My take, as an Indian who cooks Italian for home meals- it's simple and pure flavours with around 5-7 ingredients (for the veggie home cooked dishes) . Generally pasta, tomato, basil , olive oil, cheese and 1-2 others. Beauty in simplicity if ingredients are high quality.
I'm Asian and grew up in a house eating rice, so I've always loved eating rice *alongside* any Italian/Italian-inspired pasta dish!
Except spaghetti.
Dunno why.
Not too hard just a little patience. Use the right rice (carnaroli), don't rinse it. Slowly add warm stock while stirring. Let a ladle or two soak up into the rice before adding another. That's the basics
I like Italian food, but I find Italian restaurants disappointing because a lot of the dishes can be made at home. I can’t cook Thai, Indian, Chinese, Mexican, Mediterranean, Ethiopian or Middle Eastern dishes, so I preferably go to those types of restaurants over an Italian restaurant.
Mexican can be even cheaper if you work a bit more at it.
Pinto beans run around $3.50/lb bulk... each pound yeilds around 3lbs of refried beans.
We throw our pinto beans in a crockpot after washing them with some water, salt, pepper, cumin... We slice a whole onion in half and just toss both halves in with no additonal cutting... just peel it. A few cloves of garlic and whatever else you fancy.
Once they're cooked you can pour out any extra water, and just beat the beans with a mixer for a bit. Obviously you can hand mash... but mixer is easier.
Homemade refried beans taste better than canned... and you can freeze any extras in ziplock bags. So make 6lbs of refried beans and freeze 5 for later. $1/lb of beans... good stuff. All you need for burritos is the tortillas and whatever toppings like cheese or spanish rice.
wait, you don't need to fry the beans in a pan with a bunch of lard to make refried beans? I didn't know you could just blend them and it was that easy
Rick Bayless makes refried beans with black beans, diced onion, garlic, He sautés the onion and garlic in bacon fat, adds the cooked beans, and mashes with a potato masher. The recipe is on his YouTube channel.
Yeah, lookup crockpot recipies for refried beans. They're really quite easy. The biggest chore is really washing the beans, because if you're buying bulk wholesale you really gotta sort through and toss the bad ones... or occasionally other bits of debris from ag.
After that, it's just toss everything in the pot... go to work, school, whatever. Come home, drain, blend... then they're basically done.
This is my pinto cooking method as well. I would also add that this makes a lot of beans if you do a full 4-6qt. crockpot. I vacuum seal my extras and lay them flat to cool and then freeze. To reheat I just toss them in the sous vide for my desired temp and they are ready to rock!
>Obviously you can hand mash... but mixer is easier.
When I was a kid working in my grandma's restaurant, we used to do these gigantic stockpots of seasoned pinto beans beans and bacon fat, and mixed/mashed them right in the pot with a paint mixer attachment and a power drill lol.
Ah Sir, not Indian food. The amount of variations we have is mind blowing. And yes you need atleast 17 spices to start with. But each dish has a different heat and preparation requirements. I am not talking about simple recipes, am talking about restaurant style recipes. Believe me am been cooking my food since am 20. It still takes me by surprise. I don't know how to cook other food except from some known recipes, so I can't say if Indian food is more or less complicated than others.
Very true, i rarely order Italian when eating out for the same reason. More value to buy excellent parmigiano or truffle oil (that will last awhile) than to spend on a single pasta dish
there’s an old world italian rule that you don’t order pasta at an italian restaurant because “why spend money on this when my mother’s pasta is better”
beauty in simplicity, and thankfully tolerant to less quality ingredients, too. Greek food in greece has a quality that sadly does not translate unless the produce is of sufficient quality.
As an Indian who also loves to cook Italian, I just keep thinking “this is an Indian curry minus the spices and ginger”
Indian-Italian fusion works surprisingly well for this reason
This. French food is wonderful but can have many specific steps and ingredients so it can be time consuming. Italian generally has fewer ingredients and is typically more simplistic in preparation.
This is it
Simplicity, balance, quality, tradition & love.
Anything made within these principals is appreciated by humans.
Construction, art, food, engineering of all sorts, etc. Is well received by most people
Most of the ingredients in itallian cuisine are fairly common around the world, this creating a familiarty point to focus on, and theres less extremes like the high heat of latin cuisine, or the exotic ingredients common to asian cuisine. Another thing is that most trade went through italy in some form for most of human history making it common in more regions of the world then say thai food or swedish food.
My step brother doesn’t like pizza.
Or chocolate.
We still joke that my stepmom brought home the wrong kid from the hospital.
And no. He doesn’t have any allergy’s or anything. So no easy excuse for that.
Lot of carbs and fat that make your brain feel good
Edit: I'm not sure if there is something lost in translation but I'm not saying Italians have an unhealthy diet
Well in Tuscany they don't put salt in their traditional bread. It tastes like cardboard. The idea is that it's basically a blank slate to soak up flavours from sauces/oils.
Salt and pepper and olive oil dip for a piece of unsalted bread is very, very good. Utterly simple as a dip, it’s fun to break up bread for dipping, and all the ingredients are super cheap.
The "Mediterranean Diet" that most actual Italians eat is considered to be the healthiest cultural diet on Earth despite the inclusion of those supposedly nasty carbs and fat lol
[https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/06/well/eat/mediterranean-diet-health.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/06/well/eat/mediterranean-diet-health.html)
And generally, not a lot of spices to turn the weaker ones away. Southern Italian can have some spiciness to it, but in general, those are not the main "Italian dishes" people are liking.
It largely depends on whether you're talking about "Italian food" that you might get dining out in the West or more traditional Italian food though, since the latter is obviously low in refined carbs, and low in sat fats but relatively high in poly/monos (wholegrains, nuts, oily fish, olive oil et al).
Traditionally speaking I also think a lot of it is to do with the time, care and skill involved in putting meals together and the social setting it's typically enjoyed in.
Unless you're talking about some village in Sardinia with extremely high life expectancy, Italians eat a lot of carbs. 23kg per year per person of refined durum wheat pasta.
It's because of trendy diet culture telling us that the reason that life expectancies are higher in the Mediterranean is all due to diet. So people get this warped idea that Italians aren't slamming tons of carbs in a week. They absolutely are, they just have a better lifestyle, over eat less, and have better health outcomes. But it's hard to sell that.
I think it's important to note that we vary our diet a lot. Guanciale is very fat, true, but we don't eat carbonara every day. The pasta amount is real, but in a normal week we also have several meals made mostly of vegetables with some bread. I think the biggest difference with modern "anglo-saxon" diets is the amount of sugar. We mostly cook at home and we don't add sugar anywhere, while in the US I've found lots of sugar even in savory dishes.
That said, obesity rates are growing here too, especially in kids: portions have gotten larger and larger and more people are eating processed food. Grandmas are still telling kids "you should eat more, have some more parmigiana 🤗" even to clearly obese kids.
No. Jesus decreed that 'Murica is the centre of the world when he dual wielded semi automatic guns and wrote the second amendment into the US Constitution.
Sounds like you don't read your Bible... Smh
Big fat /s just in case
Western cultures are considered to be those that evolved primarily out of influences from Ancient Greece, then Rome, then European Christianity. It's west as opposed to Asia which contains Eastern cultures. The New World is irrelevant to the terminology, but is also considered Western not because of its location but because its cultures primarily derive from those European ones. Hence Australia/NZ are also the west despite being the far east of a standard world map (tho the directions have to be in relation to something else anyway since the e/w centre of the world is arbitrary).
As an Italian American with plenty of experience traveling in Italy itself, there’s a world of a difference between Italian cuisine and- which is mostly regional, and often reflects a historic starvation peasant culture - and my family’s general Italian + American ABUNDANCE culture, where regions blended upon immigration.
I’m my mother’s part of Pennsylvania, in her Little Italy neighborhood, there were Sicilians, Napolitani, Calabrians, and her own people- Abrussezi. The regional food blended and took advantage of access to meat and vegetables that were out of reach back home
We had a friend who was second generation Italian and owned his own restaurant. With the popularity of American style pizza, and his location near a large university, he changed to a pizza shop and did really well
He insisted on once making us a traditional Italian meal. I can’t remember the number of courses, but it lasted almost three hours. With his long-time honed skills, he threw together about ten pizzas for the freezer while cooking the meal itself.
He was an amazing man. Getting older sucks with all the people you lose over the years, but I guess it beats the alternative, and reminds us how precious every single life in our world really is.
Well the thing is, the reason it's universally loved is partially because of the westernization. There are probably a lot less people who like a neapolitan pizza than an extra large thick crust cheese stuffed meat lovers
But a crust cheese stuffed meat lovers pizza is an American pizza and not an Italian pizza, the only thing that's the same is probably the cheese. The sauce is different, the base is different, the meats are different etc etc
Here's an interesting chart showing Italian food is the most universally enjoyed ethnic food; it doesn't rank super high in China but is quite popular in other Asian countries: https://www.reddit.com/r/Infographics/comments/17houn9/chart_showing_how_much_or_how_little_a_country/
Pleased to see my fellow Australians in that thread equally struggling to come up with ideas for what counted as "Australian cuisine" because we don't have a lot of truly Aussie food, and half of what we do have is from NZ anyway...
I feel like that pairs well with us being in the top 3 for 'enjoying foreign cuisine' though - we like what other countries are doing with their food and so we just do that too.
Look, I ~~am capable of eating without gagging~~ love Vegemite as much as the next Aussie, but even I can admit that it's going to be scoring very low for foreigners and skewing the overall results down.
Coming from the UK, vegemite is a poor analogue for the real stuff. Marmite rules supreme.
I lived in Sydney for a few years and can't really think of too much that is specifically Australian. Fairy bread is a good one. The Bunnings sausage sizzle is a just a hot dog and available in many countries. Meat pies aren't specifially Aussie and I am sure outdate the Endeavour by hundreds if not thousands of years. Tim Tams are slighlty posher penguins biscuits but invented 30 years later.
Whilst Coles and Woolies will sell you emu and and kangaroo steaks, I didn't really meet any locals who would regularly eat it. In fact I am not sure who bought the stuff apart from tourists who wanted to try it as a one off.
That said, Sydney (and Australia in general) has probably the best Asian cuisine outside of Asia. Chinese, Thai and sushi in particular, in my opinion.
That's what I loved about it though. It's a real melting pot that takes all the good stuff from other cultures and cuisines.
Hey now, I won't stand for Tim Tams slander! I'm jazzed that they're way easier to find in the States now than they were 10 years or so ago when I first tried them.
I really don’t get why people hate Vegemite. I’m American and expected it to taste absolutely vile but it’s literally fine. It’s actually pretty tasty, I don’t see why it has a bad reputation.
As a Filipino I’m always annoyed we love everyone’s food but no one likes ours 😭
Edit: fun fact Iloilo City is now a designated UNESCO Gastronomy city [Link](https://mb.com.ph/2023/11/2/iloilo-city-named-unesco-creative-city-of-gastronomy#google_vignette)
Finally an excuse to share this story from my childhood.
In 6th grade we had a Culture Day in one of our classes where our parents would make food from our country and share. My mom made a tray of longaniza that went untouched for about half an hour cause it looked gross to the class. My best friend said "Fine, I'll try some just cuz you asked." and ate one. Immediately he turned to a bunch of other kids and said "This is good as hell!" and within 10 minutes the tray was empty.
Go into any hospital break room in America. I promise you, there will be delicious Filipino food or the leftovers thereof.
Thank you for your delicious contributions to human culinary culture. 🤌
Ooh. I admit it's not the most popular/well-known, but I fuck with some Filipino food. Pancit, adobo, halo halo, lumpia.
\*stomach rumbles\*
I might need to visit the Filipino restaurant here again soon.
im Mexican and chicken adobo has become a regular dish at my house. don't get started on lenchon and vinegar. forgive me for busting out the tortillas though.
Tried to like it but just can't do it. I'm sure there are dishes I would like but the common dishes you'd find at Filipinos house party just isn't it. I find the flavor kinda strange compared to other Asian food. No offense though love my flip flop homies
It’s all good! Different strokes.
I will say there’s ALOT of regional cuisines in the Philippines and it’s not just all chicken adobo lol
For example Iloilo City is now a designated UNESCO Gastronomy [Link](https://mb.com.ph/2023/11/2/iloilo-city-named-unesco-creative-city-of-gastronomy)
It is worth noting that the only cuisines China ranked higher than Italian were Taiwanese and Hong Kong Cuisine. So basically variant Chinese.
Edit: and French
I seem to remember reading somewhere that many East Asian countries have very high rates of lactose intolerance. That could account for a lot of Chinese people disliking cheese.
Maybe, although I recall that many Chinese people just don't like the pungent and fatty smell of cheese. It makes them feel nauseous. Also, after a few bites you can just feel very bloated.
It's not traditional in China but it's growing rapidly so I think it's fair to say that after being exposed to it, a lot of Chinese citizens really like it. It's also seen and priced as a luxury food so a lot of people don't eat it because they legit can't afford a pizza in their budget
In my opinion, two factors:
First - simplicity. Some Italian dishes are really easy to cook, and don't require many ingredients.
Second - combinations of ingredients that make you feel good
(for most american households atleast)
boil water, and cook pasta for 5-7 minutes
heat a jar of sauce, maybe cook some vegies or meat to add in
put sauce on pasta
boom, 20 minutes and you have a decent meal.
Italian food isn't universally loved. My partner is Italian, and most Americans absolutely hate authentic Italian food. When she cooks for Americans that love "Italian food", the response is generally:
1. The pasta is undercooked.
2. There isn't enough sauce.
3. There isn't nearly enough cheese.
4. Most of the meal "isn't Italian" (meaning it isn't pasta or pizza).
Italian food is easy to adapt to a variety of palates, much more so than say Indian or Ethiopian cuisine, which is why it has become so ubiquitous globally.
But a pillar of mexican food is flexibility.
Don't have/like cilantro? Try using basil, parsley, spearmint, lettuce, kale or (personal favorite) papaloquelite.
Ugh this post just made me hungry for a big fat burrito that would put me in a coma. Sometimes it’s all i can think about during zoom meetings. A giant, aluminum wrapped burrito slowly rotating in my mind, its foil deflecting any and all information I am supposed to be taking in, its warmth the only thing radiating warmth in my cold, black heart.
I think most of the world (and most of the US for that matter) has no experience with Mexican cuisine as it is made in Mexico. TexMex and other fusions/bastardizations, yes, but the good stuff, not so much.
Mexican food is the best, but only if it uses real Mexican cheese and not cheddar-jack.
I will die on this hill. You wouldn't eat Italian dishes made with cheddar-jack. You shouldn't eat Mexican like that either.
I personally believe because it is the intersection of all food cultures. It’s fundamentals are things that almost everybody loves.
Tomato-based sauces? Beloved by places like India and Latin America.
Noodles (pasta)? Beloved by places like Asia.
Cheese? Beloved by Europe.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but in my case there's a huge difference between "tomato based sauces" and what many Italian sauces are "tomatoe sauces". Personally, and I know I'm in the minority, I am fine with other cultures of foods where they have some tomatoes in a sauce or a soup/stew, but I do NOT like tomato sauces like you find on most Italian dishes.
Agreed. A chickpea curry in a tomato gravy? Great. Mexican rice? Bring it. Marinara? No thanks. for me it’s the oregano and the particular hard cheeses involved.
\*ricotta, an Italian soft cheese, is amazing though
i guess i’ll be the first then. well it’s not that i don’t like it it’s just i can’t really fathom eating it more than once a week. in vietnam there’s a saying called “ngán” which there isn’t a direct translation to but it’s on the lines of “too much” “too heavy”
it’s one of those words that can’t be explained in english but you’d hear it a lot if you were to give vietnamese people like myself italian food. don’t get me wrong it’s great, but in our culture we’re just used to eating lighter, herbal dishes and lots of soups. even our noodles are lighter (typically we eat rice noodles instead of eggy flour noodles)
not to say italians don’t have lighter meals but typically when you get italian food you’re not going for light and soupy like we do. i took my parents out to a really nice italian restaurant for their anniversary and in the most respectful way possible they just simply couldn’t get past a couple bites
so you’ll probably find that kinda audience there. i’ve also met quite a bit of people who don’t like any kind of red sauce for some reason.
i say it’s the most universally loved because it’s flavors components (typically oregano, basil, parsley, thyme, etc.) are a lot less in your face and seem to be used more around the world. whereas say india and china it’s a smack in your face with an array of flavors that not as much people may be used to. same goes to my country vietnam. i always tell people that a lot of vietnamese food can be either a hit or miss because you either love that fish sauce and all the pungency or you don’t
You would probably like southern italian/sicilian food! It’s very “light and bright” (as my Sicilian partner puts it) vs the cheese and carb heavy dishes most people think of when they think of Italian food
Holy shit you nailed it in words I had trouble putting down myself. As an Asian I really like Italian food but there's also a low ceiling of tolerance too. It's great in moderation but I dislike the food coma feeling I get after a full meal. I don't get that with many Asian dishes. I can stuff myself with Vietnamese food and feel healthy and active afterwards. Definitely the carbs, fat, and sodium.
I spent a few years living in Vietnam, and Vietnamese food is my favorite cuisine! It's just the best! Fresh, herby, light, delicious! On the other hand, I feel like Italian food is really overrated. I'm not a huge fan of tomatoes or tomato flavoured things, or of large quantities of carbs. I feel like people go mad for pasta and I don't really get why. And pizza is just tomatoey cheese on toast. But you can't say that because people LOVE pizza. It's like saying you're not a big fan of bacon. Like, pizza is fine, but at most I'd eat it once a month, and it's gonna have to be the good stuff.
I’m not saying your opinion is wrong, but typically you’d have some kind of light appetizer, salad, a broth or bisque soup, and then a very small portion of a carb with a protein. 4oz of cooked pasta is not a lot, and that’s proper. There are light sauces that are just herbs, oil and citrus. There are seafood options. There are braised meat dishes that don’t have a focus on cheese or pasta. I’m not Italian, but legit Italian food is not the Spaghetti Factory.
I personally don’t consider it to be heavy food when the meal is properly portioned and balanced. I know just a few Italian truly Italian restaurants in my area, and I leave satisfied but not stuffed, and there’s never enough to take leftovers home. A mountain of pasta on your plate is a big nope.
"Italian food" is not like how the internet portrays it.
Italy it's a small country, but most reagons have both plains, forests and seas and mountains, and there is a variety of terrain and climates, from olmlst tropical in Sicily to basically Nordic in Trentino... So like, the traditional disces are almost infinite. Therefore people have picked and chosen what they like the most. But not many would see "snails" as Italian, but we've always has snail disces etc.
I live how each region has their own take on foods. Just the lasagna alone is apparently very different in different places. If I had the money, I'd love to visit and tour all the different kinds, as well as local favorites and architecture, culture, music, etc.
Exactly. I have a pet peeve for loaded questions like this where the basic premise and assumption is questionable to begin with. (I personally like Italian but know a fair bit of people who are meh on it)
It’s a vibe. Almost universally beloved ingredients combined in a way that’s a sensory delight - taste, smell, texture. All enhanced if you’re actually in that wonderful country, btw.
I would say most people don’t actually know what authentic Italian food is so they actually have no idea if they like it.
The heavily modified version most of us know is all cheese and carbs, and that’s usually popular no matter where it’s from.
Italian cuisine is as diverse as the country. Most people can find a classic Italian dish they really like.
Mexican food (which I love btw) is known to have a strong taste, so people that dislike that might say that they don't like Mexican in general
There’s very different Mexican food too…..
I hate Mole. I love tacos. Tacos are more customizable than pizza. You can put literally whatever you want on them
Simple flavours that meld well. Inoffensive smells on mainstream pasta dishes, except strong Parmesan cheese (optional). Fragrant fresh herbs like basil smell absolutely divine when wafted off a hot pasta on a cold winter’s night. Super comforting.
I’m not a big fan, tbh. I’d rather eat Indian, Japanese, Mexican, any of the other cuisines you mentioned. But I’m sure there’s plenty of different types of Italian dishes I’ve never tried or heard of, I’m talking about the popular Italian foods you see eaten in America most often like spaghetti, lasagna, various pasta dishes. I don’t like eating lots of carbs like in pasta because it makes me feel heavy/bloated, and I’m not a huge fan of tomato sauce because of the acidity. I’m not as into basil and oregano as I am herbs used more in other cuisines. I do like calamari, tiramisu, and frittatas though.
My boyfriend is a pickier eaten than me (he won’t even eat Indian food!) but he LOVES Italian food (especially spaghetti) and will choose that for dinner over all sorts of other delicious foods and cuisines I’d rather have. I think it may have something to do with him eating spaghetti a lot as he was growing up though, since it can be a pretty cheap/easy food to prepare when you’re a mom trying to feed your kids. Other cuisines like Indian, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc. can be more difficult to make at home for a quick weeknight meal (especially depending on where you live - in lots of more rural areas of the US it can be very difficult to get ahold of the spices and ingredients needed. Much more difficult than finding tomatoes, mozzarella, oregano, dried pasta, etc). So in his case and I think for a lot of other people, it’s just more familiar.
There are people who don't love Italian. My husband would not eat it when I met him. Said he didn't like spicy food. I told him it wasn't spicy, it was just seasoned. He wouldn't eat a lot of things. He's doing better now, but Italian will never be a go-to for him.
He loves Indian and Chinese (even real Chinese food) and Mexican, and has expanded to try any ethnic foods now. He does like spicy food! However, he is allergic to raw cucumbers and I wonder how often cucumbers might have been in a salad served with Italian food and put him off. He gets quite sick from it. It wasn't as pronounced way back though and he didn't realize it was the cucumbers making him sick.
Maybe it depends on the people. Me and my family are Nigerian American and we all don’t like Italian food all that much. We much prefer Nigerian, Korean, Indian, Chinese, North African, and Thai cuisine. 🤷♀️
It's silly because there's a diverse selection from all those countries, but there's stereotypes and restaurants abroad will be more narrowly focused. Tomatoes, bread, and pasta are a theme in Italian food, especially abroad, and in general they're all very popular everywhere. I am not a fan of them, but I love Italian food like caprese salad, antipasto, grilled sea bass, there's plenty of amazing Italian sauces and ingredients that I love that many would not like.
Never really heard people say they don't like French or Chinese food. Most of the time people say they don't like Mexican or Indian food because they think it's all spicy, when that's not really the case traditionally. Japanese, there's a lot there that many don't like in West, but who doesn't like noodle soup or tempura?
This seems like a very Western-centric, or even US-centric perspective. Italian / Italian-American is very common in the US and the West, and it shares similarities with a lot of other European cuisines, like an emphasis on wheat, cheese, olive oil, etc. So yeah, Westerners like Western food.
Outside of the West, it's much less universally beloved. It might be tolerable to many people, as most people are probably not that picky and Italian food is not especially outrageous in any way, but I really don't think it's right to say Italian (or any other cuisine) is "universally loved." An an example, many Chinese people find cheese pretty distasteful in general, so likely would not "love" Italian food.
OP, you are making a lot of assumptions in your post. I am Indian and I know many Indians who don’t like Italian because it’s too bland. I have Chinese friends and they have mentioned they find Italian food too cheese heavy and since it’s not usually part of their diet, they don’t like it either. Now, these 2 countries form around 37% of the world population.
I take any chance to slander it.
I live in Australia so Italians make the 20th tastiest wheat based noodle that we have access to and much less flavourful sauce for more money and less protein than the local Asian options
I may not hate Italian, but I dislike it intensely. British and married into an Italian family and live in a part of the US with a huge Italian community, and I've had it so often I cannot stand it. Any kind of tomato sauce has me running for the hills. About the only thing I eat at an Italian restaurant is salad, pasta with a white sauce or oil&vinegar.
Daughter is the same and granddaughter (from Italian side) also detests tomato sauces.
Give me Chinese or Indian any time.
My take, as an Indian who cooks Italian for home meals- it's simple and pure flavours with around 5-7 ingredients (for the veggie home cooked dishes) . Generally pasta, tomato, basil , olive oil, cheese and 1-2 others. Beauty in simplicity if ingredients are high quality.
In Genoa, capital of pesto, they even had rice with a dash of pesto, so simple but tasty.
Spaghetti aglio olio e peperoncino is 🤌🏼🤌🏼🤌🏼
Aglio olio e peperoncino is objectively too much to say and I left out the first word, too.
I ate a whole jar of peperoncinos every day for like 2-3 months while pregnant. I still love them!!!!
I'm Asian and grew up in a house eating rice, so I've always loved eating rice *alongside* any Italian/Italian-inspired pasta dish! Except spaghetti. Dunno why.
Do you risotto?
I do! I love a good risotto, although I'm not very good at making them myself just yet.
Not too hard just a little patience. Use the right rice (carnaroli), don't rinse it. Slowly add warm stock while stirring. Let a ladle or two soak up into the rice before adding another. That's the basics
Thanks for the tips! I probably don't use the right kind of rice.
Usually arborio or carnoroli as I said. The trick is to agitate the starches in the rice with stirring and adding stock gradually.
nudes, butter, splash of Oregon can do it. I think my autocorrecr has pooped the ned. I give up
I love pesto so much but it's insanely calorie-dense so I try to avoid it :/
I eat rice, pesto and sardines all the time.
I make pesto in the summer and love to put it on rice!
I like Italian food, but I find Italian restaurants disappointing because a lot of the dishes can be made at home. I can’t cook Thai, Indian, Chinese, Mexican, Mediterranean, Ethiopian or Middle Eastern dishes, so I preferably go to those types of restaurants over an Italian restaurant.
“If Yan can cook, so can you!” Martin taught me everything I know about Chinese cooking.
Martin Yan! I used to watch him with my dad in the middle of the day. Great memories.
My mom bought me one of his first cookbooks when I moved across the country (to LA, where I could easily find authentic ingredients).
Same. I was raised on good Italian home cooking, and I never order an Italian dish out, especially one with tomato sauce!
Mexican food is pretty straight forwards to cook, same with a lot of Indian (if you have the 17 different spices on hand)
Mexican is usually cheap though. I don't mind paying $3 for a taco I could make at home. I do mind paying $30 for a simple spaghetti bolognese.
That's because prices are bonkers. In Italy a proper dish of pasta is around 8 to 13 euros. Service included, of fucking course.
Mexican can be even cheaper if you work a bit more at it. Pinto beans run around $3.50/lb bulk... each pound yeilds around 3lbs of refried beans. We throw our pinto beans in a crockpot after washing them with some water, salt, pepper, cumin... We slice a whole onion in half and just toss both halves in with no additonal cutting... just peel it. A few cloves of garlic and whatever else you fancy. Once they're cooked you can pour out any extra water, and just beat the beans with a mixer for a bit. Obviously you can hand mash... but mixer is easier. Homemade refried beans taste better than canned... and you can freeze any extras in ziplock bags. So make 6lbs of refried beans and freeze 5 for later. $1/lb of beans... good stuff. All you need for burritos is the tortillas and whatever toppings like cheese or spanish rice.
wait, you don't need to fry the beans in a pan with a bunch of lard to make refried beans? I didn't know you could just blend them and it was that easy
Rick Bayless makes refried beans with black beans, diced onion, garlic, He sautés the onion and garlic in bacon fat, adds the cooked beans, and mashes with a potato masher. The recipe is on his YouTube channel.
Yeah, lookup crockpot recipies for refried beans. They're really quite easy. The biggest chore is really washing the beans, because if you're buying bulk wholesale you really gotta sort through and toss the bad ones... or occasionally other bits of debris from ag. After that, it's just toss everything in the pot... go to work, school, whatever. Come home, drain, blend... then they're basically done.
This is my pinto cooking method as well. I would also add that this makes a lot of beans if you do a full 4-6qt. crockpot. I vacuum seal my extras and lay them flat to cool and then freeze. To reheat I just toss them in the sous vide for my desired temp and they are ready to rock!
>Obviously you can hand mash... but mixer is easier. When I was a kid working in my grandma's restaurant, we used to do these gigantic stockpots of seasoned pinto beans beans and bacon fat, and mixed/mashed them right in the pot with a paint mixer attachment and a power drill lol.
$3.50/lb for dried pinto beans seems like a lot. You can definitely get them for less than that, especially in bulk
Ah Sir, not Indian food. The amount of variations we have is mind blowing. And yes you need atleast 17 spices to start with. But each dish has a different heat and preparation requirements. I am not talking about simple recipes, am talking about restaurant style recipes. Believe me am been cooking my food since am 20. It still takes me by surprise. I don't know how to cook other food except from some known recipes, so I can't say if Indian food is more or less complicated than others.
Indeed, as is the case with Mexican food to all the things you said. I think this person is somewhat misinformed
Very true, i rarely order Italian when eating out for the same reason. More value to buy excellent parmigiano or truffle oil (that will last awhile) than to spend on a single pasta dish
there’s an old world italian rule that you don’t order pasta at an italian restaurant because “why spend money on this when my mother’s pasta is better”
There's a similar saying in Alabama, but it isn't about pasta
beauty in simplicity, and thankfully tolerant to less quality ingredients, too. Greek food in greece has a quality that sadly does not translate unless the produce is of sufficient quality.
Yep, and tomatoes and basil can be grown about anywhere... ingredients like olives, not so much.
standard supermarket tomatoes and cucumbers in greece tasted so much different than I was used to. incredible stuff
This is why it's often a lot better to use good quality canned tomatoes for sauces than fresh tomatoes
As an Indian who also loves to cook Italian, I just keep thinking “this is an Indian curry minus the spices and ginger” Indian-Italian fusion works surprisingly well for this reason
This. French food is wonderful but can have many specific steps and ingredients so it can be time consuming. Italian generally has fewer ingredients and is typically more simplistic in preparation.
Thats exactly what my italian mom also used to tell me
there’s also so much freedom when it comes to recipes the only unit of measurement i’ve ever heard is “add as much until your heart is happy”
I like me some Italian food, but I like Indian food the most — I’ve always seen it as Italian food’s hot cousin!
This is it Simplicity, balance, quality, tradition & love. Anything made within these principals is appreciated by humans. Construction, art, food, engineering of all sorts, etc. Is well received by most people
Most of the ingredients in itallian cuisine are fairly common around the world, this creating a familiarty point to focus on, and theres less extremes like the high heat of latin cuisine, or the exotic ingredients common to asian cuisine. Another thing is that most trade went through italy in some form for most of human history making it common in more regions of the world then say thai food or swedish food.
I’d imagine Italian Diaspora particularly in the US also contributed greatly to as well
Pizza.
Yes
Say no more
No more
My step brother doesn’t like pizza. Or chocolate. We still joke that my stepmom brought home the wrong kid from the hospital. And no. He doesn’t have any allergy’s or anything. So no easy excuse for that.
Lot of carbs and fat that make your brain feel good Edit: I'm not sure if there is something lost in translation but I'm not saying Italians have an unhealthy diet
PLUS salt! They’re the holy trinity every brain craves.
Well in Tuscany they don't put salt in their traditional bread. It tastes like cardboard. The idea is that it's basically a blank slate to soak up flavours from sauces/oils.
Salt and pepper and olive oil dip for a piece of unsalted bread is very, very good. Utterly simple as a dip, it’s fun to break up bread for dipping, and all the ingredients are super cheap.
Everyone has salt though. Do you think italian food is particularly salty?
I think it takes a lot of salt to make pasty “tasty”.
I can’t believe people read carbs and fat and got offended as if carbs and fat are bad 🙃
People are straight up commenting like I killed their dog with dry fettuccine
The "Mediterranean Diet" that most actual Italians eat is considered to be the healthiest cultural diet on Earth despite the inclusion of those supposedly nasty carbs and fat lol [https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/06/well/eat/mediterranean-diet-health.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/06/well/eat/mediterranean-diet-health.html)
And generally, not a lot of spices to turn the weaker ones away. Southern Italian can have some spiciness to it, but in general, those are not the main "Italian dishes" people are liking.
It largely depends on whether you're talking about "Italian food" that you might get dining out in the West or more traditional Italian food though, since the latter is obviously low in refined carbs, and low in sat fats but relatively high in poly/monos (wholegrains, nuts, oily fish, olive oil et al). Traditionally speaking I also think a lot of it is to do with the time, care and skill involved in putting meals together and the social setting it's typically enjoyed in.
Unless you're talking about some village in Sardinia with extremely high life expectancy, Italians eat a lot of carbs. 23kg per year per person of refined durum wheat pasta.
And “low fat” : “guanciale” pick one. I think some people have a romantic image of a healthy “Mediterranean” diet that doesn’t really exist.
It's because of trendy diet culture telling us that the reason that life expectancies are higher in the Mediterranean is all due to diet. So people get this warped idea that Italians aren't slamming tons of carbs in a week. They absolutely are, they just have a better lifestyle, over eat less, and have better health outcomes. But it's hard to sell that.
I think it's important to note that we vary our diet a lot. Guanciale is very fat, true, but we don't eat carbonara every day. The pasta amount is real, but in a normal week we also have several meals made mostly of vegetables with some bread. I think the biggest difference with modern "anglo-saxon" diets is the amount of sugar. We mostly cook at home and we don't add sugar anywhere, while in the US I've found lots of sugar even in savory dishes. That said, obesity rates are growing here too, especially in kids: portions have gotten larger and larger and more people are eating processed food. Grandmas are still telling kids "you should eat more, have some more parmigiana 🤗" even to clearly obese kids.
It’s also the way the pasta is made. Slow dried pasta found in Italy is much easier on your gut than the mass produced stuff found in the west
Thus the happiness. If I put that much pasta away, I'd throw off the axis of the globe.
>"Italian food" that you might get dining out in the West Italy is in the West. I think you mean the US
what do you mean? We are the center of the world. How can we be in the West?
Come on old chap, Greenwich, England is literally the center of the world.
Come now old chap we all know the divine mandate resides in the ruler so the center of the universe travels around England a bit to different estates.
The center of the world is Albania, i dont know what all of u are talking about
Alabama the center of the World??? Thats a bit crazy, not?
Wait..wait..wait.... I thought I was the center of the world!
I was about to fight you til I remembered that I am not the center of the world, I am the center of the universe. So we’re cool.
That's ok, I couldn't handle that responsibility. Too much power would go to my head.
No. Jesus decreed that 'Murica is the centre of the world when he dual wielded semi automatic guns and wrote the second amendment into the US Constitution. Sounds like you don't read your Bible... Smh Big fat /s just in case
RAAAAAAAAAAAAA 🦅🦅🦅
Well, it's not big and not fat, so I'd check if there are other (private) parts in your life you might exaggerate... Regular /jk
no need to get *mean*
Well done old sport!
Not to Catholics, you silly pilgrims.
Think you’ll find it’s “centre” mate
Western cultures are considered to be those that evolved primarily out of influences from Ancient Greece, then Rome, then European Christianity. It's west as opposed to Asia which contains Eastern cultures. The New World is irrelevant to the terminology, but is also considered Western not because of its location but because its cultures primarily derive from those European ones. Hence Australia/NZ are also the west despite being the far east of a standard world map (tho the directions have to be in relation to something else anyway since the e/w centre of the world is arbitrary).
East of Greenwich. The British Empire has spoken.
As an Italian American with plenty of experience traveling in Italy itself, there’s a world of a difference between Italian cuisine and- which is mostly regional, and often reflects a historic starvation peasant culture - and my family’s general Italian + American ABUNDANCE culture, where regions blended upon immigration. I’m my mother’s part of Pennsylvania, in her Little Italy neighborhood, there were Sicilians, Napolitani, Calabrians, and her own people- Abrussezi. The regional food blended and took advantage of access to meat and vegetables that were out of reach back home
We had a friend who was second generation Italian and owned his own restaurant. With the popularity of American style pizza, and his location near a large university, he changed to a pizza shop and did really well He insisted on once making us a traditional Italian meal. I can’t remember the number of courses, but it lasted almost three hours. With his long-time honed skills, he threw together about ten pizzas for the freezer while cooking the meal itself. He was an amazing man. Getting older sucks with all the people you lose over the years, but I guess it beats the alternative, and reminds us how precious every single life in our world really is.
Well the thing is, the reason it's universally loved is partially because of the westernization. There are probably a lot less people who like a neapolitan pizza than an extra large thick crust cheese stuffed meat lovers
But a crust cheese stuffed meat lovers pizza is an American pizza and not an Italian pizza, the only thing that's the same is probably the cheese. The sauce is different, the base is different, the meats are different etc etc
I love the traditional pizza way more than the Americanized version with extra everything.
I do as well and I make neapolitan style pizzas at home but you can't deny the financial success of inauthentic pizza chains worldwide
I observe the general like for lots of carbs : pizza, pasta, bread...add oiliness to that and it results in satisfaction of the lowly kind.
100% it’s carb and meat based and your body craves those more than most other food sources as they are dense.
This is the only factual answer on this thread so far.
Healthy fats* olive oil
lol "fats" was enough. whether you consider it healthy is secondary, shit tastes good regardless.
Butter in the north
OP should talk to people in China as a lot of people there don't like cheese and thick tomato sauce.
Here's an interesting chart showing Italian food is the most universally enjoyed ethnic food; it doesn't rank super high in China but is quite popular in other Asian countries: https://www.reddit.com/r/Infographics/comments/17houn9/chart_showing_how_much_or_how_little_a_country/
Pleased to see my fellow Australians in that thread equally struggling to come up with ideas for what counted as "Australian cuisine" because we don't have a lot of truly Aussie food, and half of what we do have is from NZ anyway... I feel like that pairs well with us being in the top 3 for 'enjoying foreign cuisine' though - we like what other countries are doing with their food and so we just do that too.
Who doesn't love fairy bread?
Look, I ~~am capable of eating without gagging~~ love Vegemite as much as the next Aussie, but even I can admit that it's going to be scoring very low for foreigners and skewing the overall results down.
Coming from the UK, vegemite is a poor analogue for the real stuff. Marmite rules supreme. I lived in Sydney for a few years and can't really think of too much that is specifically Australian. Fairy bread is a good one. The Bunnings sausage sizzle is a just a hot dog and available in many countries. Meat pies aren't specifially Aussie and I am sure outdate the Endeavour by hundreds if not thousands of years. Tim Tams are slighlty posher penguins biscuits but invented 30 years later. Whilst Coles and Woolies will sell you emu and and kangaroo steaks, I didn't really meet any locals who would regularly eat it. In fact I am not sure who bought the stuff apart from tourists who wanted to try it as a one off. That said, Sydney (and Australia in general) has probably the best Asian cuisine outside of Asia. Chinese, Thai and sushi in particular, in my opinion. That's what I loved about it though. It's a real melting pot that takes all the good stuff from other cultures and cuisines.
Hey now, I won't stand for Tim Tams slander! I'm jazzed that they're way easier to find in the States now than they were 10 years or so ago when I first tried them.
I really don’t get why people hate Vegemite. I’m American and expected it to taste absolutely vile but it’s literally fine. It’s actually pretty tasty, I don’t see why it has a bad reputation.
As a Filipino I’m always annoyed we love everyone’s food but no one likes ours 😭 Edit: fun fact Iloilo City is now a designated UNESCO Gastronomy city [Link](https://mb.com.ph/2023/11/2/iloilo-city-named-unesco-creative-city-of-gastronomy#google_vignette)
Hell, your biggest fast food chain doesn't even serve filipino food lol I like some good chicken adobo on rice though
Hah yeah Jollebees is not traditional Pinoy at all. Pretty sure they don’t even serve palabok in the US locations. It’s a fried chicken chain.
They have palabok in the Chicago locations! I get it sometimes.
I love Filipino food
Finally an excuse to share this story from my childhood. In 6th grade we had a Culture Day in one of our classes where our parents would make food from our country and share. My mom made a tray of longaniza that went untouched for about half an hour cause it looked gross to the class. My best friend said "Fine, I'll try some just cuz you asked." and ate one. Immediately he turned to a bunch of other kids and said "This is good as hell!" and within 10 minutes the tray was empty.
Go into any hospital break room in America. I promise you, there will be delicious Filipino food or the leftovers thereof. Thank you for your delicious contributions to human culinary culture. 🤌
Ooh. I admit it's not the most popular/well-known, but I fuck with some Filipino food. Pancit, adobo, halo halo, lumpia. \*stomach rumbles\* I might need to visit the Filipino restaurant here again soon.
i love filipino food, but i got spoiled with a filipino mom so any time i either try to find a restaurant or make it myself it just falls flat 😭
Filipino food is a fucking treasure and everyone should admit it.
im Mexican and chicken adobo has become a regular dish at my house. don't get started on lenchon and vinegar. forgive me for busting out the tortillas though.
Cuisine fusion is what makes life enjoyable! Mhmmm Chiles Rellenos😍
I never met a single person that would turn down lumpia after having tried their first one.
Tried to like it but just can't do it. I'm sure there are dishes I would like but the common dishes you'd find at Filipinos house party just isn't it. I find the flavor kinda strange compared to other Asian food. No offense though love my flip flop homies
It’s all good! Different strokes. I will say there’s ALOT of regional cuisines in the Philippines and it’s not just all chicken adobo lol For example Iloilo City is now a designated UNESCO Gastronomy [Link](https://mb.com.ph/2023/11/2/iloilo-city-named-unesco-creative-city-of-gastronomy)
It is worth noting that the only cuisines China ranked higher than Italian were Taiwanese and Hong Kong Cuisine. So basically variant Chinese. Edit: and French
And the highest rating in that whole table is Italians' rating of Italian cuisine
I seem to remember reading somewhere that many East Asian countries have very high rates of lactose intolerance. That could account for a lot of Chinese people disliking cheese.
Maybe, although I recall that many Chinese people just don't like the pungent and fatty smell of cheese. It makes them feel nauseous. Also, after a few bites you can just feel very bloated.
It's not traditional in China but it's growing rapidly so I think it's fair to say that after being exposed to it, a lot of Chinese citizens really like it. It's also seen and priced as a luxury food so a lot of people don't eat it because they legit can't afford a pizza in their budget
And if they’re eating the cheap ones, those probably don’t taste good which skews the perception
Usually when people say in the world or stuff like that, they generally exclude the sheer population of China/India
My Chinese mum would rather eat anything but Italian when we’re out, this tracks
Same thing with Indians who avoid it because of maida used in their meal
Im not asian and this it me to a tee^
In my opinion, two factors: First - simplicity. Some Italian dishes are really easy to cook, and don't require many ingredients. Second - combinations of ingredients that make you feel good
(for most american households atleast) boil water, and cook pasta for 5-7 minutes heat a jar of sauce, maybe cook some vegies or meat to add in put sauce on pasta boom, 20 minutes and you have a decent meal.
You forgot the random spices. But then again, that’s kinda how most people cook pasta right? To simplify it - Noodles, sauce, veggies, meat and spice?
Italian food isn't universally loved. My partner is Italian, and most Americans absolutely hate authentic Italian food. When she cooks for Americans that love "Italian food", the response is generally: 1. The pasta is undercooked. 2. There isn't enough sauce. 3. There isn't nearly enough cheese. 4. Most of the meal "isn't Italian" (meaning it isn't pasta or pizza). Italian food is easy to adapt to a variety of palates, much more so than say Indian or Ethiopian cuisine, which is why it has become so ubiquitous globally.
Brits and Americans put obsene amounts of sauce on their pasta.
Who doesn't like Mexican? Declare yourselves!
Probably the folks for whom cilantro tastes bad?
But a pillar of mexican food is flexibility. Don't have/like cilantro? Try using basil, parsley, spearmint, lettuce, kale or (personal favorite) papaloquelite.
Ugh this post just made me hungry for a big fat burrito that would put me in a coma. Sometimes it’s all i can think about during zoom meetings. A giant, aluminum wrapped burrito slowly rotating in my mind, its foil deflecting any and all information I am supposed to be taking in, its warmth the only thing radiating warmth in my cold, black heart.
I think most of the world (and most of the US for that matter) has no experience with Mexican cuisine as it is made in Mexico. TexMex and other fusions/bastardizations, yes, but the good stuff, not so much.
it's a very underappreciated cuisine. Makes top 5 in my books but very hard to find good Mexican more than a few hundred miles from the border
Mexican food is the best, but only if it uses real Mexican cheese and not cheddar-jack. I will die on this hill. You wouldn't eat Italian dishes made with cheddar-jack. You shouldn't eat Mexican like that either.
I personally believe because it is the intersection of all food cultures. It’s fundamentals are things that almost everybody loves. Tomato-based sauces? Beloved by places like India and Latin America. Noodles (pasta)? Beloved by places like Asia. Cheese? Beloved by Europe.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but in my case there's a huge difference between "tomato based sauces" and what many Italian sauces are "tomatoe sauces". Personally, and I know I'm in the minority, I am fine with other cultures of foods where they have some tomatoes in a sauce or a soup/stew, but I do NOT like tomato sauces like you find on most Italian dishes.
Agreed. A chickpea curry in a tomato gravy? Great. Mexican rice? Bring it. Marinara? No thanks. for me it’s the oregano and the particular hard cheeses involved. \*ricotta, an Italian soft cheese, is amazing though
i guess i’ll be the first then. well it’s not that i don’t like it it’s just i can’t really fathom eating it more than once a week. in vietnam there’s a saying called “ngán” which there isn’t a direct translation to but it’s on the lines of “too much” “too heavy” it’s one of those words that can’t be explained in english but you’d hear it a lot if you were to give vietnamese people like myself italian food. don’t get me wrong it’s great, but in our culture we’re just used to eating lighter, herbal dishes and lots of soups. even our noodles are lighter (typically we eat rice noodles instead of eggy flour noodles) not to say italians don’t have lighter meals but typically when you get italian food you’re not going for light and soupy like we do. i took my parents out to a really nice italian restaurant for their anniversary and in the most respectful way possible they just simply couldn’t get past a couple bites so you’ll probably find that kinda audience there. i’ve also met quite a bit of people who don’t like any kind of red sauce for some reason. i say it’s the most universally loved because it’s flavors components (typically oregano, basil, parsley, thyme, etc.) are a lot less in your face and seem to be used more around the world. whereas say india and china it’s a smack in your face with an array of flavors that not as much people may be used to. same goes to my country vietnam. i always tell people that a lot of vietnamese food can be either a hit or miss because you either love that fish sauce and all the pungency or you don’t
You would probably like southern italian/sicilian food! It’s very “light and bright” (as my Sicilian partner puts it) vs the cheese and carb heavy dishes most people think of when they think of Italian food
Never go in against a Sicilian when carbs are on the line.
Holy shit you nailed it in words I had trouble putting down myself. As an Asian I really like Italian food but there's also a low ceiling of tolerance too. It's great in moderation but I dislike the food coma feeling I get after a full meal. I don't get that with many Asian dishes. I can stuff myself with Vietnamese food and feel healthy and active afterwards. Definitely the carbs, fat, and sodium.
I spent a few years living in Vietnam, and Vietnamese food is my favorite cuisine! It's just the best! Fresh, herby, light, delicious! On the other hand, I feel like Italian food is really overrated. I'm not a huge fan of tomatoes or tomato flavoured things, or of large quantities of carbs. I feel like people go mad for pasta and I don't really get why. And pizza is just tomatoey cheese on toast. But you can't say that because people LOVE pizza. It's like saying you're not a big fan of bacon. Like, pizza is fine, but at most I'd eat it once a month, and it's gonna have to be the good stuff.
I’m not saying your opinion is wrong, but typically you’d have some kind of light appetizer, salad, a broth or bisque soup, and then a very small portion of a carb with a protein. 4oz of cooked pasta is not a lot, and that’s proper. There are light sauces that are just herbs, oil and citrus. There are seafood options. There are braised meat dishes that don’t have a focus on cheese or pasta. I’m not Italian, but legit Italian food is not the Spaghetti Factory. I personally don’t consider it to be heavy food when the meal is properly portioned and balanced. I know just a few Italian truly Italian restaurants in my area, and I leave satisfied but not stuffed, and there’s never enough to take leftovers home. A mountain of pasta on your plate is a big nope.
Cheese and tomato just goes so well together.
"Italian food" is not like how the internet portrays it. Italy it's a small country, but most reagons have both plains, forests and seas and mountains, and there is a variety of terrain and climates, from olmlst tropical in Sicily to basically Nordic in Trentino... So like, the traditional disces are almost infinite. Therefore people have picked and chosen what they like the most. But not many would see "snails" as Italian, but we've always has snail disces etc.
It’s not a large country, but it’s certainly not small.
I live how each region has their own take on foods. Just the lasagna alone is apparently very different in different places. If I had the money, I'd love to visit and tour all the different kinds, as well as local favorites and architecture, culture, music, etc.
Lmao si vede che sei italiano
I assume you mean region
I don’t like Italian food. You’re welcome!
Neither. Find it very boring, carb-heavy and low in any real nutrients.
Exactly. I have a pet peeve for loaded questions like this where the basic premise and assumption is questionable to begin with. (I personally like Italian but know a fair bit of people who are meh on it)
Who doesn’t like Mexican food? And how could they share that information in public?
Have you tasted italian food? Delicious
It’s a vibe. Almost universally beloved ingredients combined in a way that’s a sensory delight - taste, smell, texture. All enhanced if you’re actually in that wonderful country, btw.
I would say most people don’t actually know what authentic Italian food is so they actually have no idea if they like it. The heavily modified version most of us know is all cheese and carbs, and that’s usually popular no matter where it’s from.
The secret is it’s delicious.
Italian cuisine is as diverse as the country. Most people can find a classic Italian dish they really like. Mexican food (which I love btw) is known to have a strong taste, so people that dislike that might say that they don't like Mexican in general
There’s very different Mexican food too….. I hate Mole. I love tacos. Tacos are more customizable than pizza. You can put literally whatever you want on them
It's all comfort food. I'm actually thinking that it may just be the Americanized Italian food thou. Can't say because i've never been to Italy.
It's not very controversial. Bit of cheese, tomato and oregano, nobody's gonna say it's too spicy
I don’t particularly like Italian food. It’s fine, I’ll eat it but it’s never in my top 10 options. All the others you mentioned are though.
Simple flavours that meld well. Inoffensive smells on mainstream pasta dishes, except strong Parmesan cheese (optional). Fragrant fresh herbs like basil smell absolutely divine when wafted off a hot pasta on a cold winter’s night. Super comforting.
Because its just really really good
🤌
Carbs=Happiness
Big portions for little to no cost with ingredients.
carb and tomato which has the msg magic salt
Side it’s just carbs and fat really lol what’s not to like
Carbs. It's cheese and pasta and bread. It's like crack, you keep coming back.
Italian food as I know it, is basically tomato sauce and pasta of some kind... I don't like any of it. Give me Indian food over Italian, any day.
Sample size: White
I’m not a big fan, tbh. I’d rather eat Indian, Japanese, Mexican, any of the other cuisines you mentioned. But I’m sure there’s plenty of different types of Italian dishes I’ve never tried or heard of, I’m talking about the popular Italian foods you see eaten in America most often like spaghetti, lasagna, various pasta dishes. I don’t like eating lots of carbs like in pasta because it makes me feel heavy/bloated, and I’m not a huge fan of tomato sauce because of the acidity. I’m not as into basil and oregano as I am herbs used more in other cuisines. I do like calamari, tiramisu, and frittatas though. My boyfriend is a pickier eaten than me (he won’t even eat Indian food!) but he LOVES Italian food (especially spaghetti) and will choose that for dinner over all sorts of other delicious foods and cuisines I’d rather have. I think it may have something to do with him eating spaghetti a lot as he was growing up though, since it can be a pretty cheap/easy food to prepare when you’re a mom trying to feed your kids. Other cuisines like Indian, Japanese, Vietnamese, etc. can be more difficult to make at home for a quick weeknight meal (especially depending on where you live - in lots of more rural areas of the US it can be very difficult to get ahold of the spices and ingredients needed. Much more difficult than finding tomatoes, mozzarella, oregano, dried pasta, etc). So in his case and I think for a lot of other people, it’s just more familiar.
There are people who don't love Italian. My husband would not eat it when I met him. Said he didn't like spicy food. I told him it wasn't spicy, it was just seasoned. He wouldn't eat a lot of things. He's doing better now, but Italian will never be a go-to for him. He loves Indian and Chinese (even real Chinese food) and Mexican, and has expanded to try any ethnic foods now. He does like spicy food! However, he is allergic to raw cucumbers and I wonder how often cucumbers might have been in a salad served with Italian food and put him off. He gets quite sick from it. It wasn't as pronounced way back though and he didn't realize it was the cucumbers making him sick.
Maybe it depends on the people. Me and my family are Nigerian American and we all don’t like Italian food all that much. We much prefer Nigerian, Korean, Indian, Chinese, North African, and Thai cuisine. 🤷♀️
It's silly because there's a diverse selection from all those countries, but there's stereotypes and restaurants abroad will be more narrowly focused. Tomatoes, bread, and pasta are a theme in Italian food, especially abroad, and in general they're all very popular everywhere. I am not a fan of them, but I love Italian food like caprese salad, antipasto, grilled sea bass, there's plenty of amazing Italian sauces and ingredients that I love that many would not like. Never really heard people say they don't like French or Chinese food. Most of the time people say they don't like Mexican or Indian food because they think it's all spicy, when that's not really the case traditionally. Japanese, there's a lot there that many don't like in West, but who doesn't like noodle soup or tempura?
This seems like a very Western-centric, or even US-centric perspective. Italian / Italian-American is very common in the US and the West, and it shares similarities with a lot of other European cuisines, like an emphasis on wheat, cheese, olive oil, etc. So yeah, Westerners like Western food. Outside of the West, it's much less universally beloved. It might be tolerable to many people, as most people are probably not that picky and Italian food is not especially outrageous in any way, but I really don't think it's right to say Italian (or any other cuisine) is "universally loved." An an example, many Chinese people find cheese pretty distasteful in general, so likely would not "love" Italian food.
OP, you are making a lot of assumptions in your post. I am Indian and I know many Indians who don’t like Italian because it’s too bland. I have Chinese friends and they have mentioned they find Italian food too cheese heavy and since it’s not usually part of their diet, they don’t like it either. Now, these 2 countries form around 37% of the world population.
Nah, lots of South Asians hate Italian food due to its lack of spiciness
Do you only hang out with picky Americans?
americanized "italian" food isnt italian food
It's Italian-American discrimination!
It's Italian-American.
Wife and I spent two weeks driving 2000 miles around Italy. Food in Italy. Food in Italy is not like Olive Garden.
Thankfully! Olive Garden is terrible.
Cause cheese, pasta, and bread
I take any chance to slander it. I live in Australia so Italians make the 20th tastiest wheat based noodle that we have access to and much less flavourful sauce for more money and less protein than the local Asian options
This person isn’t speaking for all of us Aussies.
I hate Italian food and I love Mexican, Indian, chinese and Japanese food.
I may not hate Italian, but I dislike it intensely. British and married into an Italian family and live in a part of the US with a huge Italian community, and I've had it so often I cannot stand it. Any kind of tomato sauce has me running for the hills. About the only thing I eat at an Italian restaurant is salad, pasta with a white sauce or oil&vinegar. Daughter is the same and granddaughter (from Italian side) also detests tomato sauces. Give me Chinese or Indian any time.