Local Cuisine You Had to Ask About (that's interesting)

So the Fancy Dining thread got me to thinking about times I’ve had to ask about food on a menu, and not necessarily at fine dining establishments. Tyring out the local food specialty can be a fun and delicious experience.

Vacationing in the East Coast of Canada, we decided to try something Acadian. Stopping off at a small family restaurant, the menu had a listing for Rappie Pie which meant absolutely nothing to me. The waitress explained what it was to me and I gave it a try. Loved it!

Visiting the Amish country in Pennsylvannia, we came across Scrapple. I think I may have heard the term before (or maybe my memory confused it with scrabble) but hadn’t a clue what it was. I asked our waitress, and of course had to try it after the description. Yummy!

I ate a plate of sizzling sisig that my cousins had ordered when I was in the Philippines about ten or so years ago. I only remembered to ask what exactly it was afterward. Even knowing what it is, I’d still it eat. It was tasty.

When I moved to Lexington, KY back in 1994 I asked what lamb fries were before I ordered them. I’m glad I did, I don’t think I would have enjoyed sheep testicles.

We had been living in Paris for a couple of years and were reasonably savvy when it came to continental cookery. Of course we’d had crepes before but always either plain with butter or with a sweet topping like Nutella or chantilly. We ended up going to Brittany with a friend for a few days to pick up his sword that he;d ordered from an armourer deep in rural Morbihan. This is a place way, way off the beaten track and so Breton that none of the signs are even in French, everything is in Breizh instead.

So we’re in a little village called Ploerdut and of course there’s a creperie in the centre. We have the menu and our friend Julien says that we must all have a Complete. We go along with him as he’s usually right when it comes to good food and Oh. My. God.

Basically it’s a galette, a savoury crepe made from buckwheat folded parcel-wise around cheese, ham, a fried egg and onions. We had it with the local Breton cider (pressed in the building next door) and it was just heavenly.

I never had Country Ham until I moved to Virginia, and imo the really good ones can compete with European types.

I have a secret dream of opening a sandwich shop here in town where you can get good examples of regional sandwiches you can’t normally get around here. For example: Kentucky Hot Brown, Philly Cheese Steak, Chicago Italian Beef, Sausage and Peppers, Beef on Weck, etc. We’ll also have good Meatball Subs and Pulled Pork sandwiches.

I had always thought of crepes as really thin French pancakes, and had only ever had sweet ones until I was led into a Creperie in old Quebec City. Wow! You can have them with all this other stuff too? Neat!

You are my new hero.

I would drive up there and live in a tent next to that shop.

Good plan, but fair warning: A lot of those rely on regional water supplies as well. You can’t make weck outside of the East Coast for some magical reason.

Also a Hot Brown isn’t perzackly a sandwich, but I’d love to see one on the menu.

H.

In my younger daze, took a trip to central Illinois where my mom’s side of the family hails from (farming country).

Uncle George (RIP, a pretty cool dude but gone at this point) cooked up some Turkey Fries. Didn’t tell us what they were before we ate them. I’m pretty cool with trying different things so I would have tried them anyway.

Deep fried turkey testicles. Come in a five gallon bucket (you have to do the frying).

Who knew?

[Also, they were delicious]

I think of it as an open face sandwich, but admittedly, I only know of them from that episode of Throwdown with Bobby Flay.

I was just about to post this. I just came back from the Philippines and had sisig several times. It is delicious.

I also had one serving of balut, but the less said about that the better…

Dug this thread up to open up a discussion about Sri Lankan food.

There’s a sri Lankan place down the road from me, which i tried one day because it was close and I was feeling adventurous, didn’t fancy a burger.

What an eye opener.

Kothu rock.

Nothing yet as interesting as scrapples though, or sheep fry.

I’ve got Sambar Idli, ghee dosa and Chicken Kothi roti on the way now. Looking forward to it.