butchers that also sell halal charcuterie and places that not only serve cuisine from the different countries of the Maghreb but from different regions as well.

Mexicans and Asians have a long history in California. More than 30 years. Wow it took us a long time to come such a short way in the eyes of the mainstream. This thread really shouldn't go further on a food only forum. (Ludja, I hope you know that I respect your point of view and have always enjoyed your posts. You've always stuck me as an intelligent, thoughtful and fair person. )

Raquel- Do you have any reccomendations for LA eateries. I know there are places in Eagle Rock, Glendale and K-Town.

Shochu is Japanese for Korean soju. A group of Korean restaurant owners got a law passed that allows establishments with just a wine license to serve it. Something about protecting a cultural tradition. Soju cocktails are pretty trendy in LA right now. I've always liked Koreanized Japanese food and Japaneseized (is that a word?) Korean food, as well authentic dishes served at the same meal. Some of the menu items are interesting like "unagi bibimba" (it's Korean sweet soy sauce seasoned eel bibimbap). I always thought of the dish as more Japanese when I had it at Korean places, but on this menu it's written as a Korean dish. The language of marketing, I guess.

Phoenicians? Does mean that the Ancient Lebanese invaded Algeria? ← Invaded is not really the term to be used. The Phoenicians established trading routes and post in Algeria and saw the birth of Carthage (Tunisia now). - Berbers: Original indigenous population with the great dynasties of the Almoravides (Al Murabitun) and the Almohad (Al Muwahiddun) - Pheonicians: Traders - Romans: Invaders and occupiers ← I meant it has a joke for Nadia.

Phoenicians? Does mean that the Ancient Lebanese invaded Algeria?

Can't remember the cross street, it's down the street from Alegrias on the other side of the street. It's a pizza place, I don't know if they serve any North African dishes. We didn't ask and it's been a couple of years. Maybe they do now. I've only recently heard of these places (not that means anything, I don't exactly have a finger on the pulse of SF) that also serve a few Maghribi dishes as a side line, someone told me for immigrant cabdrivers especially. I also found this list of North African and Middle Eastern restaurants. I haven't look through it all, but some places are described as serving both Maghribi and Mashriqi dishes, such as Al's deli. Why Al and not Ali?

Does one of the Algerian places have a red headed Algerian working there? On Lombard?

So apparently the question of why North African food isn't more popular can be answered by saying that it is more popular. ← I'm not sure what you mean. I was making an observation that certain things suchs as couscous are familiar, but not thought of as necessarily being North African in origin or marketed that way. Whole Foods makes pretty good merguez in LA. I had really good merquz at a friends house and she told me she bought it at Gelsons. There's a Tunisian place in LA where they make their own merguez, it used to be great untill they changed to beef. There are a few other places in LA. Don't know about SF. EDIT: beef, not lamb.

North African cuisine or at least forms of it are more familiar to people than they realize. Couscous the staff of life in North African cuisine is a ubiquitous grocery store item. It's carried at Trader Joe's and Whole Food Market. Based on couscous sales and the new flavored ones in boxes, seems like alot of people are eating subpar couscous rather happily. I see no reason why there would be resistance to eating properly steamed couscous, even the box stuff taste 1000 times better when steamed. Alot of fine dining menus in America have a few "North African" inspired dishes. I'm compiling a list for a food blog. It's interesting how the term "North African" as opposed to calling it by a specific country within North Africa (Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria) seems to have created more confusion here. That's the impression I get anyway. Maybe there are more Ehtiopian restaurants than North African ones, but North African dishes have crossed over into the mainstream at the casual level and the fine dining level more than Ethiopian has. The cuisine is very accessible, most of the dishes would appeal to a range of people and palates, Americans included. Let's hope sysco never comes up with a "North African Kit". But something like this is so far into the future, if the interest builds to point that there is a demand for casual couscous joints outside of large urban areas, surely an enterprising chef can execute a nice franchise package.

Jalapenos in Bahn Mi are found in So Cal places, many that cater to Vietnamese. Seems more a like a substitution more than fusion. I wonder what Thai chilis are called in Mexico or elsewhere in Latin America? If get my drift about the origins of chili peppers.

You're correct LA doesn't typify the US. In certain ways I wish it did. Underneath the glitz and BS of hollywood, there are so many so called ethnic communities that thrive in LA.

I've been thinking about your post, as well some of the other posts. I'm quoting you but I'm not directing all of my comments at your post. I did a search on the Arab population. Doesn't surprise me at all that Los Angeles has a huge Arab/ Arab-American population. Arab-Americans represent a fairly affluent and well educated group of Americans. There is a great deal of diversity in the Arab community but this forum is not really the place to discuss this. There are many Arab and Middle Eastern owned business in LA that cater to and thrive within their respective communities. Most seem to crossover with other Arab communitites. Others are simply Arab owned, but have nothing do with being Arab. After more than 30 years in LA I barely notice foreign language signs. But for the past week or so I've been actively studying the signage of Arab/North African/Middle Eastern owned business. Most business names don't make a reference to a specific country, some refer to landmarks, a tiny few make a reference to a city, alot have an English that doesn't mean anything to someone who doesn't speak Arabic, Armenian or Farsi. Sometimes signs are written in Arabic, Armenian and Spanish, no English. Sometimes in Hebrew, Farsi and Arabic. The Middle Eastern (and to a lesser extent North African) restaurant scene reflects the diversity. Today I drove by restaurant after restaurant that have been open for as long as I can remember but never went to because there was little or no signage that I could understand. Clearly they are surving or thriving by catering to people from the source culture. Then there is the other type of Middle Eastern/North African restaurant that caters to those outside of the source culture. These places usually refer to the Mediterranean in their names. They usually list names of dishes that are recognizable to outsiders. The dishes are usually on the windows, kebabs, pita, shawerma, taboule, hummus... As for North African restaurants in LA it's growing very slowly, but still growing. I can't think of a single North African restaurant that went out of business around here, I can think of a few that have expanded. Also many French restaurants serve a couple of North African dishes. So "Middle Eastern" and "North African" may sound *yucky foreign* to some, but hey you know what you've been eating alot of the food without consciously being aware of the origins. Maghrebis and Mashriqis do share common dishes. As for the 1001 Arabian nights, disco Riyad places places, why do celebrities flock to them so?

He's saving up for a bicycle. ← He'll be too busy in the kitchen! Let's see...we already have three bicycles at home (no kidding), so that's makes one for me, one for my wife, and one for you! I think we already have a pretty solid business plan... ← We can call it "caravan express." Hey, if the food is good, it's a surefire cash cow.

I've never been to Little Poland either. But I really like Teresa's. It's good food after a long day of BS business meetings, honest food.

Let's all post this next to our computer screens. It get even worse when specifics are discussed based on what someone's neighbor said.

He's saving up for a bicycle.

Coincidence or ratings? I'll take Michael's word for it. Tha man is a pillar I tell you, a pillar! (I'm not joking)

We don't use turmeric in our cooking. Flay's dish looks more Korean/Southeast Asian from the recipe Ellen linked to. Alot of this stuff doesn't really bother me much. Of course I'd prefer a more informed voice. But at least some notion of Korean, Koreanized American, Americanized Korean is reaching a larger audience. Maybe I won't be asked about kimchi that's been buried in the ground anymore. Has anyone else noticed that Korean BBQ and packaged Korean BBQ sauces are the new Teriyaki? I think some companies have simply re-labeled teriyaki sauces to tap into a growing interest in Korean foods. In LA alot non-Korean Asian restaurants served Korean BBQ or other Korean Beef dish. The Thai place down the street from me has Korean braised short ribs listed a house specialty. There's a Japanese BBQ chain that basically serves Korean BBQ and customers cook the food at the table Korean style. Some of the names of the dishes are Japanicised pronunciations of Korean. Apparently they have several hundred locations in Japan and they've open at least one in LA. I can't remember the name right now. But it reminds me of some of the places in Seoul that serve Korean and Japanese.

I'll have to try and document the entire process. The fermentation process can be fickle. You'll hear even old Korean ladies with decades of kimchi making experience wondering what went wrong with a particular batch.

Korean mustard. Gyuh ja.

Tyler Florence, Ming Tsai, Morimoto, David Rosengarten, and a Chinese America female chef who's name escapes me did a few things about Korean food or Korean ingredients. Rosengarten did a well informed piece on kimchi and galbi jim (I think that was the dish). I remember being impressed with his level of knowledge. It was a good show. Tyler Florence, hmm, better than Flay, but I would have preferred he said "Kimchi like" The Asian chefs did 'fusiony' dishes that were quite nice.