A question (or two) regarding food

[beboots]

Hello, everyone on my friends list! I had a few quick questions for you all.

I've been thinking, lately, of "Canadian culture" (if such a thing exists, and I think that it does), and what you really think of as defining a person's culture. One of those things is the food they eat. And I got to thinking: maybe some of my favourite foods, things that

Comments

[especially]

I'm pretty sure these things aren't that uncommon. &I put corn syrup on my waffles (don't like maple syrup, bad canadian, etc).

Things I know are rare outside of canada:
Smarties
Ketchup chips

[beboots]

I heard that about Smarties! That's kind of bizarre... but then again, I like M&Ms better, so... ;)

[beboots]

...We have Thanksgiving too! ;) We just, uh, have it in October so that the celebration of the "harvest" occurs before everything gets frozen over. We have a much shorter growing season up here. ;)

That's what I was wondering about perogies! ... They're so delicious, I have to wonder why they haven't migrated everywhere...

[dhrachth]

We've got all three in Alabama. Pumpkins and maple syrup are pretty common. Pumpkins are all over the place in the fall for Halloween and Thanksgiving, not so much the rest of the year but you can always get the canned stuff for baking with. Maple syrup is pretty standard, but there's lots of other syrup flavors to choose from mostly made with corn syrup, like my personal favorite butter pecan. Maple candies you don't see very much. Pierogies are probably the hardest to find, but they are available in most of the larger supermarket's freezer cases. I think fried pierogies are probably responsible for about 20% of the weight I put on during grad school.

[beboots]

"my personal favorite butter pecan" Ooh... that sounds delicious! :D

Maple candies are delicious as well; you can get them in the consistency of smooth lolipops (in shapes like maple leaves, moose, etc.), but you can also get them like hard-packed brown sugar, also in shapes like maple leaves. They melt on your tongue; delicious and patriotic! ;)

[boko]

Hmm, I've heard of all of these foods

[beboots]

I'm a huge fan of gyoza! Perogies are superficially similar in looks, but the fillings are quite different. Gyoza are more... meat and herbs and such, but perogies are more often potato and/or cheese and/or herbs. I'm a huge fan of dumpling-like foods in general. :3

Maple syrup is the most Canadian of foods, I think. I mean, the leaf is on our flag and all that. ;) The most delicious form of it, though, I find, is what the francophones call "tire", which just means "to pull". It's a winter delicacy in which really hot maple syrup is dribbled in a row into troughs of crushed ice/snow so it firms up into a delicious drippy and sometimes chewy taffy. It's AMAZING. <3