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I would like to know what varied and ethnic cuisine a rural county in Idaho has to offer.
Depends what size of rural county and where in Idaho you're talking of--most of Idaho outside of Boise would be considered rural in much of the world. In the bigger towns of some rural counties you'll probably find restaurants(or varying degrees of authenticity and taste) serving Mexican, Chinese, Thai, Italian, and maybe Indian. In the rural farming towns you'll most likely find Mexican--and it might even be decent considering how many Mexicans will be living there. The most likely food to find is going to be Mexican and then bad Chinese.
In the most rural and remote counties, you might have a population of a few hundred people and just a couple restaurants or cafes serving burgers and sandwiches or steak and potatoes.
It should be considered cheating if the 'best food' country thrives off imported cuisines.
I agree, and that applies to any country.
The thing is, most people consider original American food to be no more than hotdogs and hamburgers. Sure, we invented those two but we are way more than Hotdogs and Hamburgers. Anyone who thinks KFC is fried chicken will be looked on with horror by any decent Southern cook. The South have their biscuits, chicken dumplings, real fried chicken, fried okra, turnip greens cooked with ham hock, grits, sweet tea, mint julep, etc. Heck, just Louisianna state alone will bring you food galore with their gumbo, etoufee, blackened fish, Cajun shrimp, etc. Then there's Maine with their abundance of fresh seafood. Those were just a few cities.
Put it like that, I'm not sure Australia can measure up. When I visited Perth, Melbourne, and Sydney years ago, all I got when I looked for authentic Australian food was vegemite or chicken pie. They have fresh seafood, I give them that, but no more fresh than other coastal cities in US. If anything, we are more creative with how we cook our fresh produce.
Sorry, but I have spent significant time in Europe and the food quality is higher than ours and the variety is on par.
People who derp about the United States and our "cultural diversity" really haven't traveled well. When I lived in Berlin, it felt a lot like New York. There were at least a dozen or so ethnic restaurants two blocks within my apartment on the outer rims of the city.
Overall, Germany, along with Europe, has strict food regulations ensuring quality. The country also has a very large amount of ethnic diversity (more so than the USA in my opinion) with many people from Asia, Africa and the Middle East. This makes for a great variety of food available.
Yeah I'm tired of Americans thinking America is so unique in being so diverse. Australia had a greater percentage of people born overseas, and a lot of these groups are less integrated. Come to Melbourne and you'll see what I mean. There are places that truly do feel like Hong Kong, Mumbai, Rome, Istanbul, Singapore, Saigon.etc. It's so international it feels like a mini world in comparison. We only really lack Latin American and obviously don't have quite the range of American food but that's changing fast. Being close to Asia we of course have that in spades.
You may have a higher foreign born population but do you realize how many divse groups have been living in America for generations, Australia is white and Asian thats it, come to California, NY, Chicago, Texas where its asian,hispanic, black, arab and white. USA is more diverse HANDS DOWN
I think the OP's title should've read "largest variety of options" instead of "best food".
There is zero chance I'd say the US has the best food, as in meat/produce. What we have is more of most everything, but of inferior quality (excepting what you might find in a farmer's market).
OTOH, for the simple fact that the Eastern Hemisphere all but ignores Mexican/Central American and most of South American cuisine, the US is the champion in offering more variety of cuisines.
I'm in Pittsburgh, and it typically takes a decade for a new popular cuisine to make it here, but we've not only got Malay, but also Nepalese, Uzbek and places here now. All of Europe and Asia is represented. About all we're missing is West Africa, although some of the Caribbean places offer dishes with West African roots. We do have Ethiopian, Egyptian and Moroccan, and a coffeehouse that has S. African specialties.
You may have a higher foreign born population but do you realize how many divse groups have been living in America for generations, Australia is white and Asian thats it, come to California, NY, Chicago, Texas where its asian,hispanic, black, arab and white. USA is more diverse HANDS DOWN
I disagree. Americans think having half of your city being African American or Latino is diverse. This is not DIVERSITY, this is merely having a few dominate groups that are considered minorities.
Australia has a wide range of population ethnicities. Note the different ethnicities:
Maybe it's because you don't know any better. They always say America is a great melting pot, but that mainly applies to the big cities like NY, DC, Chicago, SF, LA. Most of America isn't particularly diverse or global. I have friends in the Midwest who have never tried Korean, Thai or Turkish food. That's par for course here. I'm under the impression Middle Eastern food is kind of uncommon outside the biggest cities, while it's very common here.
Cities like Sydney, Melbourne, Toronto, Montreal, Paris, even Singapore to some extent, definitely rival the most global/diverse American cities. NYC, London, Toronto, Sydney, Melbourne, with DC/SF/LA/Chicago in the wings could well vie as having the most global food scenes in the world.
You don't understand, even outside of big cities the US smaller cities are still quite diverse, not as diverse as NYC or Chicago but really in smaller cities here, there is still quite a large Hispanic, black and Asian population. You say you know people from the Midwest that has never tried a certain type of food but how does that have to do with diversity? Thats like saying I have never been to NYC so NYC doesn't exist...they still exist.
I disagree. Americans think having half of your city being African American or Latino is diverse. This is not DIVERSITY, this is merely having a few dominate groups that are considered minorities.
Australia has a wide range of population ethnicities. This chart is for Melbourne alone. Note the different ethnicities:
Both the US and Australia are diverse, but please don't start another stupid CityData "Diversity War". You'll have kids posting in here with census data from New York and Los Angeles for miles...
Both the US and Australia are diverse, but please don't start another stupid CityData "Diversity War". You'll have kids posting in here with census data from New York and Los Angeles for miles...
I'm new here and the other started it. Actually OP started it with this ridiculous thread. It essentially links ethnic diversity to quality of food. This argument is inevitable.
This is hilarious comparing a country of 300 million + people to other countries in the world. The U.S. has some of the greatest wealth in the world, and if you have the money you can get almost anything.
Unfortunately the first majority of Americans eat inferior quality produce, overly processed food that has the minimal nutritional value, as well as high fructose corn syrup in the majority of products, and couldn't tell the difference between cilantro and celery if they're lives depended on it.
I live in Colombia, and on every street corner you can find fresh produce, doesn't matter if the neighborhood is poor or rich, and most of the produce is grown in the country and minimally processed. You can see it in the Colombian people: they tend to have better physiques and overall health compared to Americans, and the majority are much poorer. Everywhere I go I can find fresh cilantro (how many Americans have even heard of cilantro? hehe), tropical fruits, lettuce, different varieties of onions, tomatoes, bags of a dozen fresh oranges that cost about 2 dollars. You can get fresh-squeezed juices from hundreds of street carts here in Bogota.
So for me it doesn't matter that less than 1 percent of Americans have access to trendy Malaysian or Vietnamese restaurants and ethnic eateries, I know from plenty of experience living in the states that the vast majority of Americans eat second-rate food that's processed and hormone-injected, in spite of our country being "superior". Just go to the average American city and look around you! We're the fattest and unhealthiest developed country in the world by a huge margin. The majority of American cities are "food deserts", and no the yuppie Whole Foods with 5 dollar tomatoes doesn't make up for that.
Quality beats quantity hands down. Some people really need to leave the U.S. and broaden their perspective. It gets really annoying when Americans think they are the best at everything.
I live where some might think is part of the backwoods of the nation, but fresh cilantro is in every grocery store where I shop and I use it often. Sorta comical to read the opinion of someone who writes as you have. It's annoying to me for someone who visits the United States and then goes all over the forum posting negative information about it. I'm not talking about you. The person I'm talking about considers himself an expert on the American South which is ludicrous, to say the least. As a rule, Americans do not think they are the best at everything, but they are best at many things and only SOME Americans think Americans are the best. I've traveled to many foreign lands and am pleased to say I'm not narrow-minded.
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