1) Food log: I don’t have many new thoughts about what I am buying and eating that is relevant to this course but I do have thoughts about what I don’t eat (at least not in the “garnished” way many food personalities on TV present it). I am talking about high-taste food or the “exquisite” and “elite” taste of the foodie, the people with of love, knowledge, and curiosity for food. This type of food is described as having “good taste”. Good taste is not necessarily gourmet as we once thought of it (the usually French, fancy expensive foods). Some of it is hand-crafted and has a reputation of authenticity and exoticism. Foodies like to new and adventurous exploration and, if I may, “taste-bud traveling” is the way of doing this. Foodies eat garnished or authentic Mexican, Creole, and other “exotic” plates. Okay by now you may have noticed the many words I put in quotations but exoticism is especially important because it suggests trying/sampling, being bold and direful, and excitement. And these notions imply that these foods are outside of the dominant culture and the very words “exotic” means foreign or not native and the food is othered. But exotic to the place it comes from is not so exotic, it’s naturally occurring and typically, just as hotdogs and hamburgers are American. The “exotic” cuisines in America may be exotic to the country of origin it is supposed to represent because it may be not authentic at all. “Chinese” food in America is stuffed with MSG and is far from real Chinese food. Okay, so maybe the foodie will not really eat from chain Chinese food places but what about garnished “Mexican” cuisine in America is not the real corn tortillas that can be eating daily without all the tummy aches from all the bad fats and additives.
I grew up in an area heavily populated with first language Spanish speakers so papa rellena made Colombian hands were not too exotic over time but it was foreign from what my Colombian best friend has tasted in Colombia (“the real deal”). My grandma puts turkey gizzards in her stuffing and oxtails in her greens and my aunt puts turkey butt in her string beans. These offal foods are not “exotic” to me. What is exotic is the Americanize cuisines that are supposed to duplicate “other” foods, not that the foods are foreign.
2) “Foolitcal” (Food-Political): Imagine an efficient food in these ways: 1) it is good for the environment because it as an alternative to “carbon-costly beef” (clearing forests for cattle pastures cause erosion and water pollution), 2) it is twice as efficient to turn foods like hay and compost scraps into meat than cows, and 3) one male and seven females can double in size in just months! This meat is about two pounds and about the size of a squirrel. It is cuy—also known as the guinea pig. This animal is more than bizarre, efficiency. In an NPR article, it is written, “At one company, in Connecticut, imports have nearly doubled since 2008 — from 600 guinea pigs per year then to more than 1,000 today.” Guinea pig is described as tender and juicy and hard to compare—not even to chicken. “La Mar Cebicheria’s Chef Oka says cuy is ‘very oily, like pork combined with rabbit.’” (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/03/12/174105739/from-pets-to-plates-why-more-people-are-eating-guinea-pigs).
Foods that are most commonly presented on TV shows and that seen as “bizarre” and “exotic” to the United States seem to be those common foods of other countries that are common because of its benefits (accessibility and availability, cheap but high, whole nutrition, etc). For instance, it’s just like the whole cicada season in the United States. The overpopulation of the annoying plant destroying bugs all of a sudden leads to publications of cicada recipes by popular press. All of a sudden, the United States becomes interested in nutritiously, juicy bugs. This is all proof that bizarre is not so bizarre (odd or freakishly weird) when its benefiting the environment, creating more meat for your plate, procreating more meat for your household, and all while being meaty, tender, juicy, and to the United States as compared to other countries, a novel taste.
Maybe What We Eat Shows Who We Are?: About Our Food 