Weekly Questions from revgalblogpals. Here goes!
1) Is there a food from a foreign land whose reputation led to trepidation when you had a chance to give it a try? Did you find the courage to sample it anyway? If so, were you pleasantly surprised or did you endorse the less than favorable reputation that preceded it?
Eww. I am remembering in detail a meal at a Chinese restaurant in NY/Chinatown, at which my former college roommate (who I was meeting up with for the evening, and who was always more daring than me!) told the owner to bring us a meal he would serve to us if we were Chinese. We were served many things I'd never seen before; most of them were wonderful! But I actually tried to eat the sea cucumber when it arrived, I really did. It was the worst gag reflex I can ever recall. And I had the same reflex several years later, when I saw one at a "petting aquarium." Ugh!
2) What food from your own country/culture gets a bad rap?
My heritage is Italy and Cornwall. It's hard to think of something that has a bad rap from either place!
Perhaps the Cornish pasty, which looks heavy and uninspired, and are sometimes made badly by places that sell them, but when it's made right, it is a blend of the best flavors I know. Beef, potato, onion, and rutabaga (not carrots - that's a Finnish pasty!), with a good lard crust so you can pick it up and eat it. And lots of ground pepper. Glad fall weather is coming so I can start up the oven and make some soon.
3) Of what food are you fond that others find distasteful?
Lima beans? Brussels sprouts? Beets? Lox? None of them sound distasteful to me, so I'm not sure if they qualify!
4) Is there a country’s food, not native to you, that you go out of your way to eat?
Indian Dosa. There's a restaurant in Ann Arbor that fashions them into all sorts of shapes - cylinders and so forth - and stuffs them with wonderful things. But they are so interesting and crispy and large! I love them.
5) What is your guilty pleasure food?
It's gotta be ice cream. I really have to keep it out of the house, because I just can't resist its clarion call from the freezer to me!
Bonus: What was your most memorable meal (good or bad), either because of the menu, the occasion, the company, or some other circumstance that makes it stand out?
For my then-husband's 50th birthday, I invited some friends and family members to join us for dinner and I made a number of the Italian dishes from the movie "The Big Night" (google it if you're not familiar, and try to watch it sometime!). The entire meal was amazing, but probably the highlight was the Timpano - layer after layer of pasta, sauce, meatballs, sausage, cheese, all enclosed in a crust, baked, then cut into slices that include all those amazing layers. It was unbelievably good and fun to make! One day I'll bring my best friends together and do it again.
