You have to be careful when comparing the US to the rest of the world, because the US is the one breaking the ground of new levels of relatively-well-distributed wealth. (Put aside the question of how well for a moment, please.) For instance, it turns out that the US did not have uniquely bad dietary habits around flour and sugar, it's just that the US was the first to discover people really like to eat that crap and could afford the infrastructure to deploy it; now the bad diets and the consequences are spreading like wildfire as the requisite level of wealth is spreading. (dhughes says Canada is there too, certainly they have that level of wealth too.)

Correspondingly, it is hard to know whether the rest of the world cooks their own meals and don't eat out much because of some sort of intrinsic betterness or culture, or because they simply can't afford it yet. Once people can afford it in more places they may be more inclined to eat out. And if they do, they'll start losing the ability to cook overall. Culture may induce some lag but there's no particularly compelling reason to think that more countries won't follow along.

Not so much, see here: http://www.mint.com/blog/trends/mint-map-global-wealth-distr...

Most of the "western" countries are ahead of the US for distributing wealth amongst the population.

A well-distributed wealth of $15K a year will not show you how that country will necessarily behave when it has a spotty-but-$42K-average wealth.

I suggested strongly that the point not be missed, I guess I should have just cut straight to spelling it out even if it would have broken the flow. You point is not relevant to my point at all.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jamie_oliver.html

And the tragedy is, that Jamie Oliver has failed to bring in change in schools in in the U.K., so he went off for a larger market (U.S.A.). It is a niche area.

[1] http://www.foodincmovie.com/

[2] http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/panorama/2010/12/supermarkets_wha...

This is exactly it. The marketing power behind processed foods has kept generations of Americans from realizing that they're even able to do things that every household did itself when our great-grandparents were alive.

In our home, I bake our sandwich bread. Even my grandmother marvels that I do so, but with a KitchenAid it takes me hardly any time, costs practically nothing ($0.44/loaf) and produces far better bread than any I've found in a store. When my kids begin to need lunchmeat, I'll roast our own turkey and beef: it'll be cheaper, it'll taste better, it won't have preservatives, and my kids will learn from me what I never learned from my own family: that we can feed ourselves.

And somebody seems to be cooking in the poorer neighborhood a short walk away. The grocery stores have fresh vegetables, meat, 10-pound bags of rice, and so on, along with the canned stuff.

I wonder whether the article isn't aimed at readers in their 20s, on their own for a little while, but not really accustomed to a settled life.

(After looking at dhughes's post: my sample is also skewed toward the baby boomers. Caveat lector.)

Over here people invite their friends for dinner all the time, and it would be beyond unacceptable to serve anything not prepared by the host/hostess.

Reading the great Tony Bourdain I learned that what happened in the US happened after WWII; before that time the US was a pretty "normal" country, food-wise.

Did Tony indicate what initiated the change?

But that was mostly based on observations during business trips to France - which most likely skewed our arguments quite a bit.

It turns out that you can make homemade chocolate pudding with only one extra ingredient; cocoa powder, cornstarch, and milk. (A pinch of salt usually improves it, though.)

I still buy rice pudding, though. I've tried making it and it always turns out awfully.

> I still buy rice pudding, though. I've tried making it and it always turns out awfully.

Here's grandma's recipe how to make rice pudding.

Ingredients: 1 liter of milk, 1 or 2 eggs, about half a cup of dessert rice, half to a whole cup of sugar, cinnamon, salt.

Bring the milk to a boil. Put in rice and sugar and a pinch of salt and cook with a lid for about 20 minutes (or whatever the package says). Make sure it doesn't char. In the meantime split the egg yolks from the egg white. Add some sugar to the egg white and whip until creamy with a fork or with a mixer. Add some sugar to the egg yolks and stir until white and creamy. When the rice is ready put out the stove, and add some of the milk to the egg yolks and stir. Then slowly add the egg yolks to the pan while stirring. You need to stir really well otherwise you get bits of solidified egg yolk in your pudding. Next add the egg white and stir. Put in a bowl, cover it with cinnamon and then sugar. Let it cool down for a couple of hours.

My grandma used to say it tastes as if an angel is peeing on your tongue. I can guarantee that it tastes so much better than rice pudding from the supermarket.

Many dishes have a kernel, the essential thing that makes that dish that dish. For puddings it's stirred egg yolk and whipped egg white. Next time you make instant pudding use a little bit less of the instant pudding powder, and add egg yolk stirred with sugar and egg white whipped with sugar in the same way as for the rice pudding. This will improve the flavor and change the texture from a gelatiny pudding to something more like a real custard.

Like chocolate pudding, caramel pudding is just a small variation. Put sugar and a little bit of water in a pan, and heat until brown (not black!). Then add milk or water and dissolve the caramel, and add this to the pudding. Nice with whipped cream.

One cup arborio rice

3 cups milk (or one cup cream/half-half and 2 milk)

Teaspoon of vanilla if you like

Put in non-stick pan

Bring to boil

Turn down to lowest setting for 25mins

When it's done (depends how sticky you like it) Stir in a spoon of sugar and a spoon of butter if you're feeling decadent - or jam or maple syrup or whatever

No, Canada is pretty bad too. I don't know anyone under the age of 30 who cooks, all they do is eat out every single day for every meal.

If they do cook at home it's a frozen pizza or a packaged pasta such as Kraft Dinner.

You're right it's very expensive, I don't know where they get the money. That $10 burger and fries could buy enough food for a few days such as rice, potatoes, pasta.

Breakfast in America is something of a tradition to eat a large one. I walked around many mornings looking for something to eat, and the best I could find most of the time was a sandwich.

In America there are tons of places offering instant meals for a dollar. Fine cuisine and the time honored art of dining (as they experience in France on every meal) is lost. Food is fuel, and you can get a salty, satisfying meal for only a few bucks here which leaves more time to go watch TV, play WoW etc...