SC - Getting people to eat period food

[david friedman]

Siegried writes, in a thread on "getting people to eat period food:"

>     I can always cook for my local group and households. Fewer people,
>better budget, a WHOLE lot more flexibility regarding dishes (I can actually
>do a REAL Frutti di Mar antipasto without making people yak when they find
>out there's squid, octopus, and conch in it). I might actually get some time
>to go do the things I never get to do, what with always being in the
>kitchen. Gee, wonder what shopping's like these days . . .
>     But I will certainly not bust my butt for people who have such a low
>opinion of my chosen field of endeavor. Besides, it would be much too
>discouraging to serve Bistec Ajado to someone who couldn't tell it from beef
>jerky.

And then, in response to a query for recipes, responds, in effect, 
that both Frutti di Mar are modern ethnic dishes, for neither of 
which he has a period recipe.

This seems to be getting us back to the confusion between "period 
food" and "odd and exotic stuff that lots of people don't like." 
Except that this time it is the person arguing for "period food" who 
really means "people should be willing to try stuff they find exotic."

As it happens, I agree that people should be willing to try stuff 
they find exotic. But the fact that something is exotic and ethnic 
doesn't make it period, any more than the fact that something is 
period means it is exotic.

David/Cariadoc
http://www.best.com/~ddfr/