Note to vacationing non-Americans: while it’s true that America doesn’t always have the best food culture, the food in our restaurants is really not representative of what most of us eat at home. The portions at Cheesecake Factory or IHOP are meant to be indulgent, not just “what Americans are used to.”
If you eat at a regular American household, during a regular meal where they’re not going out of their way to impress guests, you probably will not be served twelve pounds of chocolate-covered cream cheese. Please bear this in mind before writing yet another “omg I can’t believe American food” post.
Also, most American restaurant portions are 100% intended as two meals’ worth of food. Some of my older Irish relatives still struggle with the idea that it’s not just not rude to eat half your meal and take the rest home, it’s expected. (Apparently this is somewhat of an American custom.)
Until you’re hitting the “fancy restaurant” tier (the kind of place you go for a celebration or an anniversary date), a dinner out should generally also be lunch for the next day. Leftovers are very much the norm.
From the little time I’ve spent in Canada, this seems to be the case up there as well.
the portions in family restaurants (as opposed to haute cuisine types) are designed so that no one goes away hungry.
volume IS very much a part of the american hospitality tradition, and Nobody Leaves Hungry is important. but you have to recognize that it’s not how we cook for ourselves, it’s how we welcome guests and strengthen community ties.
so in order to give you a celebratory experience and make you feel welcomed, family restaurants make the portions big enough that even if you’re a teenage boy celebrating a hard win on the basketball court, you’re still going to be comfortably full when you leave.
of course, that means that for your average person with a sit-down job, who ate a decent lunch that day, it’s twice as much as they want or more. that’s ok. as mentioned above, taking home leftovers is absolutely encouraged. that, too, is part of american hospitality tradition; it’s meant to invoke fond memories of grandma loading you down with covered dishes so you can have hearty celebration food all week. pot luck church basement get-togethers where the whole town makes sure everybody has enough. that sort of thing. it’s about sharing. it’s about celebrating Plenty.
it’s not about pigging out until you get huge. treating it that way is pretty disrespectful of our culture. and you know, contrary to what the world thinks, we do have one.
First Look at Tomm Moore’s New Film, ‘Wolfwalkers’
Cartoon Brew reports: Tomm Moore’s first two features, Cartoon Saloon’s The Secret of Kells
and Song of the Sea,
cemented his status as a storyteller and filmmaker of the first class,
while boosting Ireland’s animation scene into the global limelight,
earning him two Oscar nominations and countless other accolades. Now,
with Wolfwalkers, Moore is ready to deliver what he describes as the “final panel of our Irish folklore triptych.”
It’s an idea that Moore has been developing for years. Wolfwalkers tells the story of 11-year-old Robyn Goodfellow, a young apprentice
hunter who comes to Ireland with her father to wipe out the last pack of
wolves. Her life changes though after she saves a native girl, Mebh,
which leads to her discovery of the Wolfwalkers and transforms her into
the very thing her father is tasked to destroy. As he has done with earlier works, Moore uses Celtic folklore as a
window into our contemporary world. Thematic undercurrents of wilderness
versus order, and man’s impulse to control nature, are key to the world
of Wolfwalkers.
Embedded below is the film’s ‘concept trailer’. Enjoy!
I hate that SEPTember OCTOber NOVember and DECember aren’t the 7th, 8th, 9th, and 10th months.
Whoever fucked this up should be stabbed
If I recall, they did used to be the corresponding months. It was just when Roman leaders Julius Caesar and Augustus came into power, the months July(Julius) and August(Augustus) were added, thus throwing off the numbering of the calender.
Good news, though: whoever fucked it up did in fact get stabbed.
Wolf in Shepherd's Clothing 