Amer·i·ca·na
Pro­nun­ci­a­tion: \ə-ˌmer-ə-ˈkä-nə, -ˌmər-, -ˌme-rə-, -ˈka-nə\
Func­tion: noun plural
Date: 1841

1: Mate­ri­als con­cern­ing or char­ac­ter­is­tic of Amer­ica, its civ­i­liza­tion, or its cul­ture ; broadly : things typ­i­cal of Amer­ica
2: Amer­i­can culture

In this series, I’d like to explore var­i­ous aspect of life in North Amer­ica. Each topic will be illus­trated by a black and white picture.

Beaver­tails House

Snacks, sodas, take-outs, pas­tries, desserts, appe­tiz­ers, food stalls, fast food… you would never go hun­gry in North Amer­ica pro­vided you have some spare change in your pocket.

Food is every­where. It is adver­tised on TV and on bill­boards and chances are that there are fran­chised cof­fee shops at every cor­ner. Malls have their food courts, gas sta­tions usu­ally sell snack bars, chips and even donuts, vend­ing machines are ubiq­ui­tous and yes, there are Mcdon­alds inside Wal Mart.

It seems that each daily activ­ity requires a food stop. Three meals a day — are you kid­ding? I’m hun­gry, now!

As if con­stant eat­ing wasn’t bad enough, food is get­ting fat­ter and fat­ter. Nutri­tional val­ues are appeal­ing. Weird com­bi­na­tions are pop­u­lar, such as bacon and donut, peanut but­ter and jelly, fried chicken and pizza — a true nutri­tion­ist night­mare. But junk food is cheap and easy to store in the fridge, or con­ve­niently picked up on your way from work. Eat­ing healthy requires choos­ing fresh ingre­di­ents, pay­ing a pre­mium for low fat prod­ucts and — gasp — cooking.

For­tu­nately, North Amer­ica is also a mul­ti­cul­tural land and immi­grants brought var­i­ous dishes from home. Going out to eat often means eat­ing Chi­nese, Ital­ian, Indian, Greek etc. food. Oth­er­wise, feel free to grab some pou­tine. Do you want some wings and a 20 ounces Coke with that?

Pic­ture: a Beaver­tails house in the Byward Mar­ket, Ottawa

Related arti­cles:

1. Food In Numbers
2. The Food Saga: The Chicken Era
3. Chi­nese Food (中国菜)
4. The Sweets, The Fat And The Scale
5. Is The French Diet Still A Good Diet?