Jackie Mason was a scream. Great clip. I remember seeing him back in the day when he’d tell a long joke in English but the punchline was in Yiddish. The audience was howling. Me: What’d he say?
Didn’t translate.
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I found it hilarious, as did several of my friends.
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Same.
Me too. I imagine some might feel triggered by this as it identifies a the value-making embedded in these terms and processes.
Tourist class is cheaper though, if you want bang for the buck!
Bonus mention of CH, HO, and other food sites. I like this guy’s take.
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The article is so pathetic it’s laughable. He disdains using authentic but has no problem using creative. Talk about overused to the point of meaninglessness.
He is blithely unaware.
He also suggests “traditional.” Most importantly, though, GOOD food.
Ah yes, the much preferred ‘good.’
It’s true that you see the word ‘authentic’ all the time on restaurant signs. Because it’s a powerful motivator. And it’s a powerful motivator for a good reason.
There are legions of people who travel to places from Texas to Nepal, from New Orleans to Senegal, and come back realizing just how much better their food is over there. Wherever there is. Real emotions and ideas are behind this, even if questions will always swirl around the concept.
As it should be.
You should write for thrillist
Authentic food that doesn’t taste good is of no use to me. YMCV 
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The length of an HO post is about my limit. That might be the limit of the folks who do write for Thrillist, but that doesn’t stop them.
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I love your Taoist take on this, and agree, authenticity is a thing and meaningful in many contexts, even food contexts. Very hard to define in the context of food, but it is often in difficult pursuits we learn just a little more about authenticity. Tricky with food. When every grandma passed down her authentic recipes, but everybody’s grandma was different. But, I do see the comal and masa de maiz nixtamalizada as an authentic tortilla. Aha, but was the nixtamalization done with pot ash? That would be more authentic to the origin of the food.
On the other hand, it becomes tiresome, so I do understand Natascha’s take. Authenticity can be burdensome and useless in making decision about food. You eat what you like regardless of authenticity.
I bet I’ve tried over 1,000 different moles , made by Mexican elders(grandmas). Some very different from the next. Still, equally authentic, or not. What did I learn? I can take or leave mole. None of those many moles kicked my ass or made me speechless. Many , all, or none were authentic. Doesn’t matter. Guess I’m not a huge mole fan.
On the other hand I had cevaps made by a Serbian grandma who all my Serb friends said where the best of the best. Old country cevaps. Ate a hole in the plate and loved every bite. I felt I’d eaten authentic.
But authentic isn’t a flavor; it’s an ever changing origin story as our knowledge and use of history changes.
You make a great point that word “authentic” has been used and abused to the point to watering the concept down and blurring the understanding of authenticity.
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Every once in awhile I enjoy coming back to this thread that keeps on giving. It, more than almost anything written on HO to date (that I’ve seen anyway), reminds me of the old CH and eGullet rabbit holes and it can be a fun read. So, let me add some fuel to the fire and put in 2 more cents worth on the concept of authenticity.
I consider myself to be authentically a Brooklynite. I am 70 years old, born, raised and live in Bklyn. Only gone for grad school. And my parents, born 1910 & 1922 respectively, were also born, raised and lived in Brooklyn. But, am I really “authentic”? Would those of Native American origins in NYC think so? And, am I the same authentic as others similarly raised here - you know, like Paulie Walnuts from the Sopranos (did I ever mention that I grew up shooting pool with Jr. Sirico in a basement place one block from DiFara’s on Ave J?) or like the 3rd generation Caribbean descent folks in East Flatbush?
I also consider myself to be authentically Jewish. My parents even spoke Yiddish at home & liked Chinese food (yep, that’s my attempt at humor). As far as I know, my family history was authentic enough to be chased out of E. Europe during the late 1800s during the pogroms. But, I was never Bar Mitzvah’ed (long story) and never go to a religious service. And, that Chinese food that my parents (& I) loved included lots of shrimp and pork. And I married a shikzah (a lapsed Catholic one at that). And 3 tribes of Hasidic Jews in Bklyn don’t recognize me as Jewish and don’t look/act like me.
In summary (finally, huh?!) “authenticity” seems to be something we can all agree to be contextual enough to avoid as a directional signal & more helpful as a historical marker, alongside others. Okay, carry on. 
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Where did you attend grad school?
Wash. U in St. Louis. Lived there '75-'81.
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Thanks for joining. I 100% agree that authenticity has many different contexts in which, what is authentic to one is not to another. What do we do logically? We improve the specificity of that context in terms of geography, history, society, etc. If you enjoy the history of anything, you enjoy the search for authenticity in those contexts.
Still don’ t make a sht o’ difference when I’m ordering a gyros…an authentic gyros, or not. I use gyros specifically because of the authentic history of the product: a Grecian/American miracle !
This is going CH on us.
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Thank you for your input 
The problem with the term is that it is often applied to furrn foods from the perspective of an outsider, i.e. expecting a certain dish from a certain area to be this never-changing artifact stuck in some magical time period. Even in the areas where that “authentic” dish originated, it may not only have changed over time, but already include some “deviations” or variations, depending on who is making the dish. “Ethnic” cuisines aren’t some stagnant piece of culture to behold, they are just as alive and prone to riffs & experimentation in their countries of origin or elsewhere as any deconstructed Caesar in the US
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Thank you, @SteveR
And what @linguafood writes reminds me of what I’ve said time and again, here, and back in the land of Chowhound.
What I find unsettling in this (apart from the projections and management borders between us and them-- those lost to modernity and its awful changes and the pure “others” in touch with authentic selves-- is the currency, the economy of value. Whether it’s Pollan insisting we eat like our grandparents (often to the expectations of additional labour for women in a household) to those people who cannot bear to think of themselves as tourists or dabblers, and ensure their difference through appreciation of “authentic”.
It’s not that the word doesn’t exist, or doesn’t have meaning, but it’s so loaded as to be meaningless and often troubling in its implications.
I mean, hang out with people from anywhere and watch a fight break out over the proper preparation of X dish.
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^^This. If not a fight, at least a spirited debate!
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