What Western country has the most delicious cuisine?

[jackcorbett 2]

First off, I was inspired into conducting this poll for several reasons. First off, I am now doing the finishing touches on a new web site I've created, this one being for Greg's Kitchen New web site for Greg's Kitchen

 

Greg, an Englishman, has 35 years of experience in the restaurant business among other things having been a chef in London as well as being owner of Greg's Kitchen here in Pattaya now for more than 12 years. I've had a lot of experience over at Greg's Kitchen because for 11 months I lived just 3 doors down from the restaurant, and I've shot pictures of every single dish he was offering three years ago and Greg put those pictures on his menu just outside his restaurant. And of course, I hung out at his restaurant a lot in those days.

 

But when I was 17 I bicycled throughout England and Scotland staying at youth hostels for the most part. But I also stayed at a nice hotel in London for several days. Although I really enjoyed the meat pies both in England and Scotland for the most part I didn't think that highly of British food. Since moving full time to Pattaya I've noticed that a lot of Englishmen seem to have a strong preference for British restaurants. I've now been living nearly three years in Naklua which I oftentimes refer to as Little Germany so I've been hitting the German restaurants hard and am friends with at least one German restaurant owner. Obviously I like German food a lot, and find that in general German restaurant owners here in Naklua produce a very good product at very modest prices. I've also been frequenting a Belgian restaurant which has outstanding food at reasonable prices. Much of the cuisine there is French although there's many excellent Italian dishes as well.

 

So now I've been making the long two mile journey from Little Germany down to Pattaya and eating at Greg's more often than I have over the past several years. Greg offers the typical British dishes such as meat pies and fish and chips but he also offers many Continental European dishes as well, and I think his restaurant is absolutely first rate.

 

I've left Japanese, Indian, Chinese, and Thai cuisine off my poll although I enjoy the cuisine of these countries very much as well. The reason I've left them out is they represent an entirely different style of cooking and all are Asian. But I've kept Mexican food in my poll even though Mexico certainly is not Europe. I've kept it in because Mexico is so close to the U.S. and Mexican restaurants are so abundant in the U.S. where I come from. But I've not included American food simply because what I perceive as American food has for the most part been borrowed from Europe.

 

So fire away.

[soi unwise 6]

Two " first offs " then Greggs Kitchen............................Jack,I'm out !

[CheshireTom 1,377]

Two " first offs " then Greggs Kitchen............................Jack,I'm out !

 

LOL. I agree ........ he dishes up good (if overpriced) British fayre .......... or at least that which was typically found in transport cafes in the 80s. A place that I tend to avoid.

 

There used to be a whole host of good German restaurants but many of them seem to have disappeared as the overall German influence in Pattaya has diminished.

Edited January 14, 2009 by CheshireTom

[jackcorbett 2]

I wish there were a way I could delete one of the two polls I created. Can our moderator help me on this?

 

I created the first, and then I did not like the poll question, "Which country's-----" followed by German, French, etc rather than Germany, France and so on but didn't see a way I could edit the poll questions or choices so I hit the back button and made my changes thinking when I posted now the newly edited poll would modify the first one the way one overrides one file with a new modified one with the same name thus leaving just one poll, but it didn't work that way. I should have left well enough alone.

[wacmedia 277]

Hi,

 

I voted French even though I eat more Italian style food myself for health reasons. The French are obsessed with food and as such are always concious of its quality.

[Arno 0]

What, no Dutch?

[Samsonite 181]

British Cuisine?!

Wouldn't that be an oxymoron?

[Kev 173]

None of the above, good old Aussie tucker :)

[jacko 8,766]

Mexico is a Western country? Methinks you are pandering to the Americans who rave about Mexican food, because they know no other foreign fayre! Most of it looks like someone threw up over a plate!

 

British food is of course hardly 'haute cuisine', but if you were brought up on it, it is comfort food. I had to go Italian, it is the one European country I lived in for some months, outside the UK that you listed (Spanish can be good), and even the lunch in the factory canteen was great. German food is heavy and often overly salted, but in Germany itself I have had some excellent 'game' meals.

 

I don't need to go to Greggs for a good pie anymore, I can get a better result from the Baker's Oven for 70 baht out of my own microwave!

Edited January 14, 2009 by jacko

[The Gunslinger 3]

The best food anywhere is from Scotland, deep fried Mars Bars and Irn Bru. Lovely.

[BigDUSA 71]

LOL. I agree ........ he dishes up good (if overpriced) British fayre .......... or at least that which was typically found in transport cafes in the 80s. A place that I tend to avoid.

 

Gregg's prices are insane and the food is just OK.

[dode 2]

The best food anywhere is from Scotland, deep fried Mars Bars and Irn Bru. Lovely.

 

 

Deep fried pizza from the chippie for me

[Arno 0]

What about Turkish, Greek, Spanish....

 

The list in the poll is seriously deficient!

[dode 2]

The best food anywhere is from Scotland, deep fried Mars Bars and Irn Bru. Lovely.

 

 

Just looked at the new menu - well over-priced and food looks ordinary.

 

595 baht for a steak ? That's £12 - get real.

Edited January 16, 2009 by dode

[midlifecrisis 4,030]

Your thread title and post question do not match.

 

I voted for who I thought had the best cuisine not what I prefer eating. There is a differance.

 

I prefer mostly American faire but I do not believe it is the best cuisine in the world.

[Arno 0]

I prefer mostly American faire but I do not believe it is the best cuisine in the world.

I've not been to a country yet where I haven't seen a McD's, KFC or a Subway.

 

Aaaargh!

[blink 2]

Well i went for italian but there is good & bad in all cusine & obviously it depends on the establishment serving it.

Never ate at greggs but an expat friend of mine use to swear by it 2 or 3 years ago, however the prices nowadays do seem to be a bit on the steep side. Very varied menu & they must have the biggest choice of potato varieties in Patts so kudos on that.

)

Hi Jack Only thing i will say as someone who has dabbled a bit in web design is that it can be good to get a few opinions as once you get involved in a site you often get too 'close' to it & some fresh eyes are often helpful.

 

You seem to doing a very nice job on the site so take a bow.

my initial opinion for what its worth (not very much ) & certainly not a criticism just some fresh eyes as stated.

The font used on the famous dishes section is certainly stylish & a nice idea, on first impressions however i felt it was not particularly easy to read or consistent across the various dishes.

Im Personally not a big fan of black backgrounds for cafe/restaurants, think its more suited to night clubs or adult material but thats probably just me as these things are very subjective.

 

As said very well done on the site Jack Good Job & i hope you are getting a few quid or at least some food for all your effort.

[zaphodbeeblebrox 0]

I baked lasagna tonight. I probably cook Italian better than any other cuisine. Still prefer to eat Mexican food, though.

[midlifecrisis 4,030]

I've not been to a country yet where I haven't seen a McD's, KFC or a Subway.

 

Aaaargh!

fast food is not cuisine!

 

That is not anything I eat as an American.

[jacko 8,766]

fast food is not cuisine!

 

That is not anything I eat as an American.

Yes, think knives, forks, tablecloths and places where the food is ordered at the table.... and eaten there!

[jackcorbett 2]

Well i went for italian but there is good & bad in all cusine & obviously it depends on the establishment serving it.

Never ate at greggs but an expat friend of mine use to swear by it 2 or 3 years ago, however the prices nowadays do seem to be a bit on the steep side. Very varied menu & they must have the biggest choice of potato varieties in Patts so kudos on that.

)

Hi Jack Only thing i will say as someone who has dabbled a bit in web design is that it can be good to get a few opinions as once you get involved in a site you often get too 'close' to it & some fresh eyes are often helpful.

 

You seem to doing a very nice job on the site so take a bow.

my initial opinion for what its worth (not very much ) & certainly not a criticism just some fresh eyes as stated.

The font used on the famous dishes section is certainly stylish & a nice idea, on first impressions however i felt it was not particularly easy to read or consistent across the various dishes.

Im Personally not a big fan of black backgrounds for cafe/restaurants, think its more suited to night clubs or adult material but thats probably just me as these things are very subjective.

 

As said very well done on the site Jack Good Job & i hope you are getting a few quid or at least some food for all your effort.

 

 

Many thanks, Blink, both for the compliments and the constructive criticism. Check the famous dishes section again, if you don't mind. Greg brought your comment up to me a few days ago and I changed the "fonts" you mentioned (if you based your comment on what I had up a few days ago instead of very recently). Those are not fonts by the way but graphical images. When I created them I thought, "They are a little difficult to read, but I like the beveled effect" so it was a value judgment I made and so I sacrificed readability for creative effect. So what I did was to recreate those graphical images that appear as fonts and used an Old English font inside the images. If I had used this go around a Times Roman font, Verdana or any number of fonts they would still be more readable so once again I went for appearance over clarity but again I've made my own value judgment thinking the Old English style text can be read easily enough.

 

As far as the black background, I still like it personally for whatever kind of web site I've created. In fact even when I write a story using Wordperfect, I will use Wordperfect mode 5.1 and change the background from blue to black and use a contrasting text such as white or yellow. I like the extreme contrast I get which makes my words stand out. As far as web sites go, I used to shoot lots of pictures in the U.S. of night club performers, clubs etc. I wanted my pictures to really stand out and to cause viewers to really focus on the pictures and felt using any background color other than black would lessen the impact of my pictures. The same is true of text as I wanted the words to really jump out so a yellow, red, white or even a green text on a black background would create the desired effect. In the case of Greg's web site, I put an image at the top of the page, such as "Greg's Kitchen Pattaya's Most Talked about Restaurant" and then used an eye dropper tool to pull out one of the dominant colors in that image and then used that color for my font to give Greg's pages a bit of a classier look than if I used say a white, green, or red font. The red menu items, "home, Famous dishes, and Menu" are once again graphical images and are red because I want people to click on them and "Famous dishes" is a flashing animated gif file as I prefer people go there first rather than to the "Menu" pages themselves.

 

Ultimately more important than the appearance of a web site is can people find it by using Google, Yahoo and other search engines. Days before I did Greg's web site I did the new site for Skytop. I had told Pete that his former web site was nearly impossible to find using the search engines. I feel that in time as the search engines recognize the new site that Skytop will do far better in the future. I hope the same thing will be true for Greg. So far not enough time has elapsed for either of these new sites to appear in Google or Yahoo. I still have a few things to implement for both sites to give them both even more presence in the search engines. This will be more than anything the real litmus test for either site because "what good is even the most gorgeous web site if no one can find it?"

[midlifecrisis 4,030]

Yes, think knives, forks, tablecloths and places where the food is ordered at the table.... and eaten there!

It has to have a tablecloth? Will a place mat suffice? (as long as not paper?)

 

hehe

[jacko 8,766]

It has to have a tablecloth? Will a place mat suffice? (as long as not paper?)

 

hehe

Well you just brought "Kiss" into the grouping, what do you think?

[spgfcs 57]

I would have to say Italian. Lasagna is my favorite. Funny thing my TG just loves spaghetti, she must have had it four times in the two weeks I was there! But she won't eat it if it has any kind of beef. Chicken, pork, or even just plain sauce or it's no good to her.

[wacmedia 277]

British Cuisine?!

Wouldn't that be an oxymoron?

 

Hi,

 

A good English breakfast is a great meal.