Sitting with someone.
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Sitting with someone. I share a Japanese recipe. It uses spaghetti.
Them: “I think I’ll replace the noodles (with somen). It doesn’t feel right for an Asian recipe to use spaghetti.”
Me: “that arguably makes the dish worse, also…Spaghetti has been in Japanese recipes for a long time. It’s part of a tradition called Yoshoku. It’s been a thing in the Japanese culinary tradition for over 100 years”
Them: “It just feels like it’s wrong”
It’s not wrong, friend. You’re wrong, and being white as a winter wonderland with your food stereotypes.
They did not take this well. This person is neurospicy enough that changing this opinion will take time. Still; it’s a common enough assumption that I have to tell people that national foods are not always what everyone thinks.