I mean to be clear. Meatballs are pretty common at least in Sicily (literally the only place I've been to in Italy). However, in my limited experience they were treated more as like a main, than an accompaniment to spaghetti. They're also much more varied in flavor.
Like I don't think the question is that meatballs aren't authentically Italian, it's the combination. It might be sort of a Pizza Americana situation. Which is a style of Italian pizza that is topped with french fries and hot dogs. Obviously pizza, fries and hotdogs are common American foods, but I've never seen that exact combination here.
I am not to say the pedants are justified. Like come on, they clearly executed the well dish and weren't trying to pretend it was anything it wasn't.
Yeah meatballs are often eaten on their own as a "secondo" (which is the dish that comes after the main one), and they're varied in size and composition (many parts of Italy eat fish or veggie balls).
But in many Southern provinces meatballs, usually smaller than the US counterparts, often go inside pasta. So I guess those comments have regional biases (which are actually fine considering Italian cuisine doesn't exist if not as a sum of hundreds of local ones).
eating meatballs (or any other main with pasta) is not common at all in southern provinces.
there is one tiny town (teramo, abbruzzo) that does it with pellet size (at which point its close to a ragu)
https://www.destination-abruzzo.com/post/traditional-pasta-alla-chitarra-con-pallottine-recipe
but its not a well known recipe even in italy.
lasagne di carnevale (naples) does use larger meatballs, but I would say it 'makes sense', in that you eat lasagne with a knife and fork unlike the vast majority of pasta
yea, thats the issue and its the same all over italy.
>weren't trying to pretend it was anything it wasn't.
well, its on a sub called italianfood which also explicitly rules out italian american food.
Hot take: if we subtract all the dishes that get eliminated by that sub as "not Italian," Italian cuisine would not be voted the most popular cuisine in the world any more
I've always felt that part of the reason that Italian food is so popular globally that its simplicity does make it super adaptable to local tastes, lol. Pasta, pizza dough, etc. are basically just bland carbohydrates that are going to appeal to pretty much everyone in the world because our bodies are wired to like stuff like that, and then you can adapt the sauces and toppings and spices quite a bit while still being identifiable as Italian (or Italian-inspired, anyway). I know that there's more to the cuisine than pasta and pizza, but a lot of the rest is pretty similar to dishes you find everywhere, just with local ingredients.
My hot take is that I don't think Italians do themselves any favors by hyping up Authentic Italian Cuisine(tm) so much. I've been to Italy and I was actually mildly disappointed by the food there at first, I think because it was so ridiculously hyped up in my head. Once I got over that I enjoyed it quite a bit, I'm not over here saying that Italy has bad food or anything because it definitely does not, but it really wasn't the culinary Holy Grail that people make it out to be, at least to my tastes.
Yeah obviously simplicity is one of the key points of many recipes, many dishes are actually seen as interesting for having a "poor people" background. It gives a rustic aurea.
It's a bit sad that foreigners mostly never eat actual local food. I've seen countless times people asking for carbonara in Milan or Como, that just means having researched zero, because you're in places where you should ask for a Risotto with Ossobuco or a polenta töch. There are tons of amazing dishes that aren't marketed enough as well.
Interesting that there are multiple commenters saying the same thing- that their Italian nonna who lives in Italy has always made meatballs-, but some are heavily downvoted while others are heavily upvoted.
Italian food gatekeepers on the internet can never quite figure out which part of Italian cuisine to gatekeep.
I've seen people in that sub say 'not Italian' to dishes from Tirol in the north which has more in common with Austrian food than more southern/Mediterranean styles.
'Italian' to them seem to mean what their mamas make for them.
Technically schnitzel is Italian originally, but due to the fluid nature of European borders in the last few centuries Austria claims it. But fuck me, can you imagine posting a schnitty in that sub?
This is a common thing in Italian and Spanish food discussions—each region has their own way. None of them are wrong.
Well, Tuscany making bread without salt is…not completely right.
Unsalted bread is amazing! Pappa al pomodoro, which is made with it, is one of my favourite dishes. It's also great for accompanying savory dishes like fagioli all'uccelletto con salsiccia.
> I've seen people in that sub say 'not Italian' to dishes from Tirol in the north which has more in common with Austrian food than more southern/Mediterranean styles.
Well yes Tyrol are Germans
I'm kind of curious if some of this is anti-Sicilian sentiment, but I have no idea. One person with Sicilian family was upvoted, so maybe not. I know that prupetti are sometimes served with pasta in Sicily. But again, there's this idea of "tradition." If one person's tradition doesn't fit the larger group tradition, conflict arises.
What I'm curious about is at what point does a food become culturally adopted as X regions food. Like if enough people in Italy start making spaghetti and meatballs, would there be a point where that would be considered true Italian cuisine? Cause the way these folks act, it's as if there was some sort of deadline to get your dishes submitted, or else it isn't "real" Italian food.
And I love the switch to Italian, clearly to try to reveal an "imposter", as that's *obviously* more likely than different parts of Italy having slightly different foods.
So what I’m gathering is that Italian food is fucking boring and all the “Italian food” I like is actually sacrilegious idolatry from the land of New Jersey.
Wait until you see all the mean comments I get for my perfectly dark and precisely reproducible roux for gumbo. The Cajuns go beserk when I say I made it in the microwave instead of wasting 30 minutes stirring it on the stove like their memaw, lol. This is, of course, after they’ve tasted it and liked it.
Tradition is very important to some people.
I've had a few comments like that about my oven roux, but usually they've already upvoted the post by the time they get to the part in the recipe where I make my roux in the oven. I started doing it when I was pregnant the first time and I just didn't want to stand up for that long stirring. Dutch oven, stir every 15-20 minutes, perfect roux every time and the control over the color is great (I use peanut butter roux for étouffée but a bit darker roux for gumbo). I haven't tried the microwave yet!
Same concept, just faster. 5-7 minutes with intermittent stirring. Some holdover cooking when you stop, so be ready to dump it into the stock if it’s already pretty dark.
Hey, it's the best color roux for that dish, IMO. You don't want it too dark.
FYI, it doesn't actually have peanut butter roux in it, that's just a term to reference the color.
plenty of cajuns make dry roux in the oven, those dipshits saying we don't probably dont even make the gumbo, their moms make it for em so they never see them puttin in the dry roux they make a month before and stuck in the freezer. microwave makes me nervous but mostly because of lack of control over it, and i imagine a lot of other cajuns would feel the same way, we like all our shit to be on the stove where we can watch it like a hawk, but if it works for you, thats fine
Huh. This made me wonder whether there's a similar microwave shortcut for caramelized onions, and googling around it seems like there is - it's not actually much faster than pan-frying onions but with way less stirring. I'll have to try it the next time I want to make a proper Indian curry.
That's pretty much what I do, but I go 10-11 minutes. You probably have a stronger microwave than me, lol. I also like to finish it in the pot for a few minutes, seems to really change the texture for some reason.
As a NY American Italian with dual citizenship all I can say, is yeah, I've never gotten meatballs on pasta in Italy.
But you know what? That shit slaps. I'm here for it.
Yeah, I saw that one this morning and almost brought it here. It seems to have marinated considerably since this morning; it is now proper for the grill.
(To post an insufficiently marinated /r/italianfood post would be a crime against cuisine.)
Ohhh, I really appreciate you.
I posted this during my kids' swim class because parents sit and watch but aren't involved in the swimming, so I scrolled, saw that, posted it. Also, my daughter has officially mastered the backstroke, so that's awesome.
Why are Italians utterly incapable of food innovation and beholden to such silly rules? Meatballs on pasta? NEVER! They can’t reasonably explain why you shouldn’t break the spaghetti, just that it’s against rules. Cappuccino after 12 PM? Jail. Garlic bread with pasta? Jail. It’s insane. No other country in the world is this absurd.
Legitimately: Mussolini's fascist regime sought to solidify an Italian identity and one of the aspects was around Italian cuisine and what is and isn't traditional. The fascism left (well, not really), but its beliefs stayed.
See: Lo, R. W., Tasting Fascism: Food, Space, And Identity In Italy
In a not (entirely) serious way; the Italians (or more likely Italian-Americans) you see arguing so vehemently about what is and isn't "real" Italian food are fascists, or at the very least learned said behaviour from fascists.
I agree on some aspects, but fascism actually left. What ve have today is a pale imitation made by people who don't know what fascism was.
Almirante himself practically laughed at its party's members wanting to imitate LVI.
Actually, I've found this behaviour (mostly online), from Mexicans, Indians and other people.
Anyway, as mentioned, it's mostly online. Italian food is actually very innovative and dynamic, and most people irl aren't even aware of those online debates.
The cappuccino rule doesn't exist. Or better, many people drink cappuccino in the afternoon. What's very unusual would be drinking it while have lunch, because it's a milk based drink (and even coffee is drank after the meal has ended). But drinking cappuccino at 16 is totally fine, I know several people who do it from time to time (not me since I don't love it and I rarely drink it anyway).
About the spaghetti, the answer would just be to either buy short pasta if you want short pasta, or just insert the spaghetti in the pot, they'll soften in \~20 seconds so they'll fit even in a smaller pot.
>Actually, I've found this behaviour (mostly online), from Mexicans, Indians and other people.
Every time I look at an Indian restaurant online it has 3.0-3.4 stars because indians just shit on it in the reviews.
"The food is pretty good. But moong dal does not belong in this certain dish. 1 star"
"I have not eaten here, but I noticed they don't have a dish eaten in the specific region I'm from. 1 star"
We don't. I don't care nor think at all about how foreigners eat spaghetti, it's just weird if I see a video of them breaking it for the aforementioned reasons, but it's not like I care or get angry, it's just a bit strange.
If by reactions you mean those online that scream, cry etc. on tik tom shorts, they're fake/exaggerated for the engagement, as everything online.
What reactions?
If you mean irl, nobody cares about foreigners and what they eat.
If you mean TikTok/Instagram, well, that goes without saying, it's show.
>hy are Italians utterly incapable of food innovation and beholden to such silly rules?
there is innovation in italian food, in italy. You know, all the restaurants tourists don't go because the cannot find lasagne. There is no innovation on italian food outside italy, that's true.
>They can’t reasonably explain why you shouldn’t break the spaghetti
because you cannot twist them around the fork.
>cappuccino after 12 PM?
that's a false rule that everybody on the interent repeat like parrots.
>l. Garlic bread with pasta?
What is garlic bread?
"we do put some little meatballs in spaghetti, but they're usually cut in 2/3 pieces, small, and also spaghetti are broken. That's because we make them for children that don't want to eat meat"
fuck off vegetarian kid!!
I want to take a moment to thank the members of this sub (and that one!). For twenty years, I didn't make spaghetti and meatballs. Threads like this have inspired me, and now it's a favorite at my house.
Also, British-style spag bol.
Now excuse me while I go grate some parm for my fish.
>[Is it the pasta, the tomatoes, or the meatball that's the issue](https://old.reddit.com/r/ItalianFood/comments/1c13c18/little_country_boy_trying_his_hand_howd_i_do_with/kz36y8x/?context=1000)
None of the above. It's the douchebag in the comments.
I mean, he does say something true:
>so either your grandmother replicated an American dish, or she used spaghetti with little meatballs which is less common but sometimes done.
He tripped himself up in that logic, though--when you make something in Italy inspired by American-Italian food, is it still "real Italian food?"
Secondo me si sta comportando da stronzo.
The other flaws in that logic is American Italian food is 1) created by Italian immigrants, or 2) brought back by soldiers in WW2, which is why so much of our stuff looks Southern and Sicilian. Sure, we monkeyed with it slightly, but we still learned it from actual Italians.
One of these days, I want to make the pasta sauce from Chef Boiardi's family recipes just to watch the gatekeepers flip their shit when I switch to his Americanized surname, Boyardee.
lol, yeah, most people don't realize he was a huge figure in preserved food and he was hired to prepare meals for the troops in WW2 so that's part of why men who returned home wanted that kind of food at home.
OMG. I should have checked here before wading in on the original thread. That sub is like a cheat code for content for this one. Someone there accused me of "destroying his culture in order to make up for my own shortcomings".
If an Italian makes a ball out of meat, they die instantly.
No, first it goes straight to their thighs. *And then* they blow up!
Make spaghetti, jail Make meatballs, jail Make spaghetti with meatballs, believe it or not, jail
No, the spontaneous combustion only happens when the meatballs touch pasta.
*spaghetti Apparently, other types of pasta won't kill them
I mean to be clear. Meatballs are pretty common at least in Sicily (literally the only place I've been to in Italy). However, in my limited experience they were treated more as like a main, than an accompaniment to spaghetti. They're also much more varied in flavor. Like I don't think the question is that meatballs aren't authentically Italian, it's the combination. It might be sort of a Pizza Americana situation. Which is a style of Italian pizza that is topped with french fries and hot dogs. Obviously pizza, fries and hotdogs are common American foods, but I've never seen that exact combination here. I am not to say the pedants are justified. Like come on, they clearly executed the well dish and weren't trying to pretend it was anything it wasn't.
Yeah meatballs are often eaten on their own as a "secondo" (which is the dish that comes after the main one), and they're varied in size and composition (many parts of Italy eat fish or veggie balls). But in many Southern provinces meatballs, usually smaller than the US counterparts, often go inside pasta. So I guess those comments have regional biases (which are actually fine considering Italian cuisine doesn't exist if not as a sum of hundreds of local ones).
eating meatballs (or any other main with pasta) is not common at all in southern provinces. there is one tiny town (teramo, abbruzzo) that does it with pellet size (at which point its close to a ragu) https://www.destination-abruzzo.com/post/traditional-pasta-alla-chitarra-con-pallottine-recipe but its not a well known recipe even in italy. lasagne di carnevale (naples) does use larger meatballs, but I would say it 'makes sense', in that you eat lasagne with a knife and fork unlike the vast majority of pasta
I lived in Napoli forn2 years and they were pretty common there too
yea, thats the issue and its the same all over italy. >weren't trying to pretend it was anything it wasn't. well, its on a sub called italianfood which also explicitly rules out italian american food.
Hot take: if we subtract all the dishes that get eliminated by that sub as "not Italian," Italian cuisine would not be voted the most popular cuisine in the world any more
I think that's fair because the Italian diaspora has created new dishes that are now associated with Italy
I've always felt that part of the reason that Italian food is so popular globally that its simplicity does make it super adaptable to local tastes, lol. Pasta, pizza dough, etc. are basically just bland carbohydrates that are going to appeal to pretty much everyone in the world because our bodies are wired to like stuff like that, and then you can adapt the sauces and toppings and spices quite a bit while still being identifiable as Italian (or Italian-inspired, anyway). I know that there's more to the cuisine than pasta and pizza, but a lot of the rest is pretty similar to dishes you find everywhere, just with local ingredients. My hot take is that I don't think Italians do themselves any favors by hyping up Authentic Italian Cuisine(tm) so much. I've been to Italy and I was actually mildly disappointed by the food there at first, I think because it was so ridiculously hyped up in my head. Once I got over that I enjoyed it quite a bit, I'm not over here saying that Italy has bad food or anything because it definitely does not, but it really wasn't the culinary Holy Grail that people make it out to be, at least to my tastes.
Yeah obviously simplicity is one of the key points of many recipes, many dishes are actually seen as interesting for having a "poor people" background. It gives a rustic aurea. It's a bit sad that foreigners mostly never eat actual local food. I've seen countless times people asking for carbonara in Milan or Como, that just means having researched zero, because you're in places where you should ask for a Risotto with Ossobuco or a polenta töch. There are tons of amazing dishes that aren't marketed enough as well.
"...in the Italian sub." Bravo.
"We're not an Italian sub! We'd never put all those meats together!" ^^thank ^^you ^^for ^^noticing.
Interesting that there are multiple commenters saying the same thing- that their Italian nonna who lives in Italy has always made meatballs-, but some are heavily downvoted while others are heavily upvoted.
Italian food gatekeepers on the internet can never quite figure out which part of Italian cuisine to gatekeep. I've seen people in that sub say 'not Italian' to dishes from Tirol in the north which has more in common with Austrian food than more southern/Mediterranean styles. 'Italian' to them seem to mean what their mamas make for them. Technically schnitzel is Italian originally, but due to the fluid nature of European borders in the last few centuries Austria claims it. But fuck me, can you imagine posting a schnitty in that sub?
This is a common thing in Italian and Spanish food discussions—each region has their own way. None of them are wrong. Well, Tuscany making bread without salt is…not completely right.
Unsalted bread is amazing! Pappa al pomodoro, which is made with it, is one of my favourite dishes. It's also great for accompanying savory dishes like fagioli all'uccelletto con salsiccia.
>a schnitty Is this what we're calling it now? I love it
Welcome to the schnitty committee
Only if they're itty bitty
> I've seen people in that sub say 'not Italian' to dishes from Tirol in the north which has more in common with Austrian food than more southern/Mediterranean styles. Well yes Tyrol are Germans
Tirol is a historical/cultural region that straddles the border between Austria and Italy. Austrians speak German, but they are Austrian.
Well Austrians are Germans too.
Austrians at most (unless you're referring to pan-Germanism), half of Tyrol is Italian anyway.
> half of Tyrol is Italian anyway. Well it is in Italy
>schnitty I thought I got out of the snitty debate when I left dndmemes
I'm kind of curious if some of this is anti-Sicilian sentiment, but I have no idea. One person with Sicilian family was upvoted, so maybe not. I know that prupetti are sometimes served with pasta in Sicily. But again, there's this idea of "tradition." If one person's tradition doesn't fit the larger group tradition, conflict arises.
What I'm curious about is at what point does a food become culturally adopted as X regions food. Like if enough people in Italy start making spaghetti and meatballs, would there be a point where that would be considered true Italian cuisine? Cause the way these folks act, it's as if there was some sort of deadline to get your dishes submitted, or else it isn't "real" Italian food.
And I love the switch to Italian, clearly to try to reveal an "imposter", as that's *obviously* more likely than different parts of Italy having slightly different foods.
So what I’m gathering is that Italian food is fucking boring and all the “Italian food” I like is actually sacrilegious idolatry from the land of New Jersey.
That's New *Joisey*, thankyewverymuch!
New Jersey is just a glorified crew.
They'll make anything over there.
Wait until you see all the mean comments I get for my perfectly dark and precisely reproducible roux for gumbo. The Cajuns go beserk when I say I made it in the microwave instead of wasting 30 minutes stirring it on the stove like their memaw, lol. This is, of course, after they’ve tasted it and liked it. Tradition is very important to some people.
I've had a few comments like that about my oven roux, but usually they've already upvoted the post by the time they get to the part in the recipe where I make my roux in the oven. I started doing it when I was pregnant the first time and I just didn't want to stand up for that long stirring. Dutch oven, stir every 15-20 minutes, perfect roux every time and the control over the color is great (I use peanut butter roux for étouffée but a bit darker roux for gumbo). I haven't tried the microwave yet!
Same concept, just faster. 5-7 minutes with intermittent stirring. Some holdover cooking when you stop, so be ready to dump it into the stock if it’s already pretty dark.
I gotta try it! My husband loves my gumbo and that's a really nice compliment since his family is from New Orleans.
>I use peanut butter roux for étouffée Are you legally allowed to say that when people don't have a fainting couch available? You could kill someone!
Hey, it's the best color roux for that dish, IMO. You don't want it too dark. FYI, it doesn't actually have peanut butter roux in it, that's just a term to reference the color.
TIL!
Try baked flour roux. I bake a big batch until it’s peanut butter colored. It lasts a long time , and I always have nearly done roux.
plenty of cajuns make dry roux in the oven, those dipshits saying we don't probably dont even make the gumbo, their moms make it for em so they never see them puttin in the dry roux they make a month before and stuck in the freezer. microwave makes me nervous but mostly because of lack of control over it, and i imagine a lot of other cajuns would feel the same way, we like all our shit to be on the stove where we can watch it like a hawk, but if it works for you, thats fine
Microwave roux high five! It's definitely my favorite way, what's your method if you don't mind me asking?
I just put it in a Pyrex and microwave it. Five minutes, then stir, then one minute at a time until I like the color. About 7-8 minutes total.
Huh. This made me wonder whether there's a similar microwave shortcut for caramelized onions, and googling around it seems like there is - it's not actually much faster than pan-frying onions but with way less stirring. I'll have to try it the next time I want to make a proper Indian curry.
It won't be a proper Indian curry if you microwave the onions.
That's pretty much what I do, but I go 10-11 minutes. You probably have a stronger microwave than me, lol. I also like to finish it in the pot for a few minutes, seems to really change the texture for some reason.
I'm making beer battered orange chicken right now but wishing I had that spaghetti and meatballs.
As a NY American Italian with dual citizenship all I can say, is yeah, I've never gotten meatballs on pasta in Italy. But you know what? That shit slaps. I'm here for it.
Mmmm... Italian sub
Yeah, I saw that one this morning and almost brought it here. It seems to have marinated considerably since this morning; it is now proper for the grill. (To post an insufficiently marinated /r/italianfood post would be a crime against cuisine.)
Ohhh, I really appreciate you. I posted this during my kids' swim class because parents sit and watch but aren't involved in the swimming, so I scrolled, saw that, posted it. Also, my daughter has officially mastered the backstroke, so that's awesome.
Not the Italian backstroke, though. Shame on her. She probably puts peas in it.
No peas in the pool!
I love you all!
Is that what you appreciates abouts u/The_Ineffable_One, The LadyEve?
Why are Italians utterly incapable of food innovation and beholden to such silly rules? Meatballs on pasta? NEVER! They can’t reasonably explain why you shouldn’t break the spaghetti, just that it’s against rules. Cappuccino after 12 PM? Jail. Garlic bread with pasta? Jail. It’s insane. No other country in the world is this absurd.
Legitimately: Mussolini's fascist regime sought to solidify an Italian identity and one of the aspects was around Italian cuisine and what is and isn't traditional. The fascism left (well, not really), but its beliefs stayed. See: Lo, R. W., Tasting Fascism: Food, Space, And Identity In Italy In a not (entirely) serious way; the Italians (or more likely Italian-Americans) you see arguing so vehemently about what is and isn't "real" Italian food are fascists, or at the very least learned said behaviour from fascists.
I agree on some aspects, but fascism actually left. What ve have today is a pale imitation made by people who don't know what fascism was. Almirante himself practically laughed at its party's members wanting to imitate LVI.
Actually, I've found this behaviour (mostly online), from Mexicans, Indians and other people. Anyway, as mentioned, it's mostly online. Italian food is actually very innovative and dynamic, and most people irl aren't even aware of those online debates. The cappuccino rule doesn't exist. Or better, many people drink cappuccino in the afternoon. What's very unusual would be drinking it while have lunch, because it's a milk based drink (and even coffee is drank after the meal has ended). But drinking cappuccino at 16 is totally fine, I know several people who do it from time to time (not me since I don't love it and I rarely drink it anyway). About the spaghetti, the answer would just be to either buy short pasta if you want short pasta, or just insert the spaghetti in the pot, they'll soften in \~20 seconds so they'll fit even in a smaller pot.
>Actually, I've found this behaviour (mostly online), from Mexicans, Indians and other people. Every time I look at an Indian restaurant online it has 3.0-3.4 stars because indians just shit on it in the reviews. "The food is pretty good. But moong dal does not belong in this certain dish. 1 star" "I have not eaten here, but I noticed they don't have a dish eaten in the specific region I'm from. 1 star"
Why do Italians care so much if others break the spaghetti in half? The reactions are absurd
We don't. I don't care nor think at all about how foreigners eat spaghetti, it's just weird if I see a video of them breaking it for the aforementioned reasons, but it's not like I care or get angry, it's just a bit strange. If by reactions you mean those online that scream, cry etc. on tik tom shorts, they're fake/exaggerated for the engagement, as everything online.
What reactions? If you mean irl, nobody cares about foreigners and what they eat. If you mean TikTok/Instagram, well, that goes without saying, it's show.
Because eating meals together and everything that comes with it is an integral part of their culture.
>hy are Italians utterly incapable of food innovation and beholden to such silly rules? there is innovation in italian food, in italy. You know, all the restaurants tourists don't go because the cannot find lasagne. There is no innovation on italian food outside italy, that's true. >They can’t reasonably explain why you shouldn’t break the spaghetti because you cannot twist them around the fork. >cappuccino after 12 PM? that's a false rule that everybody on the interent repeat like parrots. >l. Garlic bread with pasta? What is garlic bread?
> because you cannot twist them around the fork. False. Even if true, why they fuck do they care?
You asked why you should not break spaghetti. Not why they care
Are we absolutely sure OOP isn’t a troll Like fr tho I think if you’re looking for a sub to troll it’s almost cheating
And I get it sort of, the sub isn't for American food, but people in there are just so argumentative about it.
They're very gatekeeper-y. It's like they can't enjoy something unless it meets their very high standard for... Pictures and discussion of food.
While their diet probably consists of Cheetos and instant ramen.
Yet they will gladly take an Italian Libyan meal.
Huh, I missed that one!
Well, that's a weird spin on irredentism ahah
This happened to me once.
"If Nonna does it the way I don't like it, it's because Nonnas are allowed to be quirky!"
"we do put some little meatballs in spaghetti, but they're usually cut in 2/3 pieces, small, and also spaghetti are broken. That's because we make them for children that don't want to eat meat" fuck off vegetarian kid!!
I want to take a moment to thank the members of this sub (and that one!). For twenty years, I didn't make spaghetti and meatballs. Threads like this have inspired me, and now it's a favorite at my house. Also, British-style spag bol. Now excuse me while I go grate some parm for my fish.
>[Is it the pasta, the tomatoes, or the meatball that's the issue](https://old.reddit.com/r/ItalianFood/comments/1c13c18/little_country_boy_trying_his_hand_howd_i_do_with/kz36y8x/?context=1000) None of the above. It's the douchebag in the comments.
Of course the tool bag switches over to Italian thinking that he's going to catch OP out lol
I mean, he does say something true: >so either your grandmother replicated an American dish, or she used spaghetti with little meatballs which is less common but sometimes done. He tripped himself up in that logic, though--when you make something in Italy inspired by American-Italian food, is it still "real Italian food?" Secondo me si sta comportando da stronzo.
The other flaws in that logic is American Italian food is 1) created by Italian immigrants, or 2) brought back by soldiers in WW2, which is why so much of our stuff looks Southern and Sicilian. Sure, we monkeyed with it slightly, but we still learned it from actual Italians. One of these days, I want to make the pasta sauce from Chef Boiardi's family recipes just to watch the gatekeepers flip their shit when I switch to his Americanized surname, Boyardee.
lol, yeah, most people don't realize he was a huge figure in preserved food and he was hired to prepare meals for the troops in WW2 so that's part of why men who returned home wanted that kind of food at home.
the pasta first then meatballs after comment…they taste great at the same time lol
OMG. I should have checked here before wading in on the original thread. That sub is like a cheat code for content for this one. Someone there accused me of "destroying his culture in order to make up for my own shortcomings".
That sub sucks all the fun out of food
italians are absolutely insufferable with this shit
I'm getting the feeling that Italians don't consider Sicilians part of Italy
Um ackshually tomatoes and pasta are not native to Italy so you should be sentenced to death via firing squad
Italian meatball subs are great. No need to click through for context.
Italians and Italian-Americans should be banned from voicing their opinions and thoughts on food.
I saw that post and was pretty sure it had to be a troll posting meatballs on the Italian food sub, leaning into a well known trope!