Regional foodstuff

[NeufUnSix]

What is your local favourite? Something where you live or where you grew up, but cannot get anywhere else it seems. You might be stuck somewhere where they have never heard of food-X, and you will forever live in misery, perhaps getting the ingredients from your hometown in care packages or covert smuggling operations.

You might expect me to say "poutine", but you'd only be partly right. I'm not from Montreal originally, and while a high-quality poutine is a mighty delicious way to a stroke, I have other favourites from my homeland of the Maritimes.

First up is a Nova Scotia classic - the Almighty Donair and all donair-variants. You might have heard of a "doner" or some imitation in the US, usually passed off as a sort of gyro with a bunch of veggies or salsa on it. This is wrong. A true donair is a fast food delicacy found only in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick -  dripping in grease, made from spiced beef loaf that is sliced thin and refried, stuck into a soft pita, covered in a few token bits of onion and tomato, then smothered with the most delicious sweet sauce I've ever come across (it's milk, vinegar, sugar and garlic). Out East we have donair burgers (see above but substitute hamburger buns for a pita) donair pizzas (donair sauce instead of tomato sauce, layer of mozza, then slices of the donair meat on top) and donair panzerottis (take the basic donair formula, fold it into a chewy crust, and bake the whole thing). All are stupendously tasty, even though anyone who is told about a donair usually cringes and changes the subject.

Next up is the OTHER poutine - Acadian poutine rapée (that means grated, not raped). This is an east coast classic that is hard to make, and the best is always produced by some leathery skinned old woman in a farmhouse who sells them out of her porch and is always sold out before noon. Poutine rapée is a large ball of grated potato flesh with a core of seasoned ground beef or pork. It's rolled into a delicate ball and boiled until it becomes a big grey ball that looks as appetizing as a skinned armadillo. But looks are deceiving - slice it up to expose the heart of meat, and then pour a little pile of white sugar on your plate. Roll the chewy potato in the sugar and savour the starchy sweetness. If you say "poutine" east of the New Brunswick/Quebec border, they understand this thing. West of that they think of fries, cheese curds and seasoned gravy.

Anyone else have any site-specific favourites? Spiced cajun alligator tail is one of my "never going to find that again" favourites from the South.

[triangleforge]

Prickly pear cactus fruits are finally getting ripe up here in the highlands of Arizona, so last night we finished making a first batch of prickly pear syrup. It's simply splendid on waffles, pancakes, ice cream, etc. It's got a shocking magenta color to it and a taste that's similar to apple or pear but with a very different twist to it. We'll be making more, but it's nice to have some put up in the canning jars.

And while we're talking cactus, another tasty bit from the prickly pear is the green pad itself, at least the young ones. Called nopal or nopales (the plural, I guess?) in Spanish, they're common in Mexico and easy to find canned in the supermarkets, fresh at the local Mercados and in several dishes on the menus of Mexican restaurants here. Most common preparations are huevos con nopales (eggs & nopales) or carne con nopales (beef & nopales).  The flavor is really yummy -- crunchy, tart and fruity (at least the fresh ones) with a mucilaginous texture just like okra. Yeah, I know -- but I LOVE okra...

One item of local fare I haven't yet tried: javelina,  though there are fresh tracks under the mailbox most mornings; think anyone would notice if I set up one night on the porch with my bow?

[red baron]

My socal favorite.

Birria:

Birria is made using a base of dried roasted peppers. This gives birria both its characteristic savoriness as well as its remarkable variety, as different cooks will chose different peppers to use for the broth base. Birria is served by combining a bowl of broth with freshly chopped roasted meat of the customer's choice. One eats it by filling a corn tortilla with meat, onions and cilantro, seasoning with fresh squeezed lime juice, and then dipping it into the broth before eating it. The broth itself is also eaten with a spoon or by drinking from the bowl.

Also Fish Tacos in Ensenada.

[jdubbs32584]

I'm located in the South, Charlotte in particular. Here are some things I can't really find elsewhere.

Nilla Wafer and Banana Pudding:

Layer Nilla Wafers and sliced bananas with vanilla pudding. Top with whipped cream. Mmmmmm *drool*



And Carolina BBQ (Eastern and Western). I have major trouble finding it anywhere else.

And Price's Chicken Coop. Nationally known for their fried chicken. There's fried chicken everywhere but this place has been mentioned all over nationally. I think its unique to Charlotte.

[Nitewaif]

I have spent the last 10 years traveling all over the country with my job, a few months at a time in each place.  I'm from Memphis, and though Memphis bbq tops the list, I now have cravings from all over the country.  I get angry when a place represents itself as serving Memphis BBQ, then I go in salivating, only to find they serve swill. 

A few that top the list:

New Mexico green chile.  Green chile cheese hashbrowns.  Mmmm!! 
Hot lips pizza and voodoo donuts in Portland.
Smoked fish and chowder (best I've ever had!) at the Smokehouse in Brookings, Oregon.
+1 to Prickly Pear jelly.  I have one jar from a friend in Tucson.  I'm hoarding it.
Coffee in Seattle - for some reason, it all just tastes better when I am there.  Also, Dick's burgers in Seattle.
Gator bites/gator on a stick from New Orleans.
Fried green tomatoes.

I'll be eating at my favorite place in Indy when I go to GP.  Then I'm headed to Memphis for BBQ.  Last time I went home, I ate bbq for every meal, every day for a week.     It was divine!

[teddy037.2]

mmmm... poutine.... 



I'd have to say spam musubi, for something... decidedly local.

not a huge fan of ethnic hawaiian food, but I like to eat it from time to time. everything else is heavily every-asian/western mixed.

[DesmoDiva]

From VT, where I grew up:  White chedar cheese....milk is white, therefore cheese should be white, NOT orange.  (not really that hard to find) and Sugar on snow. 

From AZ, lived at Arcosanti: anything made with prickly pears (juice, sauce, jelly, etc), food at Tara Thai II in Prescott Valley, YUMMY!!!

From Buffalo, now home:  Bison french onion dip (best with dorritos), and of course, wings.
                               

[Bick]

We've got nothing unique...  

Well, Rocky Mountain Oysters, many fine rattlesnake dishes, Rocky Mountain Rainbow Trout...  and the birthplace of Chipotle Grill and Good Times Burgers (made with local Coleman Beef).  

What we do have is more microbreweries per capita than anywhere else in the country          

(and we host the annual Great American Beer Festival)

[ZLTFUL]

Iowa Chops. Both the super thick cut pork chops and the farm league hockey team.
And sweet corn. And I don't give a make the beast with two backs what you say, we ARE the corn state and NO corn in the world beats Peaches and Cream sweet corn. Been to 48 of the 50 states...had corn in each and every one of them...Iowa sweet corn *IS* the best.




The nilla wafers and banana pudding thing is popular here too.

[jdubbs32584]

The nilla wafers and banana pudding thing is popular here too.

Shush! It only exists where I say it exists!

[Jaman]

Growing up - my mom's cooking.  I'm lucky not to weigh 300+lbs.  From travels/various places lived, see below...

Fish tacos - Ensenada, right by the docks, wait for the fish to come in, out of the sea, into the batter & fryer...

Pizza - NYC, Grimaldi's / John's / Vinnies

Street food - Thailand, delicious, but paid for it for a few days following....

Paella - Barcelona, can't remember the restaraunt, but best I've had

Steak - Bueno Aires

French Fries (pomme frites) - Maastricht

Pat's King of Steaks - Philly

Ben's Chili Bowl - DC

La Taqueria burritos - Mission, San Francisco CA

[LMT]

Boiled green peanuts. 

I grew up in the South and they were made fresh at roadside stands, small stores, and some gas stations. 

Here in the West (Seattle now, but CA and OR) we do not even get them in the can.  I have to order them from the Lee Brothers web site.

[SacDuc]

Name that city: Black Bear Soda, squeeky cheese curds, Usingers Sausage, kringle & Sprecher Beer

Hint: Yah der hey!

[pennyrobber]

+1 on the New Mexico green chile. This is the one thing I miss most about NM. It is much like  in that no matter what you put it on, it always makes it better.

[cyrus buelton]

I'll be eating at my favorite place in Indy when I go to GP. 

Which is??