Random Topic Is Random

[Riverspell]

So I'm sitting here chowing down on pepperoni pizza and surfing our wonderful forum and began to ask myself, do my fellow members eat pizza?

Most of you are from the UK or nearby countries. And I know next to nothing about your culture. Like what you enjoy eating and doing and what some customs are there or social do and don'ts and holidays and such.

I do realize that curiosity killed the cat but sometimes satisfaction brought it back. Cats do have nine lives after all. So here's an oblivious American cat ready to stick it's foot in a toasting toaster.

And of course you are welcome to ask all the questions you want about my country and stuff.

First question, the one that started all this, do you guys eat pizza? Do you even know what pizza is? What kind of foods do you typically eat and enjoy? Over here, a good portion of us do apply to the stereotype that Americans eat rather unhealthy foods. However that's not all of us. I do know that we enjoy things like pizza or hamburgers and such. But in my family those are often handmade (so a bit healthier) and not often the top food in the household. Our foods are also seasonal at times. While we'll eat most anything at anytime, some foods are eaten more often depending on the time of year. Like my dad's family will have these awesome BBQs in the summer with ribs and corn on the cob and watermelon and baked beans and other such summery things. October-December tends to be the dreaded months of weight gain. Seriously, the holidays incorporate a lot of eating and not all the foods eaten are terribly healthy. Like Thanksgiving, I know at least in my family that we eat far more than we should. We literally expand my grandparents table not just for the amount of people but the amount of food. I remember one year it was a competition to find the biggest turkey. xD Christmas is similar, but in my dad's family since we we're exhausted from Thanksgiving we have a buffet table instead. We cover there still extended table in random snack foods and pig pile on the living room floor to read the book of Luke's version of the Christmas story and share presents. I love this cause it's the only time of year I get summer sausage, little smoked weenies, and those nummy almond sliced covered soft smoked cheddar cheese balls. Nummy.

Then there are the manners that go with eating at the table. My mothers mom tried to drill traditional manners into my skull. While they are still there they aren't used terribly often. If I'm eating in public I do use them. But at home? Pfft, the rest of my family throws them out the window so I'm not as worried about it. xDD

So yeah, I'm curious and I thought maybe we could share questions and such back and forth? If anyone is interested that is.

[Kitsune]

Yeah we eat Pizza (unless some of us don't like Pizza in which case it would be odd to eat it), infact my partner would happily eat nothing but Pizza... and we had takeaway last night so we ate the remains of the cold pizza this morning (like students). So yeah, being UK based we like Pizza and know what it is and we eat pretty much anything from italian to chinese and everything in between as well as pub foods which are traditional things like savoury pies, fish and chips, sandwiches, Roast dinners etc. And puddings, sponge puddings and custards = gooood.

We similarly eat unhealthy foods as we have a lot on offer, ready meals are a big thing as working 9-5 and beyond means we need to grab something quick and easy when we're too tired to cook!

We've got a wide range of takeaway places from indian to thai to places that do a bit of everything. Chips and cheese are a firm favourite after a night out, then there's chips and curry sauce, chips cheese and gravy (ick).

We have seasonal veg but also get imports so some things are on offer all the time. and it depends on the family really, some people hand make things, some eat healthy, some happily live off takeaways and some are inbetween all those.

We love BBQs even if we don't have the weather for it. When the first rays of summer sunshine start showing (and for you guys in America you'd maybe class it as cold and not a summer day at all) we get very excited and most of the guys cast their shirts off even if it's cold, just because 'THE SUN IS BACK! IT'S HERE. We though it left forever!'.

We can quite easily have BBQs on an overcast day and we similarly have corn on the cob, sausages, ribs, chicken etc, sometimes watermelon but it isn't a staple part of a BBQ, more personal preference.

We don't have thanksgiving but we do tend to stuff ourselves at Christmas and we get a range of christmas food markets (usually German christmas markets) which spring up around that time,

We also have pancake day on 'Shrove Tuesday' which is the tuesday before 'Ash Wednesday' in February. I don't know if you have that in america? a lot of people just eat pancakes and don't think of the religious connotations of it. It's just an excuse to eat pancakes for the majority I think!

Also at easter the kids go crazy for easter eggs, do you guys have easter egg hunts too?

also our pancakes are different to american style pancakes, they're thinner and more like French Crepes.

[Chip2014]

I enjoy pizza. I make pizza with my kids every Monday after school.

Chip x

[Riverspell]

Sorry I didn't reply to this as soon as I could! Life took a steep downward turn and I was a bit disinterested in things period. So, anyways.

We have ready take meals for work too. My step mom would take them in as she wasn't allowed to leave her work place to find food. She had to bring it in or go without.

And to not be offensive, but what in the world is sponge pudding? Also, are chips and cheese nachos? Over here we put cheese and other toppings on tortilla chips and heat them up so the cheese gets all melty. We call them nachos. Is this the same thing? If it is, I have no idea why anyone would put gravy on it. *shudders*

You guys sound like my tiny state of Washington. Well, it's not actually tiny compared to some states, but you get the point. We're over on the Pacific Coast and people like to call our weather bipolar. Usually we are mild to moderate in temperatue. Averaging about, maybe, 50 degrees F on a given day. (You guys use Celsius right?) Our weather mostly consists of partly to mostly cloudy and rain. Shit tons of rain. Lots and lots of rain. While a good portion of us do use umbrellas and all that, most of us don't bother with it. For one, we're used to being soaked, and for two more often than not we get a bit of a breeze with the rain. So who wants to fight with an umbrella? Also, sometimes that breeze turns in a full on out windstorm. It happens. During the summer our weather is even more confused. We average about 70 degrees F in the summer. Occasionally we have a heat wave where we all swear up and down that we're snow men and we're melting. Winter is madness. Don't even get me started. Oh, whatever. It is madness. Seriously. Fall and Winter for us are pretty much the same thing, with Spring edging in there a bit. It gets cold. Not at first, it slips down into the 40's most of the Fall and Spring. Winter can stay there too, but sometimes we have a sudden cold snap (like we're having right now) and the temps plummet way down. Teens and lower sometimes. And it's absolutely horrid. We don't always get snow, our weather is usually contrary enough to not dump stuff on us until it's warm enough to make it soggy, wet snow instead of just cold snow. We can expect snow as early as October (it happened on Halloween once) and my mom has seen it as late as May. It's unusual, but it happens. Weather is bipolar here. Up closer to the coast we have a stretch of land that is always wet. It's a temperate rainforest (that place is absolutely amazing) and when they're not having occasional sunlight, it's dumping rain on them. On the other side of the mountains (Washington is cut down the middle by them) it's all flat plains and the weather there is drasticly different from the side I live on. They seem to roast to death half the year and the other half they freeze to death. Either way, lots of dying. xD

We do almost the same here, with the shirts. There are crazy people anyways that run around in sandals or socks and sandals all dang year long. It's about 23 degrees F outside right now and I saw a man in shorts and sandals earlier this evening. I thought he was crazy and I asked him why (we were standing in line at an ATM) and he just shrugged and said he liked the goose pimples. I shut up at that point. Seriously, we're weird. There are lots of weird people here. And being a major harbor and airport spot with a ton of jobs in advancing careers means we get a lot of cultures here that blend to make some more weird stuff. Oh, don't get me started about the over abundance of Starbucks and the people that will literally fight for a spot in line. Like, really?

I don't know anything about "Shrove Tuesday" or "Ash Wednesday". I've heard about the Ash one but know nothing about either of these.

Yes we do Easter here. With easter egg hunts and everything. We use real eggs and fake eggs stuffed with candy and prizes together. My brother and I used to get real enjoyment out of hiding the real eggs from the parents and seeing how long it took them to find them. Our record was 3 months with one egg. They couldn't figure out the smell. xDD

Being a religious individual of the Christian variety Easter has other meanings to me as well but most folks here just participate for the fun of it.

But you guys seriously have a day just for pancakes? Can I join in? I mean, I hear your guyses healthcare is better too. And I'm hoping your government isn't collapsing either. xDD

[Settng Sun]

There are all kinds of sponge puddings - do a Google image search for one and you'll see lots of (absolutely delicious) examples. In fact, I'm sure I just put on a couple of pounds doing such a search.

We do indeed have a special day for pancakes. I'm surprised it never caught on in the States as you guys always seemed more in to pancakes than we are over here.

As for pizza, I only really like your regular cheese and tomato and sometimes I might stick some chicken and bacon on there if I'm feeling 'adventurous'. I like the Chicago Town pizza baguettes, actually.

At the moment I'm addicted to beans on toast - or rather, toasted soft white rolls as you get a nice crispy outside to them when you toast them. Yeah, I'm in to some real gourmet shit.

[ILostHer]

Hah. Came on here to be all depressed and 'I hate this world!!!' and so far have smiled and actually, properly laughed out loud at "Do you guys even know what pizza is?" Bless your heart Riverspell (love your username) I am not laughing at you, your such innocent question really did make me laugh.

I would live on Pizza, only cheese and tomato ones though (Veggie) The kebab shop that my son should buy shares in, sells like a 3.5inch pizza! It's tiny and perfect!

My question is, where did Riverspell come from? Oh, and you know the film 'Hills have eyes' do places like that really exist? I would so go there if they did!

[gandalftheginge]

This topic is amazing!

I adore pizza, both the trashy take away ones from dominos/pizza hut and the more refined ones from pizza 'spress. I really like spicy toppings and also goats cheese with red onions. Also, unlike a lot of people, I like anchovies and olives. I used to work as a chef in a pizza restaurant, it was cool learning how to make them properly, but the variety of toppings drove me mad! There must have been atleast 15 types.

I'm from the UK and I live in oxford, but I think it's kind of hard to define a typical British food habbit, though maybe it's people who are having one meat and two veg for each meal, like porkchops, sausages and stuff. Personally, I find that kind of dull. I love having pasta dishes, which I tend to cook quite a lot. I really like curry to and anything with noodles. It's nice to go out to noodle bar or curry houses, which are pretty common these days.

We have some seasonality here, we tend to have salads and fish during the summer and then stews and cassaroles during the winter.

I've always wondered, why do americans call burgers hamburgers? I mean, there's no pork in a burger usualy.

[Riverspell]

Oh wow, I didn't think this was going to get more replies!! Sorry I didn't reply right away, I've been off the computer a few days helping out around my mom's place and adjusting.

I'm glad I could make you laugh Lost (can I call you that?)!

I like cheese pizza, but also pepperoni or a mixed meat pizza. Sometimes combination is good too.

Hmm. I'm not quite exactly sure where my name came from. There were several reasons and ideas, as well as meanings for it. I never decided on a particular one. One of which was my fascination for rivers. Despite my horrid fear of water, rivers have always drawn me in. Especially the more slow moving ones, ones where you can still see a bit of foam as it moves but shows a river can be tranquil as much as it can be angry. So basically like, the river's spell or spell of the river. And it got shortened down. That's the most basic explanation, the others are a bit harder to describe.

As to "The Hills Have Eyes", the film was to appear to be made in New Mexico I think but was actually filmed in the African country of Morocco. I didn't see the film myself so I can't be sure. But have no fear, we have plenty of terrifying places here for you to come visit if you liked. Amityville is an actual place. The movie was based on a rather gruesome murder and the house is considered haunted. We have ghost towns too, where the town has been entirely abandoned and left to the wild. Some of those places are creepy. In my state we have several haunted locations where lots of scary shit has happened. One place I really want to go is Underground Seattle. The current city of Seattle is actually built on top of the old city of Seattle. I think the old one actually flooded over or something and so they raised the city up and put the new city on top of the old one. Something like that. But the Underground is horribly haunted, so are several places in Seattle like Pike Place Market. They do an annual "Ghost Tour" several times in October for curious people. xD

I'm glad you like the topic Gandalf. Lets keep it going! And it needn't be all about food either. I'm curious about everything.

We have more than 15 types of pizza. Or at least I believe so with the amount of space our stores devot to pizza. xD I don't tend to eat a lot of spicy food. It makes me feel sick and my meds don't react well to that. They make me sick already and half the time the spicy food makes it really bad.

One meat two veg? Is that a term for a meal with a meat dish and a couple veggie dishes? Cause that's normal fare over here. Or at least it used to be. My mom still tends to cook things that way. Like say steak and potatoes and some corn or beans.

I love pasta!!! I really do. I'd live off it if I could. My only problem with it is that a lot of pasta dishes involve some sort of dairy and I'm lactose intolerant. Even with the lactaid tablets it makes me ill. Frustrating. >.<

What is a noodle bar? What is a curry house?

Fish is gross. Seriously. Makes me puke. I can handle tuna with enough mayo or fake fish fish sticks with enough tartar sauce but otherwise no. xP Seasonality here tends to depend on which state you are in. Granted, there are foods eaten in practically every state but a lot of states tend to have their own idea on what good food is.

I have no idea why we call burgers hamburgers. Yes, there's not usually pork involved. But when you eat from fast food chains, I'm sorry to tell you but that slab of meat isn't usually beef. Like McDonalds hamburgers will have some beef in them but the rest of it is ground up whatever with texture and flavor added. Oh and grease. Lots of grease. Which is why I can't usually eat fast food. I have something very similar to IBS and grease makes me super sick.

When I actually eat hamburgers it's at a family get together and we've made the burgers from scratch and with typically lean ground beef. Then we slice up our own veggies, make up our own sauces (my family actually puts peanut butter on their hamburgers, which is flat out disgusting), and bring out the case of soda.

Speaking of soda, what do you guys typically drink? I'm sure soda is in there somewhere. What do you even call soda? We have a lot of names for it. I tend to call it soda or pop, alternating back in forth depending on what comes to my mind first. Is alcohol a regular? And what age do you have to be to drink it? I'm assuming you have drinking and driving laws as well. You've got to be 21 here with a valid ID to even purchase alcohol or be let into a bar. We also have a lot of fruit juices, I actually saw watermelon juice just the other day and was shocked about it. Typically my family drinks orange (with low to no pulp) or apple juice. But my mom and I like cranberry juice as well. I tend to buy mine as a cranberry/raspberry drink. We also drink a lot of milk, well my dad did anyways and so did my step mom. Children drink it more than adults. Tea sometimes, coffee a lot. I personally love iced sweet tea. Mmmm. But again, a lot of food and drink preferences depend on the state you are in.

Ohhh, so many questions to ask!

[gandalftheginge]

I hope your adjusting well River, is it going okay?

I really do love this topic, I'm pretty curious to learn about that states aswell. I've visited California and Florida which I loved and I'm very keen to move over to the states permanently, I just need to think about jobs and see if I'm brave enough. Oh, and make new friends. Any reccomendations of places to live?

American imports of sweets and cereal are really popular here, but they are normally atleast twice the price. Things like lucky charms, pretzels and those more adventerous flavours of chocolate bars and fizzy drinks.

I'm sorry spicy food makes you sick, that must be a pain and to be lactose intolerant as well I have IBS but it doesn't sound as bad your digestive problems.

Yep, that's what one meat and two veg is, normally covered in gravy to. I don't mind having it once a week or so, but I like some variety and adventerous stuff.

Curry houses and noodles bar both specialise in their name sakes and normally do a few other dishes from there region. They are virtually always staffed by people of that ethnicity to and are decorated in a similar fashion.

I still need to investigate the hamburger myth then. I can agree with you about greasy food, it doesn't do me any favours either and is pretty yuck.

I tend to call soda either fizzy drink or carbonated. I'm a fiend for pepsi max, I really can't get enough. We can start drinking legally in the UK at 18, thought a lot start a few years before. I really like drinking ale, cider, whiskey and rum. My favourite summer activity is drinking a cold cider in a pub garden and playing some boardgames.

I used to work as a chef, I made huge quantities of hot food in a uni and a few years later making sandwhiches on a deli bar. Are sandwhich shops popular in the states?

[lonelyheartemma]

I love pizza but have never ordered pizza in my life. My mum has always cooked it for us, then it was one of the first meals I learned to cook. And I love making it so much I don't know if I'll ever order it. I make my own base as well, the mixing and rolling out is part of the fun. I don't often get to cook for my parents as my mum insists on doing it all herself but I love making pizza for other people because we all want different toppings so I have to arrange the toppings in sections and I really enjoy that. Also I find making pizza is good as a distraction technique if I feel depressed. It's difficult enough for me to need to concentrate on what I'm doing but not difficult enough for me to mess it up.

Once some guy tried to get into my pants (yes I'm sure that's what he wanted) by claiming he was my pizza delivery boy, unfortunately for him I could say with complete certainty that he wasn't!

My mum sees pizza as a summer meal so she rarely makes it at any other time of year but I tend to ignore conventions like that when I'm cooking for myself. I just cook whatever I want to eat.

My favourite pizza toppings are peppers (the vegetable not the spice), anchovies, salami and cheese but I have used other toppings when cooking for other people.

I like Christmas food but I have a much smaller appetite than the rest of my family and I find even two course meals a bit much. But my mum always does 3 course meals which doesn't go well with my digestive problems. So I love Christmas food but it can be a bit of an ordeal. I have to find a balance between not annoying my mum and not making myself feel really ill.

I love Pancake Day. One of the few things I can do well is tossing a pancake. My mum flips them over with a spatula but I can't do that so it's really lucky I can toss them. I like cream, sugar, lemon juice, lime juice, golden syrup, maple syrup and chocolate sauce on my pancakes. Sometimes all at once! I don't usually eat lemons and limes because of my IBS but I have a tiny bit on pancakes. I think the cream probably neutralises the acid a bit.

My table manners are dreadful. I never eat in restaurants partly for this reason. We had chicken today and I had to pick the bone up in my hand and gnaw is because I couldn't cut it off the bone. But I always ask permission to do this. Also, my upper lip is too short and if my lips are closed, I can't move my jaw enough to chew food. So I have to eat with my mouth open. But you can't see food in my mouth or anything like that, all the gross stuff goes on behind my teeth and my lips don't really move, they just stay in their natural position. But some people find it gross even if they can't see the food in my mouth so I'm always willing to eat with my hand over my mouth if they complain. I also hold my fork in my right hand. If I want to cut something, I often use the side of my fork but other times move my fork to my left hand so I can use knife but when I've cut it I put my knife down and put my fork back in my right hand.

I don't usually mind other people's bad table manners but I don't like it when people talk to me when I'm in the middle of chewing. I don't want to answer with food in my mouth but if I don't answer straight away they get really annoyed and start telling me I'm rude for not answering. I don't know why they can't tell I'm eating. It is a meal after all! Now I tend to give a very brief answer, then give a proper answer when I can. (I also hate it when people try to talk to me when I'm on the phone. Again, can't they tell?)

Does anyone else here eat around a table? My mum insists we have dinner at the table every day and my parents have lunch together as well. TV during meals is forbidden. I'm actually completely happy with the table and the lack of TV (I'm too clumsy to eat off my lap and I don't like TV when I'm eating in case it shows something that puts me off my food) but sometimes dinner turns into an opportunity for both parents to criticise me- and I just have to sit there because it's dinner time. When I'm eating on my own I always eat at the table out of habit but lots of people don't seem to have a dining table. Once my sister's friend came to pick her up and she asked "What are your family doing sitting round the table?" My sister told her we were eating lunch. Her friend was shocked. "At the table?"