A Tasty Melting Pot
Latin American food, particularly Mexican dishes like tacos and enchiladas, has made even greater inroads into the American diet through chains like Taco Bell. But Mexican cuisine doesn't have the same allure as Asian. "Latino food is tainted as low class," says Krishnendu Ray, professor of liberal arts at the Culinary Institute of America and author of The Migrant ' s Table: Meals and Memories in Bengali-American Households . He believes the socioeconomic background of immigrants from a particular country plays a role in the eagerness with which America embraces their foods. For example, even though the number of immigrants from India has been small relative to other groups, their cuisine is widely available and admired. That's no surprise, says Ray, since nearly 60 percent of Indian immigrants are professionals.
As more Americans travel overseas, people are no longer satisfied with an Americanized version of immigrant food. "We fall in love with Thai food, then we want to come home and re-create it," says Karen Page, the author, with husband Andrew Dornenburg, of The New American Chef , a tour of global techniques and ingredients. At the same time, modern transport and technology make for easy export of native ingredients. "Now, what you get in a Korean restaurant in New York and Los Angeles is very close to what you get in Seoul," says David Rosengarten, author of It ' s All American Food .
Of course, certain "authentic" foods have a hard time finding a fan base, even among immigrants. Yimeem Vu, the 25-year-old Hmong coordinator for the Minnesota Food Association, was born in Minnesota after his parents came from Laos in 1978. The family eats traditional Hmong foods at home, and after a chicken dinner, the final treat is to boil the feet and eat them. "It's like chewing on leather," Vu says. "I like chicken breasts and thighs myself."
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