Travelogue #11: Foodporn.

An assortment of things I ate during my time in the US. 

Magnolia Bakery.

I think this was John’s Grill in San Fran. Solid and unexceptional food. Lovely atmosphere.

Ferry Building SF. 

Boudin, of the bread bowl soup fame. 

Sonoma wine trip

Salted caramel ice cream. Delish. 

Can’t remember the place, but it was prawn ravioli with pine nuts, pesto sauce and spinach, and it was ravenously satisfying. 

Triple choc pudding

The Plaza Bistro, Sonoma

Nations Cafe, New York. 

Dean & Deluca, Soho: the site of the only decent coffee I had this entire trip, and the most excellent babka.

Highland Kitchen, Somerville MA, one of the best meals of the entire trip - pork chops, apple salad, refried black beans and Spanish rice; pan roasted half chicken with herb gravy and asparagus. Noms. 

Somewhere near Harvard Square. Can’t remember, but the potatoes were a winner.

Sonsie in Boston, excellent (but expensive) food, better for people-watching.

Cod espanola at The Burren, near Davis Square. 

MOOOARR ice cream. 

Trying to explain “American food” is a bit like explaining “Australian food”. No one knows exactly what it is, or if it even exists, and attempts to define it usually end in cultural cringe.

The only two safe generalisations you can make is that 1) serving sizes in the US are appropriate only if you were feedings cows instead of human beings; and 2) the coffee taste marginally better than concentrated meat extract. And no - I do not need flavoured syrup in my cappuccino thank you very much.

The above mentioned aside, eating in the US - much like in Australia - is typified by the multicultural composition of the country. High quality food was easily accessible and the restaurant scene seemed active enough, though we did not bother to look too deeply into it.

We had some snooty, but exceptionally good French food in San Francisco; the world’s greatest Chinese custard tart from Golden Gate Bakery; plenty of cheap and delicious Mexican food everywhere we went; Korean food in LA; fresh, abundant seafood in Boston; and when I visited Main Street in Flushing after a day at the US Open in New York, I found probably some of the best, most authentic Chinese food I’ve ever had outside China. 

But at the same time, there was also an enormous amount of easily accessible and cheap garbage disguised as food for sale in the US. When we were in New York, we stayed in Brooklyn where some parts were full of hipster-populated cafes, and yet in other parts, the only restaurants we could find were depressing fried chicken stores with flickering fluorescent lighting. The food culture, much like the rest of the country, seemed to be a study in extremities and class.