Comment by FooBarBizBazz
3 years ago
Found this interesting:
> The Great Wave off Kanagawa is now considered a japanese masterpiece, but in reality is heavily influenced by Dutch landscapes and Japan at the time considered it almost foreign art. As if some european now did anime.
A lot of great things seem to happen this way. Not being so cultured, I think of food. Whether katsu (Portuguese), massaman curry (Persian), pav bhaji (Portuguese again), guilty American pleasures like General Tso's (Taiping-era Chinese refugees), or your favorite Vietnamese patisserie (out-French the French), these collisions seem to produce great things.
100%.
The entire industry of japanese bakery happened almost by accident. After WW2 America forced Japan to buy its exports and one of the things america had loads of was Wheat. Well japan already had rice as its staple food so what where they gonna do with this wheat?
They made tons of flour and made loads of baked goods, that are incredible nowadays. (Its a country with sweet tooth and it shows).
Another brilliant thing they did was electrocute the bread and make Panko, which is crispier and healthier than normal breadcrumbs. Something europeans hadn't thought off cause we made bread the same way for a thousand years.
> electrocute the bread and make Panko
The Germans are kicking themselves. "Use electrocution to make schnitzel! Why didn't we think of that?!"