Stephanie discovered an amazing cafe in my area the other day, and when I googled it, one of the first results was A Certain Local Food Blog I Sometimes Like To Hateread.
And so this bingo card was born: things white foodies say about ~ethnic~ restaurants and cafes.
(We didn’t set out for this to be a week of food politics. We just really enjoy food, and also food politics.)
| “I thought the food would be too spicy, but…” | Authenticity! | “Try to overlook the shabby decor…” | “It’s [culture’s] version of [familiar Chinese dish which may or may not have been invented in Australia]” | “You’re meant to share the dishes, but…” |
| “You really expect to be paying these sorts of prices for Western European food…” | There’s an elderly immigrant lady who wants nothing more than to feed white people | Free
Square |
The food is “unassuming” | “We used to think of [gentrifying suburb] as a wasteland but now it’s worth visiting!” |
| “[Culture’s] food is about to become the next big thing.” | Multicultural! | “Isn’t Uber great?” | “The menu calls the dish X, but I think it’s actually Y.” | “Pan-Asian” |
| “I wouldn’t have thought [cuisine] could accommodate vegans, but…” | “And so we’re off to the opening of a new hipster cafe…” | Something something MSG | “It’s so weird how lots of people from the same background live around here…” | “It’s so homey, you picture the owner’s mum in the kitchen!” |
no-award.net 
Now I am dying to know what blog.
I’ll never tell! In writing!
Ahahaha, I recognise a number of these from my food blog reading in the past week (and the rest from my food blog reading in the past decade). I know I’ve been guilty of using a couple of these clangers myself.
Incidentally, I’ve tried to rid my writing of ‘discover’ given that the cafe or food product I’m referring to is always well known to the people running/making it and isn’t waiting around for me, White Food Blogger, to notice and legitimise it.
Same! Or, at least, I try to make it clear that I’m discovering something in the sense that it’s new to me, not new to the entire human race.