Food, glorious food. It’s one of the most interesting facets of everyday life. Of course, food is required for survival. As such, its status as an everyday necessity has made every single community around the world develop a unique culinary culture. Food can be functional, or it can serve as an illustration of excess and decadence. The contemporary media landscape is littered with television shows that highlight all aspects of the food world. Netflix’sStreet Foodis a documentary series created by David Gelb and Brian McGinn that focuses on humble, accessible eateries the world over.
The recently releasedseason 3,Street Food: USA, brings the international television series stateside. Each episode of the newest season focuses on a different U.S. city. The documentarians travel the country over in search of simple street fare. They visit the bustling city sidewalks of New York, the quirky kitchens of Portland, and even spend some time in the sun when they visit Miami and Oahu. Audiences get a (metaphorical) taste of this great nation’s wildly varied set of fantastic flavors. Additionally, the series gives its viewers a glimpse into the lives of those who seek to make their lives a little more delicious and how a love of food is reflexive of a broader love for life itself.
Here’s how Netflix’sStreet Food: USAhighlights American diversity.
An Incredibly Wide Range of Food and Flavors
The United States is often pigeonholed by the rest of the world for having an unrefined palate. Stereotypically, the average American is Joey Chestnut, stuffing their face with hot dogs at an alarming rate. WhileStreet Food: USAdoes, in fact, feature several delicious-looking hot dogs, the series also provides evidence that flies in the face of all those who would seek to denigrate food culture in the United States.
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Over the course of six episodes, nearly every type of cuisine imaginable is represented in some form or another. Early on in the Portland episode, audiences are shown avegan Vietnamese restaurant, Thuy Fam’s Mama Dut. The New York episode explores more traditional American fare, like Brooklyn-crust Pizza, but also touches upon such New York staples as halal chicken over rice, which was brought to the city by Middle Eastern immigrants. Miami showcases Cuban chefs, and the Hawaiian episode sees folks gorging on the fresh fish and seafood, which have been the primary comestibles on the remote island nation for thousands of years.
The diverse set of edible options presented effectively highlights thediversity of the chefswho cooked said cuisine, which gives the series a depth that goes beyond the complex flavor profiles brought on by the various chefs' spices.
Stories of Struggle and Success
Of course,Street Food: USAisn’t justabout delicious meals. The series also discusses the challenges faced by the featured chefs. For example, a vendor serving churrasco, a broad term that encompasses several combinations of meat and tortilla, at Los Angeles’s popular Guatemalan Night Market tells horror stories about struggles associated with serving food before street vending was made legal in Los Angeles.
The Guatemalan Night Market’s workers spent years cooking while constantly looking over their shoulders for police officers, who would callously shut down their business without a moment’s hesitation. Though some aspects of selling food on the streets should be regulated in order to assure customer health, the street food business is still subject to superfluous regulations, which seem to be put in place to benefit the owners of more upscale restaurants.
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In the New Orleans episode, audiences are introduced to one of the most famous restaurateurs in the city, Miss Linda, who is better known by her cuisine-inspired moniker,the Yak-a-Mein Lady. Yak-a-mein is a dish that utilizes beef, chicken, or shrimp, alongside eggs and noodles, all stewed in a sweet, spicy broth that combines African and Asian influences.
Miss Linda was once a lunch lady at a local school’s cafeteria. She started her business when Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, which closed down the school she worked at. She decided to follow parade routes and hawk her delicious yak-a-mein. Though Miss Linda has experienced myriad hardships throughout her life, she continues to sell her flavorful noodle soup, believing that food and community go hand in hand.
Being a restaurateurisn’t all tasty treats and ravenous customers. In fact, it can be a challenging way to make a living. However, some struggles can be overshadowed by the immense satisfaction that serving a delicious meal can provide. Everybody has to eat. In a world where the restaurant experience has begun to focus on experience over flavor, it is refreshing to see a series prove that diversity is, both literally and figuratively, the spice of life.
