SC - Greetings and Chicken

[LrdRas@aol.com]

Adamantius said...

>Traditions are worth noting, understanding, and respecting, even if we
don't share them. It was the tradition of the cooks who first created the
American version of chili, as opposed to various Mexican dishes containing
chilis, to make it a certain way. In the place where this dish was created,
it is still regarded as traditional to make it in the way I have described
elsewhere. That doesn't mean you can't do it differently. It doesn't mean
you can't make Hamburger Helper with red kidney beans, if you wish to, and
call it chili. What it does mean is that if you make chili in a heretical
fashion (I _am_ joking here, for all the strokes and ulcers this discussion
seems to have brought on) you will be regarded as a heretic by those people
to whom this tradition is important. That's all. Some people take this stuff
more seriously than others. Not being a part of the culture for whom this
tradition is important, I am neither able nor required to understand or
explain why they feel this way, I only report that some of them do, and
report it purely as a coincidence that the best chili I ever had was made
that way. I have had good chili made other ways, and have never complained
about or refused, or otherwise, to my knowledge, been rude about anybody's
attempts at chili con carne, but I still try to maintain a reverence for the
proto-dish.


Traditions are definately worth noting. That is a common bond (read:
interest) we all share here. Respecting those traditions is a given, but
there is something beyond the absolute that makes for some very dynamic
activity and discourse, be it regional, or otherwise. I would imagine this
is how foods evolve.

Chile has become a generic term. Everyone knows, understands and respects
that at one point there had to be a beginning. On a similar note, almost
everyone could say they have been involved, just in the most recent past,
with the evolution of many different "blueprints" for future foodstuffs. In
my general area Tourtiere has many variations, even so far a to say, from
Quebec township to township. I think the one I grew up with, and my Mother
grew ip with and her Mother...was the right one for us, but that doesn"t
bastardize nor degrade the significance of the original Toutiere and I
understand that ours may possibly bear no resemblance to the original. :)


>Alas, you have just spoken the death knell for the American Regional
cuisine. I was hoping it wouldn't come to this ;  ) . The cuisine of a
people (as I carefully walk around the famous words of Brillat--Savarin)
helps define their identity. Their culinary traditions are a part of who
they are, who they were, and who they are becoming. When someone else takes
those traditions and changes them, it is harmful not because the tradition
has been changed, but because the changes are often made in ignorance or
disregard of tradition, until the tradition itself becomes misrepresented,
and a little bit of that culture vanishes from the earth. When the last
person living who knows the truth dies, lies become
>true. I exaggerate, but only slightly.


I fail to understand how this is the fall of the orignal last word in
American Regional Cuisine, although I may be a little peevish on this
subject and just being bullheaded. It rings very comparable to a situation
we are experiencing here in Canada but on a lager scale. The Quebec (I live
on the border of Quebec in Ontario) Government and a somewhat largish
(although still a minority) faction of the populace of Quebec has been
agonizing for decades over the fact that their identity and culture are
being fragmentized and vanishing. They are constantly riding the federal
government for more and more and more. What is happening is that, even as
they are somewhat failing to preserve the "then", there are completely
missing the boat on the here and now. In a couple of hundred years they will
have nothing the ride the gov't about as there will be nothing left at all
to preserve including the "then". To a large extent THEY are the ones
responsible for the loss of their culture, as a larger and an increasingly
more hostile populace of the rest of Canada alot of us are of the mid that
idf you want to separate, theres the door, we'll see you soon when you come
back. Anyway, I suppose I shouldn't be discussing this in this venue...

I beleive that to a certain extent a "little bit of the culture" needs
vanish in order to make room for new facets of a culture. Perhaps I am
looking at too big a picture. Inevitably we are becoming a smaller planet,
no question, but, again, perhaps we need people like you to keep people like
me in perspective.

>The problem with everyone beiong right is that eventually everyone will be
the same.

And I see it as everyone will have the right to be different with a,
hopefully, growing trend to tolerance for those differences. For those of
you that may think that this may a little niave on my part....its more a
long-term, big picture thingy.

>Would they put the man's face on the flag of either of our nations, too?


The anthem thing kinda jerked me around, but as a fairly stereotypical
Canadian in the patriotism department, I just shrugged. :) I would, however,
be interested to know WHOSE idea it was.

>This was law in Bavaria, c. 1516, stating that beer _must_ consist of
malted barley, water, hops, and yeast, and nothing else. My reference to it
was in jest.

I thought it was something like that. Not a jest, but about beer.

Micaylah


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