Monday, September 26, 2016

Reaction to Buzzfeed Videos

            In the two videos linked above, “Chinese People Try Panda Express for the First Time” and “Mexican People Try Taco Bell for the First Time.” These videos, as they are from Buzzfeed—a website primarily for entertainment, are made to entertain people, or to help students like me procrastinate on homework. These two videos share a common theme of people trying Americanized food from their culture, so for me, I expected the people in these videos to not be too fond of the food they tried from Panda Express or Taco Bell. Starting the videos, I was surprised to see a people varying in age and people who did not speak any English in the videos; however, I believe this made the video more credible. While watching the video, it surprised me that that some of the people enjoyed some of the Americanized versions of their cultural dishes, especially in the “Chinese People Try Panda Express” video. However, the majority of people did not enjoy the dishes at all.

The fact that in the “Mexican People Try Taco Bell for the First Time” many of the Taco Bell dishes had no relationship to Mexico shocked me, but I realize that the point is to emphasize how distant Taco Bell food is from real Mexican cuisine. While I personally cannot relate to any of their reactions, I believe these videos brought up the important point of how different real Chinese food or real Mexican food is from our Americanized, fast food version of it. This theme also shows in cuisines like Italian, Thai, or French. To emphasize this point, Buzzfeed also made a video where they took fortune cookies, typically associated with Chinese food, to China, and nobody knew what it was. All three of these videos emphasize the difference between authentic cuisine and our Americanized versions.

Saturday, September 24, 2016

Ethnography

            According to a couple of students, Cox hall is the location for food on Emory’s campus to go if you’re sick of the DUC. With a variety of options and a busy environment, most freshman—once they have eaten at the DUC too many times to count in a month, upperclassmen, graduate students, and many other staff and faculty members go there when they eat on campus. Cox allures its customers with tacos, pasta, crepes, salads, rice bowls, Indian, and much more. While being interviewed, both Libby Dunne and Addie Owens told me that Cox is there favorite place to grab a meal on campus because of the large selection. However, because of this, it gets very crowded, very fast, especially during lunch and dinner rushes.
            Arriving at Cox on a Friday afternoon at noon, I knew it would be busy. Luckily, I am on the earlier side of the lunch rush, so I am able to find a seat pretty easily. While ordering my tomato, basil, and mozzarella crepe, I can tell the workers have a good time working there: they interact nicely with the customers, joke around with each other, and make some good crepes. One woman, with her black hair up in a bun with a visor, even gets excited to make my order because “it is her favorite crepe,” according to one of the other workers.
After getting my crepe, I sit down in a central location in the cafeteria. I am close to the registers and the different restaurants, but also I have a good view of over half the seating. Throughout the forty-five minutes I am there, the noise continues getting louder and louder as more and more people come into Cox. The large variety of people coming in consists of undergraduate students, medical students, doctors, nurses, healthcare workers, staff members, and more. Most of these people come in with at least one other person, even if they just take their food to go.

After around thirty minutes, the cafeteria gets crowded enough where strangers have to sit next to each other at tables because no seating remains except for a few tables outside that nobody sits at because of the extreme heat. The smell of the cafeteria contains a blend of all the different foods being made and a little bit of sweat coming from everyone entering from the scorching outside and being in close proximity to each other. As I leave, I can tell the crowd is there to stay for a little while longer, the biggest drawback to Cox according to Dunne and the only real drawback I saw myself. However, I found Cox Hall, while crowded, to be a place where the Emory community comes together, from undergraduate freshman to graduate students to faculty and staff, to get some good food.

Friday, September 23, 2016

Class Dinner Party

If I were to throw a dinner party for our class, I would make it a vegetarian night, so I would make a Greek with quinoa salad, tomato and corn risotto, and chocolate chip cookies. This is what I need to make this:
·      Romaine lettuce ($3.99/Romaine heart)
·      Kale ($2.50/bunch)
·      Quinoa ($2.56/pound)
·      Greek dressing ($12.38/bottle)
·      Feta cheese ($3.98/6 ounces)
·      Tomatoes ($4/pound)
·      Corn ($3/bushel)
·      Arborio rice ($2.38/pound)
·      Vegetable stock ($3/32 ounces)
·      Fresh basil ($2.37/ounce)
·      Parmesan cheese ($3.98/8 ounces)
·      Nestle chocolate chip cookie dough ($2.50)
·      Set of plates and utensils

I would definitely need some help to make this, so I would ask my roommate and my mom to help. I would have them come with me to the grocery store in Emory Point to help me find everything and to help me carry everything back. This would take around an hour to find everything, plus the 30-40 minutes to walk there and back. I would then use the kitchen in my dorm to make everything, starting with the cookies because they can sit for a while. Then I would make the risotto because it actually tastes better after it sits for a while. Finally, I would make the Greek with quinoa salad. I think this would end up taking a decent amount of time, mostly because of the time it takes to make the risotto, which is around 45 minutes to an hour. While my mom and I were making everything, I would ask my roommate to set everything up in the Turman longue on the second floor, which provides a great environment because it is comfortable and all the chairs are already in a circle. All I would have to do for this was check with my RA to reserve the space. I believe this entire process of cooking would take around two to three hours.