What does it take to become a 'World Cuisine'?

Cav darlin'... I know several members of past Canada culinary olympic teams. Most of these fella's were/are from the west and most of them indepedantly formed their own idea of what Canadian cusine is. I know many chef's out here who exclusively use "canadian, or western - prairie/coastal' ingredients. I know that all youse who live in TO think it's the centre of the universe but you should take a tour of the west and see what we can do with food. Canada is far to large to put 'inventing' on one persons shoulders.
How that for a debate.....

Ceili, my dear, most of my family is from out West, and I understand the conundrum in defining a 'Canadian' cuisine, given the breadth and diversity in this great country of ours. Believe me...I feel the necessity myself to personally define my own version of 'Canadian' cuisine. The closest I have come is 'local and seasonal', which still does not make a 'world cuisine'. Ooh...bad Gastronomy class flashbacks....

I come from good prairie stock. Heh heh...stock....nice food pun.

I agree, to most people - at least Mericans, there idea of Canadian cusine is Back bacon. I think it'll be a long time coming before we are known on the world stage as anything else but maple sugar, bacon and maybe fiddleheads.

Don't forget poutine and tourtiere.

It's hard for me to debate with you since I generally agree, at least re US cooking.

Eating out got very interesting in the late seventies and eighties in Los Angeles, not only for Mr. Puck (I remember his wife did interior design, at least on his places), but for some fusing of cuisines going on. Thus the short lived Ishi's, with Japanese (French?) and Sing Sing (which I think no one but my then husband and I heard of or liked) which did Vietnamese-French, and some primarily French oriented chefs who played around with new ways...Ken Frank comes to mind.

That was probably part of a popularization of two ways of cooking - what became known as fusion, and a general lightening up and spirit of adventure in many cuisines. But a lot of that lightening up started in France, didn't it? Wasn't Bocuse rather modernizing, or am I remembering wrong?

I don't think the US had much of a decent history of high cuisine of its own until some of the chefs of the last few decades have seriously sought out good local ingredients (sometimes actually getting such items to develop) and revivified some traditional dishes.

When I was a child, the fancy restaurants served "continental" cuisine, such as it was.

I don't mean to say that there haven't been good local US dishes that are highly regarded, loved. But I don't think they add up to world cuisine.

It could be fair to say though that the US as melting, or boiling, pot has been a primary place for fusion of elements of world cuisines... as the major cities have populations from so many disparate lands.

osso, Dracula was indeed an interior designer. Paul Bocuse was indeed a three star Michelin chef, famous for his roasted Bresse chicken, and for shameless self-promotion. Now, let's look at Fernand Point:

http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/6454/point.html

Bocuse's master, I say, and the inventor of true 'fusion' cuisine. A blast from the past with a whiff of the future. (Hope the link works)

I like Bocuse's escallopped potatoes..

will check your F. Point link, I have heard of him but don't know anything past that.


Ahhh, nice link. I do believe I have read of him, perhaps seen pictures of the restaurant. Great list of quotes...

I had no idea that the US claimed to have a world cuisine.

What are examples of it? Roast turkey and hamburgers?

Well, it might recently consider itself (us) something of a food mecca, as there are many excellent chefs. I don't remember any claims to major cuisine-ness.

I think myself that is has a role as an associator for much regional cooking on the neighborhood level in big cities. You can actually taste the difference between foods from El Salvador and Peru and Oaxaca.... and perhaps modify your (one's) own cooking.

I think the US has a lot of diversity in its food, borrowing from other countries, I don't know about world cuisine though. *scratches head* There's apple pie and hot dogs...but aren't hot dogs German? If you head down south you have fried catfish and hushpuppies, grits, etc, I wouldn't really call that cuisine though *lol*...then you have Creole cooking, borrowed from the French of course...going west you have Tex-mex, which brings to mind chili, (I need to eat out more or read a few more cookbooks). I don't know what else you will find elsewhere as I'm only talking about the places I've lived. Ohhhh but personally, the BEST place to go for world cuisine would have to be Hawaii!! I was born and raised there till I was 16 and the diversity in food is astonishing!! Way back when Hawaii first started growing sugar cane and their main product, immigrants from all over came to Hawaii, everything from school lunches to restaurants were filled with Chinese food, Japanese, Korean, Hawaiian, Filipino, Portuguese, etc. OMG!! Id go back to Hawaii just for the food itself if I could afford it. But anyway I'm rambling...America with its own world cuisine...I can't think of a dish we have that doesnt have some aspect of it borrowed from another country, not even chili dogs!

Christina82, welcome, and thanks for reviving this thread! It's been so long...bunny, I am not saying that the US has claimed to have a world cuisine, I only stated that they are shameless promoters of what they have accomplished, food-wise (and in other areas that should be contained in other forums). Personally, I believe in 'regional' cuisine, rather than 'world' cuisine, as a guiding concept. The definition of world cuisine still stands, however. In some sense, it's not really about who introduced what ingredient where, but more a matter of how it was all integrated, within the criteria of the definition.

christina82 welcome. being born and having lived in hawaii (maui & oahu) most of my life, i agree with you regarding the many varied foods of hawaii.

the similar ethic foods on guam taste far different that the hawaii counterparts. i have not found any chinese or filipino restaurants on guam which compares to the ones in hawaii. the korean, vietnam and thai foods here though are on average better than hawaii.

here's something different

have any recipes for a contest like this cav?

dlowan, America boasts not only being "The World" , and fried macaroni and cheese on a stick is enough evidence.

yeh, who else but an American would have dreamed up the fried twinkie.

Whenever I think of Ozzmian foods , I think of grubs and lizards on a stick "Nah needs garlic"

If I absolutely had too, I'd come up with something.

Who else but a Scotsman would have dreamed up the fried Mars bar?