Traditional American Food

Well, if you’re serving fried chicken, and it’s a buffet, you must have Campbell’s green bean casserole. Baked beans is also a traditional side-dish which can easily be bought in cans and heated up if you don’t want to add the pork and bacon. There’s always scalloped potatoes just for effect as well. We also usually have a large tossed salad – various lettuces, carrots, tomatoes, cucumbers with a variety of dressings. My favorite dessert/salad is a mix of a package of mini-marshmallows, a 16 oz carton of sour cream, a can of fruit cocktail, and a can of mandarin oranges. Mix it up, put some cherries on top, and convince yourself that you’ve had your fruit requirement for the day 😉 I usually double or triple the recipe as it goes fast. My oldest will live on it, eating nothing else until it is gone.

Roast beef is usually a Sunday family dinner and the sides would be more plain vegetables, green beans, peas, etc., the salad, and biscuits and/or bread to soak up the roast beef juice.

Make sure to have lots of pop (soda) – Coke, Sprite, Root Beer, and all diet and non-caffeinated versions available with ice tea and coffee as well.

And in case the kiddies hate all this “foreign” food, we usually have peanutbutter and jelly finger sandwiches.

Hope that helps!

Weird *rubs her head* Hahah, traditional american food. Do we have anything traditional? I mean, everything’s getting revamped all the time. *laughing*

Anyway, I can only suggest things I know my granny used to make (since my parents didn’t cook). Green Bean or Tator Tot Hot Dish (or casarol since I’m midwestern we call it hot dish heheh).

Pigs in a blanket…where you take hot dogs and a can of that cressant dough and wrap the hot dogs up in them and throw em in the oven…

Grilled Cheese and Tomato soup *shrug*

Crock Pot roast beef with carrots and potatoes…

Hahah really I have no idea. But those are a couple things I know we’d do a lot.

Well, the burgers and hot dogs are definitely staples at most summer-time gatherings. To make the burgers special, add a packet of dried onion soup mix to a pound of burger. We Americans do like steak on the grill, too, but that would be very expensive for a crowd.

Also – how could I have forgotten my favorite dish to bring . . . macaroni and cheese. I must admit that I cheat by cooking up a few pans of Stouffers frozen mac and cheese, then pour it into my pot and everyone thinks I can cook 😉

And about the eggsalad (no offense to the Mr) . . . usually we do deviled eggs although it is alot of work. Be careful of either though, they go bad quickly if left out in the heat.

Oh, and pigs in a blanket here in the eastern-midwest are breakfast sausages wrapped in a pancake. American fare really does differ from region to region . . . but it’s all GOOD!

How about American Potato Salad? Though around where I live German Potato Salad is also a fav. Most of our “traditional” foods are taken either from other countries or are really modern OR variations of food from other countries. Taco salad might be another thing…or a 7 Layer salad. (yum…it’s kind of like what my hubby calls a Russian Salad ) I have access to all the historical, traditional recipes you want at my fingertips you you’d like them…considering I work at a museum that does those kinds of things.
Just let me know..and I’ll dig them up for you. (Though these old recipes are basically “Yankee” which means from the East Coast and they are basically knock-off’s of English recipes! LOL)

Just one more quick word . . . for special events, we often serve ham. It can be sliced, made into a sandwich, or enjoyed cold. A very versatile meat.

okay i’m a little (or a lot) late on this one, but who can forget APPLE PIE A LA MODE? nothing is more american than hot apple pie with a huge scoop of vanilla ice cream!