Gastronomic sins

[Torrilin]

Frankly, it took me some time to get used to the Eastern habit of putting mayonnaise where ketchup should go. 

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It's not Eastern. It's Western. If you go to a *civilized* place in PA, the only acceptable condiments for potatoes are butter and salt (baked potato), ketchup OR vinegar (french fries) or none (potato chips). Potato chips may come in salted, sour cream and onion, barbecue, or salt and vinegar flavors, all of which are vaguely heretical except plain salted. Other flavors you see made by a PA potato chip company are made for sale to non-natives.

The only other culturally appropriate uses for ketchup would be things like hot dogs, burgers and possibly scrambled eggs.

On the other hand, now that I live in LA I have to tell the local cheesesteak place to hold the mayo and mushrooms. Thankfully, their cheesesteaks are otherwise perfectly edible and traditional. I've also seen Angeleno restaurants put mayo on everything except potato chips, and just because I haven't seen them do it in a year doesn't mean there aren't any places that do.

Emily

Edited June 1, 2006 by Torrilin (log)

[MarketStEl]

Frankly, it took me some time to get used to the Eastern habit of putting mayonnaise where ketchup should go. 

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It's not Eastern. It's Western. If you go to a *civilized* place in PA, the only acceptable condiments for potatoes are butter and salt (baked potato), ketchup OR vinegar (french fries) or none (potato chips). Potato chips may come in salted, sour cream and onion, barbecue, or salt and vinegar flavors, all of which are vaguely heretical except plain salted. Other flavors you see made by a PA potato chip company are made for sale to non-natives.

You mean like Utz Carolina Style Bar-B-Q Chips? Or Herr's chips with Old Bay seasoning, and Utz' similar "Crab Chip"?

As for barbecue flavored potato chips being vaguely heretical: Maybe in this part of the country (where I live now), but not in the Barbecue Capital of America (where I grew up). You just don't serve barbecue flavored chips and barbecue in the same place at the same time.

The only other culturally appropriate uses for ketchup would be things like hot dogs, burgers and possibly scrambled eggs.

As I believe I said upthread, it's mayo on burgers that I found strange. I've run into these much more often in the East than I did in the Midwest, though apparently I was wrong about no place within 150 miles of that Overland Park Burger King serving them.

On the other hand, now that I live in LA I have to tell the local cheesesteak place to hold the mayo and mushrooms. Thankfully, their cheesesteaks are otherwise perfectly edible and traditional. I've also seen Angeleno restaurants put mayo on everything except potato chips, and just because I haven't seen them do it in a year doesn't mean there aren't any places that do.

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I've ordered more than a few cheesesteaks, mushroom wit, in my time here, though my first preference is for cheesesteak, witout. I guess the difference between Philly and LA is that in Philly, you have to ask for the 'shrooms, while in LA, they assume you want them. You do need to educate those Angelenos that the cheesesteak is at its base a simple sandwich: meat and cheese, nothing more, and you build up from there.

But you are right about this: Cheesesteaks do not come with mayo.

[jsolomon]

On Waikiki beach just this past Tuesday, my wife wanted to eat breakfast at Denny's.

Dear God, the horror.

[tryska]

I'm hope you directed her towards leonard's for malasadas instead?

[jsolomon]

I'm hope you directed her towards leonard's for malasadas instead?

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Oh my, food was one of the major traumas of the trip for her. Neophobia runs rampant in my wife, and I am a neophile. You should have seen the discussion to get her to try poi.

[tryska]

bless her heart.

hey did y'all do a luau? if so - which one?

Edited June 1, 2006 by tryska (log)

[Torrilin]

As for barbecue flavored potato chips being vaguely heretical:  Maybe in this part of the country (where I live now), but not in the Barbecue Capital of America (where I grew up).  You just don't serve barbecue flavored chips and barbecue in the same place at the same time.

Well yeah, different areas have different heresies . But when your culture says "You shall RESPECT the potato" and then proceeds to lay down dictates about how animal fat and salt are really the only things it should be aquainted with, it'll give a different result than a culture where they've got different rules.

Believe it or not, I've never actually seen an Old Bay seasoned chip. I grew up near the Utz and Snyder's and Herr's factories, and that kind of stuff is for sale Elsewhere normally. Utz sells a bunch of different barbecue chips, so I'm not sure which particular one you mean. I can't remember if it's Martin's or Snyder's or Herr's or Utz that does the radioactively hot barbecue chip... There's a lot of variation in barbecue flavored chips. Some are just sweet.

If I'm gonna have chips, I get Grandma Utz's, because they're fried in lard, and lard tastes *good*.

As I believe I said upthread, it's mayo on burgers that I found strange.  I've run into these much more often in the East than I did in the Midwest, though apparently I was wrong about no place within 150 miles of that Overland Park Burger King serving them.

It is perhaps telling that "California burgers" on a school lunch menu are the only ones with mayo in PA schools. McDonalds occasionally does burgers with mayo, Burger King always has done burgers with mayo, and getting a burger without mayo here in LA is like pulling teeth. Most midwestern burger places are in the no mayo school, and I don't know of any east coast origin burger chains. I suspect a CA native might have a very different reaction to mayo on a burger than I do. Scratch that, all the CA natives I know find it very odd that I ask burger places to hold the mayo.

Emily

[Jenny McClure]

Squirty cream, vile stuff. Pop tarts.....why?

[Sunny Simmons Steincamp]

I think the bacon and cheddar bagels I saw in Iowa somewhere probably top the "sinful and simply wrong bagels" category....

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Now there's a snack fit for a pagan.

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I confess to being one of those people who dares tamper with the Holy Bagel, and have ever since I learned to make them myself. Of course, I didn't grow up nor have I ever lived anywhere near anyplace even vaguely resembling "bagel country." I've put all manner of defilements in my bagels, some of which were wonderful, and some of which weren't. I'll spare you the gory details, since this seems painful to many of you, and Good Southern Girls don't consciously cause others discomfort.

I have few food snobberies, but those I do have are deep-seated. Please don't tell me if you put sugar on your grits; in fact, if you think sugar belongs on grits, you probably haven't HAD grits done properly. (They are, IMHO, one of the most under-appreciated and underestimated foods around.) I'd really rather not hear "barbecue" and "beef" in the same sentence (I'm from Memphis, not Texas, and I'm not Jewish.) I don't comprehend gumbo made without file powder or crawfish or okra (although I keep running into odd things like "chicken gumbo." HUH??) And ice cream of almost any form is, to me, seriously inferior to homemade frozen custard. Please don't get me started on cornbread.

I also have to fess up to liking some quirky food combos & condiments, too, and some of them are probably regional. I like mayonnaise on hamburgers... and on blackeyed peas. I put Tabasco on my hot dogs. I like Swiss cheese on my cheesteaks (but have enough self-preservation instincts and friends from PA never, ever to call them "Philly" cheesesteaks thusly assembled.) I'm not much for potato chips, unless they're pickle flavored. In than vein, I like fried dill pickles. I want cheddar cheese on my apple pie, black pepper on cottage cheese, and crave banana and mayonnaise sandwiches with embarassing regularity. I'll gleefully put just about anything you can imagine on a pizza.

And bacon & cheddar bagels sound like something I'd like to try. Of course, that might just be because I *am* Pagan.

[jsolomon]

In than vein, I like fried dill pickles.  I want cheddar cheese on my apple pie, black pepper on cottage cheese,

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There is absolutely nothing wrong with a frickle (fried dill pickle). Cheddar cheese on apple pie is heavenly, and black pepper goes with all manner of things, including cottage cheese.

But, believe you me, if it weren't for the Pagans, modern Christianity would be much more boring...

[Sunny Simmons Steincamp]

There is absolutely nothing wrong with a frickle (fried dill pickle).  Cheddar cheese on apple pie is heavenly, and black pepper goes with all manner of things, including cottage cheese.

I so agree!

But, believe you me, if it weren't for the Pagans, modern Christianity would be much more boring...

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Could be, could be... I'm certainly entertaining (to put it mildly, and on good days) to my Christian friends. They still like to come out here and eat with us, though.

[Fresser]

Lawd have mercy--I top my cheddar cheese grits with stir-fried broccoli!!

Is a Yankee dispensation in order?

Edited June 2, 2006 by Fresser (log)

[jsolomon]

Don't worry, Fress. While in Waikiki, I ate my poi with pickles.

[Kim Shook]

Lawd have mercy--I top my cheddar cheese grits with stir-fried broccoli!!

Is a Yankee dispensation in order?

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Fress, you can put anything SAVORY on your grits and be ok (we are, after all Southerners, not barbarians). It's when you start adding sugar or fruit that we get out the shotguns!

[Bobby 2 Shakes]

Spaghetti with cinnamon-laced tomato sauce. There. I said it. Now please excuse me as I withdraw to my secret recoil hideaway. I should be ok by Monday.

[Reefpimp]

Why all the cappin' on mayo? Or would the pretentious among us find it more palatable if it were called Sauce Mahonnaise, after the harbortown on Malta? You would, wouldn't you; don't bother trying to hide it, I know your dirty little secret and it's up for mockery from me!!

Ditto ketchup. Just because it's what uneducated toothless hicks slather on all their food doesn't mean there's anything wrong with it; it just means it's common. It doesn't mean it's bad. Ketchup makes a lot of things taste better; even cold leftover rice, which is what I had as part of my lunch. The other part was leftover pompano en papillote that I made a couple nights ago. I likes me some hoat kwiseen!!

[MissAmy]

Recipes that call for sugar in cornbread give me the bends. Sugar DOES NOT BELONG in cornbread.

Rant for the day completed. Thank you for your time.

[rooftop1000]

Spaghetti with cinnamon-laced tomato sauce. There. I said it. Now please excuse me as I withdraw to my secret recoil hideaway. I should be ok by Monday.

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whats even worse, is that its actually traditional... Sicilian...must be the eastern/arab influences

tracey

[sazji]

One word:

Nescafé.

[CKatCook]

I just read this thread laughing the whole way....Man, the stuff they come up with, I think the same thoughts in the grocery store everytime I am there...the other day I actually saw peanut butter that came in a package like the slice cheese singles that go on sandwhiches. You mean to tell me there are people too lazy to spread peanut butter! Its bad enough with the "cheese", but the peanut butter too now!!! Scary!