this post was submitted on 07 Feb 2026
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2 North American 4 You
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All of these foods were created by people from these countries who immigrated to the US
Also, gatekeeping food is annoying
I don't think I have actually ever seen any actual indigenous individual of a culture get mad at someone for cooking food from their own culture.
But I don't know if that's because the people who would've been mad about it got genocided and no longer exist, or if it's because people actually just don't care.
The people I HAVE witnessed getting angry about that sort of thing ... were white. I suppose they're trying to be 'culturally sensitive' but isn't that just kinda ... patronizing and infantilizing? low-key "talking over" them? As if to imply they need a white savior swooping down to the rescue >.< it just makes me uncomfortable.
White people just can't stand to be uninvolved. They don't call it brown knighting now, do they?
Yes! I hate the "this is not authentic" argument so much because it is so dumb. Stuff changes, taste changes and if people enjoy it, who gives a shit for authenticity points? This is so incredibly dumb it really makes me angry.
Furthermore, "X isn't as authentic as it is in X country" is lowkey bigoted towards immigrants. A lot of the times, the dishes being talked about are ones made by immigrants who are trying to cook dishes they are familiar with but using ingredients and equipment available to them in their new home. Whenever I hear about "authenticity" arguments, it's always acting like this food was being made by white Americans trying to krib and distort another culture's food to suit their palate, instead of immigrants authentically expressing their culture with what's available in their new context.
I for one can't think of anything more authentic than someone applying their cultural knowledge in creative and unique ways to survive and make a life in an environment unfamiliar to them.
Being something of a burrito connoisseur, I can certainly tell you what a bad burrito tastes like. It tastes like McDonald's greasy fucking cutting boards.
Okay? I don't know how you read my comment as a defense of McDonald's.
You weren't, I'm not angry, just emphatic. There is absolutely such a thing as food so bad it's an insult to its origins. And McDonald's has the worst burritos on Earth.
The "this is not authentic" exist because the food is sold as "authentic".