Does your heritage pre-dispose you to liking some foods?

[midnight armadillo]

I only ask because I am 1/4 Scottish, 1/4 Irish, 1/2 Polish. And damn, but I love oats. Steel cut for breakfast, oat milk (just tried it - heavenly!), rolled oats, Maypo, oat breads, heck raw rolled oats by the fistful - bring it on motherfucker, I'll eat it. Potatoes too, pretty much all forms. As for the Polish part, well, I do like pierogies and have a strange desire to try sauerkraut on my next hot dog.

[Chan790]

1. Not sure about heritage, but upbringing does.

An overwhelming proportion of Ethiopians when asked to name their favorite food will tell you that it's injera. Injera is a doughy, slightly-soggy salty unsweetened yeasty bread which looks like a pancake and is used to sop up soups and stews.

I suspect that nobody from outside of N. Africa who has ever tried injera would call it their favorite food...it tastes like soggy yeasty undercooked bread dough when unadorned. Others have described it as tasting like one too many saltines shoved into one's mouth at a time. That's not to say it's terrible...but almost nobody waxes poetic about salty bland bread.

Alternately, I have a hard time explaining my desire to find a decent vegetarian facsimile of haggis...not many people have a strong desire for something that smells like oatmeal cooked inside a dirty gym sock...which is how my ex-girlfriend described it. I dunno, I used to love it.

I guess if you're raised on it, you love it because it's what you grew up on.

[LeftyMom]

2. Food Fight! sells vegan haggis.

They're almost always out of stock on it, so you must not be the only one. Either that or mean vegans are giving it to each other as gag gifts. Which would not surprise me.

[Kali]

3. Injera is good, but I still get the sensation is would be better

for washing your face.

[Louisiana1976]

9. That makes sense....

[dugaresa]

16. i love ethiopian food!

wasn't raised with it and yet craved injera, i found it unique and tasty.

[Rabrrrrrr]

20. I love injera!

[EndersDame]

4. I 1/2 Mexican 1/2 Irish I love tequila and whiskey

:)

[armyowalgreens]

23. How would you know what those taste like?

You're underage.

:think:

[flvegan]

5. Being mostly of British descent

were I not vegan I'd be killing for fish 'n chips every day (haddock, please). Again. Of course growing up between Boston and Cape Cod with all those proper seafood venues might have more to do with it than heritage. Hmmm.

And I love my beer, but I prefer it cold. Sorry mother country.

[XemaSab]

6. My heritage predisposes me

to liking foods not from the parts of chilly Northern Europe that my ancestors hail from.

I must have been Mexican in my last life, 'cause I never met a chile I didn't like. :shrug:

[LeftyMom]

7. I think where I grew up has more to do with it.

I LOVE Vietnamese food, because that's what I grew up eating in my neighborhood. And Mexican, because my Dad used to live in the barrio and that's what he learned to cook and fed me growing up. And lumpia, which are these amazing eggroll things that my Philippino classmates' mothers would make huge piles of for us when we had parties at school.

Ethnically, I'm mostly Hungarian and Italian. I don't care for Hungarian food, not that I grew up on it, and while I love Italian food I'd rather eat Indian or Vietnamese.

I love anything spicy, oily or fried. All three is best, so I think if I could only eat one cuisine forever it would be Indian food.

[Odin2005]

8. 3/4 Norwegian, 1/4 German. Love Rommegrot (milk pudding) and blodpolsa (blood pudding).

Oh, and fish, I LOVE fish.

[KT2000]

10. Potatoes

just set me right.
Irish, duh.

[ZombieHorde]

11. My wife tells me the only reason I like paprika is because I am Hungarian. nt

[old mark]

12. Cake.

What does that make me?

mark

[Vidar]

13. Not in my case. I'm pure Scandinavian. I liked Italian growing up.

Now my preferences are Thai, Indian & Chinese.

[schmuls]

14. I've thought about this a lot. I'm Norwegian, English, German and

Austrian. I love every form of potato, and comfort foods that probably put on another layer of fat (body insulation). How about that theory that blood types determine what kind of food one should eat? I have 0- blood, supposedly the most ancient form, from early hunters. Hence, they should eat primarily meat. I am a vegetarian!

[dugaresa]

15. I think it is what you are raised with, my eastern european family ate anything

from head cheese to blood sausauge, as a result I am not a picky eater and will try anything.

[hedgehog]

17. It took me 54 years to realize that I fully expected potatoes at every main meal

unless I wanted to eat "ethnic" food that night. I never realized that I was the one eating ethnic food!

[La Lioness Priyanka]

18. i love all food but if i had to have one for the rest of my life it would be my own

which is to say bengali/indian. however i dont know if its predisposition, i would argue its upbringing

[zanne]

19. Gee; I hope so.

That would get me off the hook for liking fatty things and very sugary doughnuts.

[armyowalgreens]

21. 1/2 german jew-1/4 russian-1/4 italian- I love Burritos.

Although I'll admit I do love sausage, pasta and other european food.

[eissa]

22. Assyrian here

So predisposed to love any kind of meat on a stick :P But grew up in CA's central valley with heavy Hispanic population, so bring on the carne asada stuffed burritos topped with guacamole.

[elocs]

24. After my familiy have been here for over 380 years my heritage is pretty watered down.

There really have never been any ethnic foods that I've felt predisposed to liking.

[GreenPartyVoter]

25. Not me. I have a lot of Scottish in me and I hate oatmeal. Ptooey!

[applegrove]

26. Sauerkraut is really really good for you.

[Initech]

27. I think it depends on where you live.

If you live in a huge city with a lot of variety of restaurants you tend to try a lot more different foods. If you live in a small rural town with a centralized population, there's probably not a whole lot of variety.

[elana i am]

28. it might could

but in my case i'd have to say no.

i'm nuts about italian and chinese. there's not a lick of either one in me, and we were strictly a "meat & potatoes" family when i grew up because it's all my dad would eat. about as exotic as he gets is beans and cornbread or taco salad. we still don't go out to family dinners anywhere that doesn't serve some variation of a burger and fries.

on second thought, maybe it's because i never had italian and chinese when i was a kid that i love it so much now. so in a manner of speaking maybe heritage does have something to do with it.

ethiopian bread was mentioned above. i've had that and the bread by itself is pretty blah, but the lentils and stewed chicken i had over the top of it was tasty. i also love thai and mexican. i've had indian food, and i'm not fond of it. i think it's a particular spice or blend of spices that just don't appeal to my palate.

but then i'll try anything once (within reason of course. no balut for me!).

[blogslut]

29. Yes

I love sauerkraut. L-o-v-e it. I haz much German in my blood.

[hunter]

30. I have no idea.

I could eat canned sardines, anchovies, or mackerel over rice with whatever fruits and greens I happened upon every day of the year. Sweets don't do so much for me. "Kettle corn" popcorn is an abomination.

My ancestry is suspect, my ancestors would tell whatever stories they needed to. They fled Europe in the 19th century to the wild wild American West because their futures in the Old World didn't look too promising. Irish Catholic Viking Pirate Northern European Jews were not welcome at the party and Americans were so hopelessly gullible they'd believe any ancestry you gave 'em if you studied up on it a bit and faked the accent. No need to tell them about family or legal troubles in the Old Country. You are a respectable white guy with a respectable wife. Nobody questions you.

I like Mexican food too.

[kwassa]

31. My English heritage predisposes me to liking chili, garlic, basil, lemongrass ....

because English food is really pretty bad. Boring as can be, as ethnic cuisine goes.

Give me Thai food any day of the week. All Asian cuisines are interesting, all Mediterranean cuisines also.

[brendan120678]

32. I'm mostly Irish, and I hate corned beef and cabbage...

but I love Guinness!!

[TZ]

33. I think upbringing does

I have yet to meet anyone raised Jewish that wasn't a carbohydrate addict with all those bready type foods like potato pancakes, matzoballs etc....