As I said in my post, this was a restaurant run by Korean people to feed Korean people (there was a substantial expat Korean population in Ulan Bator, as Korea was one of Mongolia’s major trading partners at the time). I’m quite certain that it served “proper” Korean food, which I’ve eaten a lot of both in the US and Korea.
“Mongolianised” food would have most of the flavor boiled out of it. I’ve done a lot of eating in the Central Asian steppes and they are not big on tasty cuisine. See also beshbarmak, the national dish of Kazakhstan, which is basically a sheep cut in big chunks and boiled in a cauldron with a couple of onions and maybe a teaspoon of salt, and big flat noodles thrown in at the end. I lived in provincial Kazakhstan for a while, and the only decent food I had there was either cooked by me or served in Uzbek restaurants.
I’ve found it strange that people think it’s normal to order things as “mild” “medium” or “hot” for dishes that require more prep time than you’re sitting at the table.
“I’ll take my beef bourgignon extra-spicy today, thanks!”
Re: Bhutanese food - I worked at a hotel there for a year + but it was 15 years ago, so memories are getting hazy. The “national dish” is ema datse, which is sautéed chilies with cheese. Chilies can be anywhere from hot to insane, and there’s still always extra chili on the side.
I’d usually eat lunch in the staff canteen, there would be rice, dal, and some type of “curry” - sometimes ema datse, but other dishes usually have at least a few chilis. Chilis can be treated as a vegetable or main component. There were times when the spice level was super challenging.
Favorite things were shakam ezay, a dried beef and chili condiment that I would eat as a snack, and momo dumplings with chili sauce on the side.
I also love Szechuan food, though have not been to China.
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Harters
(John Hartley - a culinary patriot, cooking and eating in northwest England)
48
Strange. And totally meaningless as well. Unless you happen to know the restaurant and know what their normal use of chilli is.
My favourite conversation was in a Thai restaurant where I was asked if I wanted it mild, normal or spicy. Spicy, I reply. She then asked, smiling “Is that English spicy, or Thai spicy”. At which point, I bottled out and said “English”.
Not meaningless at all. When I go to a restaurant known for its spicy cuisine - or at least a cuisine known for having many, many spicy dishes, I want s-p-i-c-y. Not American spicy, not German spicy, but >insert cuisine< spicy.
Nothing worse than a som tam without a proper chile kick, or a bland vindaloo.
Yes, I believe you’ve made that point, and I have addressed it by mentioning the many non-spicy dishes available, too. Perhaps you overlooked it.
Having said that, when I am in the mood for spicy food I am bound to hit up a Sichuan, Thai, Malaysian, Indonesian or Indian place to scratch that itch… not Austrian, German, or French.
There’s a Thai place not far from that a friend of mine loved and took me to. First time I had ever been asked this question. I said Mild please.
Green curry arrives, my mouth is on fire (and I can eat spicy food), so I motioned to the waitress and asked if there had been some mistake as my curry was definitely NOT “Mild”. She looked at me with a poker face and said “well this is OUR Mild”.
Meanwhile, my friend has no spice tolerance, so I couldn’t understand how this was her favorite Thai place (She said it must have been a kitchen error as her food is always mild — she can’t digest chilli heat.)
My point about bourgignon was that expecting heat level to be adjustable in dishes that take long time to prep makes as much sense as expecting an equivalent western prep to be adjustable, which no one would dream of
No snark at all. I’m frankly surprised why you are having such a hard time understanding my point, so I’ll try one more time.
To take a previous example of yours, nobody in their right mind would dream of ordering bœuf bourguignon “spicy,” because it isn’t a traditionally spicy dish - just like French food isn’t known for being spicy.
However, when I order mapo tofu or som tam or drunken noodles or vindaloo I expect them to be spicy, because traditionally those dishes are meant to be spicy and don’t constitute a surprise element for the cook like ordering, say, spicy stroganoff would.
FWIW, I wouldn’t have been surprised that a green curry at a good, traditional Thai place would at least have some kick to it. In fact, I’d expect it. Matzoh ball soup? Not so much
Actually I think you have not understood my point at all.
It was not about whether dishes are traditionally spicy or not, but the expectation of what cuisines are adjustable vs. served as “intended” — no one would dream of asking a French restaurant to adjust food to taste (I was being facetious about using spicy bourgignon an example).
When an Indian restaurant offers “mild, medium, spicy” — most if not all those dishes require long cooking and are not actually adjustable “traditionally”.
Vindaloo is not a “mouth on fire” dish — traditionally . Spicy yes, but “how hot can you eat it” is not a notion that exists.
But somehow expectation for some (usually Asian) cuisines is that they should be adjustable away from traditional preparation.
Those who eat or have eaten a lot of a specific dish that is known to have spicy-heat and who are used to the spicy-heatness of that dish native to their country have a greater tolerance to the heat.
But a dish as served the way they’re used to can also be fiery spicy-hot for others not used to that level of heat. So restauranteurs and/or chefs have learned that to continue to sell a dish to “non-native eaters”, they’ll often have to tone down the heat, because the way they’re used to enjoying that dish won’t sell in other cultures without being a good bit milder in spicy-heatness.
Hence, “mild”, “medium” or “hot” or “the way you would eat it” (said by diner to staff member at restaurant). So perhaps restaurants have learned to have varying levels of heat for various dishes. OR they just put a certain number of chili peppers next to a dish so the diner knows that dish is a 3-pepper meal and, if they can only tolerate a 1-pepper meal, look elsewhere on the menu for something to order.
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Harters
(John Hartley - a culinary patriot, cooking and eating in northwest England)
57
Well, you keep ignoring the same points I have made, multiple times at that: namely, that I don’t expect EVERY single dish from a cuisine known to offer MANY to be spicy - just, you know, the ones that SHOULD be
But I’ll bow out of this conversation, as you seem hellbent on bringing up non-applicable (and rather silly) examples - like anyone would expect a Western dish like boeuf bourguignon to be made spicy.
Either you are not reading what I actually wrote, or you are choosing to ignore it to stick with whatever point you’re trying to hammer home that has nothing to do with anything I said.
Agree, Linda, it is an economic decision on the part of the restaurateur.
But here we have been discussing it from the perspective of (knowledgeable) consumers.
(A group of Onions tried a new Thai place that had the 1-3 pepper system a while back, and it was pretty funny because we found the system itself downgraded for the audience )
(She said it must have been a kitchen error as her food is always mild — she can’t digest chilli heat.)
