Can countries have idiosyncrasies? Well, not sure about the word, but I wanted to elaborate some more about things which I found to be different in the US, compared to Israel. I am going to follow the points I jotted down in the previous post, so let’s see how it goes.
Chocolate -
I’ve only tried Hershey’s chocolate bars, and frankly, they suck. They taste like sour milk to me and their texture is too plasticky. The good thing about them is that we have quite a few here at home now and they pose zero temptation to me. In their defense, IsraeliDad thinks they’re great and that they taste much better than the British Cadbury. He’s wrong, of course.
Vegetables -
I was told that vegetables are fairly popular in California. It took us several days to figure out where we could get some. Fortunately, we ran into an Israeli woman living in San Diego. As we shared our lack-of-greens woes, she directed us at the grocery stores that we needed. So, apparently, some places, like Albertson’s do sell you a good selection of vegetables at reasonable prices.
Still, compared to Israel, where vegetables are a fixture of every meal (breakfast, lunch and dinner), they seem to be less frequent in America. Here, you walk into a MacDonald’s and huge posters of fresh salads hit you in the face (sometimes literally, as they hang them quite low). There are several kinds of large, fresh salads. In the US, I had to look carefully at the menus of the fast food places to locate any salad and when it did arrive, it was fairly small and looked sad. Oh, in Disneyland, a side dish of salad was this weird coleslaw with apples and lots of mayo. Go figure.
Ok, the rest of my keen observations will have to wait… time to go be Mom here again.
on May 3rd, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I have to completely agree with you. There is no competition between Cadbury and Hersheys. Its Cadbury hands-down.
on May 3rd, 2009 at 9:11 pm
If you are looking for vegetables in America you can’t go to fast food restaurants! They are not a good representation of upscale American cuisine and many cheap places serve terrible salads. Fast food in general is yucky – steer clear.
In the South they have no concepts of salads. If you ask, they will generally just give you some iceburg lettuce, a sliced tomato and some caesar dumped on it.
on May 5th, 2009 at 9:39 am
What I said was that Hershey’s chocolate bars were good, and tasted the same or even better then most of our local choclates. I was not comparing them to Cadbury because Cadbury’s choclates are the one of the worst I have tasted. Maibe they are good when compered to the British food, … well, I have family there so it would be better to stop right here
on May 5th, 2009 at 12:10 pm
Clarice – it’s interesting, because I was comparing fast-food places to fast-food places. In Israel vegetables are everywhere and at least at MacDonald’s here you have a selection of very fresh large salads. You can get a very healthy meal there if you go for a large salad with roasted chicken breast and a whole-wheat bun.
on May 23rd, 2009 at 10:26 am
Yes, Hershey’s is terrible! Americans are not known for their chocolate, even if they think they are. I’m not a big fan of many of the big “international” brands such as Hershey’s or Cadbury’s – rather I prefer more “local” brands and those completely foreign to the US – the kind that I can find at my local Russian/Euro deli. And I agree with Clarice – our local fast food chains are not big on healthy foods despite their advertisements. I remember the McDonald’s in Europe carrying much of the same foods but one in Morocco actually served halal meat with pita bread and vegetables. A meal for under $5! The sad fact about it is that if you go to any of the poverty-stricken neighborhoods in the US, you won’t find too many large, affordable grocery stores within walking distance, but you’ll find plenty of fast food chains that don’t offer many healthy alternatives. And since many poor people don’t have access to a car, the fast food becomes their only option.