Keep
or Give Up Our Original Dietary Habits
Diet is an indispensable aspect for
peoples’ life. The different countries have totally different dietary habits,
although the immigrants and the international students always want to keep
their hometown dietary habits. For this phenomenon, it is a fact that the
people who are from different countries have different food culture backgrounds.
China has an old saying: Food is the paramount necessity of the people. However,
I believe Americans’ point of view is always different. It seems to me that most
of them think the dietary is not as important as Chines opinions.
For example, I am from Beijing; also I
went to America to study and live last fall. BaoDu is Beijing’s special dish;
why Beijing citizens and I like BaoDu very much is because of the long tradition.
It represents kind of cultural connotation of Beijing. Although lots of people
who are from other places in China think they cannot accept BaoDu anymore
because they think that is not tasty and it is disgusting, it still is my
favorite food since it has become a habit for me. Unfortunately, it is very
hard to find my favorite food in America; maybe because not only BaoDu, also
lots of Chinese food is too difficult to make. Also, the food culture is not
the most important thing in American eyes. Some of them believe is not worth it
to waste a long time in cooking. For this phenomenon, as all immigrants from
different countries will be affected and changed by the new cultures in
variable ways. As for me, I’ll have to get used to the American way
of life.
Sometimes although I did find a Chinese
restaurant in America, but it is not the authentic taste of Chines food and the
flavor is totally different from my hometown, and we call that “mixed food”. The
Chinese-American restaurants cook the food using different ingredients from
China. They also combine the different food culture background in different way.
But we have to admit as an immigrant or international student, as time goes on,
we will get used to eating the mixed food unknowingly.
The last time I went to the Korean BBQ
restaurant with my friends, I found some new things there. After ate here I
observed and wrote down a food observation. I found the Korean BBQ restaurant
not only has Korean food, there are also lots of countries representative food
– Chinese food, Asian food and some other countries food. For example, there
are lots of different type snacks; the most
attractive one is the chocolate fountain at the central of the after-dinner
section. It is a huge stand of sweets and a four-tier fountain of melted
chocolate where you could dip your marshmallows and sweets into it and get it
coated with chocolate. This snack is from Switzerland. Moreover, I saw there
are lots of different type soups: such as Korea soya bean soup, Japanese miso
soup and Chinese vinegar-pepper soup. Actually, because I am from China, and I
know what the traditional Chinese food looks like and what it tastes like. But
all of Chinese food in there is not very authentic. But we should be satisfied
because they already tried their best to cook every country’s food.
On the other hand, I
also found not all customers were Koreans; there were a lot of Americans and
Chinese. Most food in the Korean BBQ restaurant is not from America, but because
that restaurant was built in America, there are lots of American customers who
come there to eat. Besides, I would like to analyze the reason why there are
lots of Chinese. The United States has many Chinese immigrants; secondly, the
food culture of China has a long history, and it effects the whole world profoundly,
especially Asia.
Analyzing why there are lots of different
Asians attracted to the Korean BBQ restaurant, I believe it is not just
depending on where the food is from or that America is an immigrant country.
When I think about this phenomenon in a deep way, I found there is an intimate
relationship with the way of cooking. Such as the Chinese food in Korean BBQ, actually this kind of American-Chinese food we call them
“Mixed food”. Mixed different country food culture and using different
country’s ingredients to cook it. It seems like the Korean BBQ
restaurant built in America, although they want to keep their food originally, keep
cooking the traditional food and using the same cooking ways. Actually they
cannot make the traditional food in America. Firstly, they should mix with some
American elements and try to make the taste more suitable with the America
people’s dietary habits in order to attract more and more customers. So, even
though the dishes are still Chinese food, but the style was changed a lot. For
example, you can see they use lots of butter made in America on the food, fry
some kinds of Chinese food longer because most American customers like the food
which has high fat and high calories very much. Secondly, all of food
ingredients are using the American ingredients, so both the appearance and the
taste are totally different with their hometown food. Thirdly, there are lots
of Chinese restaurants changed to fast food style in America in order to suit
the American dietary habit. I think the Panda Express restaurant is a good
example to explain and emphasize this phenomenon. According to Jerry Hirsch in
the Los Angeles Times, “Their 1,100 Panda Express restaurants dominate Chinese
fast food and are ubiquitous residents of shopping-mall food courts, airports
and sports stadiums across America. As it celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, Panda
Express has proved itself to be an effective competitor against larger
corporate fast-food chains such as McDonald’s, KFC and Taco Bell, and thousands
of independent rivals.” So we can see the Panda Express has already become a
popular trendy in America. Actually most Chinese food restaurants in China are
not fast food because Chinese believe food is the most important part in their
life, Also, Chinese think spend a long time on diet and cooking is valuable. We
can see the Panda Express still cooking the Chinese food, but the food style is
fast food, maybe is because lots of Americans would like to take the food away rather
than eat it there. They think the diet is not as important as Chinese says. As
a result, the Panda Express was begun to change in order to suitable with
American dietary habits. Based on the above three points, fusing the American
food style with the other country’s food is an indispensable part since
traditional food have become the mixed food in America.
Back to our
topic, as an international student, we cannot change this phenomenon even
though we were very disappointed when traditional food became the mixed food
and mixed food became Americans tendency in United States. Meanwhile, we will
accept this kind of food and try to change ourselves dietary habits unknowable because
any country’s culture is irresistible. As
the author Roy Ahn said in article Home
Run: My Journey Back to Korean Food. “When I went out, I ate all the things
my friend did- pizza, hot dogs, enchiladas, and fries with greasy chili that
turned the paper wrapper orange. It’s worth nothing that two Korean-American
boys were among my circle, but we rarely went out for food from the homeland.
Whatever the reason, they were much more comfortable than I was with being
Korean-American (13)”. From this quote, we can see the author is a
Korean-American. In his article, he suggests that the American cooking and diet
culture for an immigrant is irresistible although he always tried to keep his
old eating habits. I believe, as time goes on, not only a Korean immigrant will
be effected by the food culture of the States, but also all immigrants from
different countries will be effected and changed by the new cultures in
variable ways. Maybe the different between author and I is our identity. The
author is an immigrant status, so he is living in America since he was young,
but I just stayed in America for a year as international student. Although the
Chinese and Beijing’s dishes for me still are my favorite, such as BaoDu, the
America food for me also is fresh rather than boring or disgusting because I
just living in America one year. But actually we are also very similar at some
points. I admit maybe I will change my eating habits and try to like the mixed
food in the future as the author too, because the influence of cultural
background is irresistible.
In conclusion, I am trying to adapt to
the American-Chinese mixed food in America, whatever in food style or appearance
and the taste. I think maybe I can keep my own food habits in the future, because
I lived in China already 20 years but living in America just one year. The
Chinese food effects my dietary habits deeply. On the other hand, I will go
back to China during in summer and winter break every year so that I can eat
Chinese food. Although I want to keep my own Chinese dietary habits, I still
have to admit it is possible that the American-Chinese mixed food will change
my dietary habits in the future. As I said, it is too hard to keep my original
habits because cooking and diet culture for an immigrant or international
student is irresistible.
Work Cited
Ahn,
Roy. Home Run: My Journey Back to Korean Food. Gastronomica: The Journal
of Food and Culture,
Vol. 9, No. 4 (Fall 2009), pp. 12-15.
April
29, 2012.
Jerry
Hirsch. Want rice with that? August 13, 2008, Times Staff Writer.
April
29, 2012.
QG50K0A%5DGM.jpg)
5)0R5UR%5BNMEH%5B)O2%5BYBK@G.jpg)
TB@J.jpg)
4BF@%7D%5DIY9)AA885%60%5D)VU4F.jpg)
