Kabob and Curry (Food)

I went to Kabob and Curry to eat and to try the Pakistani and Indian food. This was something that I have never really had before in my life. I was expecting the food to be hot and have lots of spices in it for some reason. I guess this reason is from a stereotype that this type of food is always spicy. Other than that I had no real expectations of what the food would be like. The restraunt was a buffet and liked this better than going to a place that you had to order from a menu because I knew I would not be sure what to order. It was also good because I could try many different things without having to buy multiple plates. There is a picture above of the food that I tried and it is labeled. The most interesting one that I think I ate was the Qeema. This looked like to me that it was ground beef with pees mixed together. Once I got home I learned that it could be lamb or beef and since I haven't really had lamb and don't know what it tastes like this could have been lamb. Well either way it was pretty good and I think this may have been my favorite thing. The meat was kind of spicy but not too spicy. It was something that I have never really seen in my culture in that the meat was mixed with peas on purpose. The curry chicken was pretty good as well and I have never had it. The two rices were not too bad to eat but they both had a weird sort of sweet taste to them. It was something that I have not really ever tasted in the type of food I eat. I was thinking the vegetable rice would be like Spanish rice but it was not really like it at all. It did have some hot little pieces in it but overall it was this weird sweet taste. Both of the rices had these orange things in them which I thought was like a carrot thing, but I think it was something else that caused the sweet taste. The other foods just looked to me like they just grabbed stuff and threw it into a dish and served it. This just shows how our cultures differ, and that in different cultures it is relative and different how they perform certain aspects of their lives. There was also pita bread that came with the meal and this was something I have had before and it was good.This was the only thing that seemed sort of normal.

One of the things that I thought was a little funny was that all of the workers except one to me looked like they were Hispanics. This is just something interesting to me because this food is supposed to be authentic Pakistani and Indian food but it is being prepared by someone that is not either of those nationalities. There being no people of the nationality of the food led to us having no informant to talk to to see how this food really fits into their culture and if it has any kind of special significance. The waitress that took care of us was definitely Hispanic because we heard her talk Spanish to some of the other customers. Which was another funny thing all of the people that were at the restraunt in the whole time we were there were not Pakistani or Indian except one man. The people that were there were whites, Hispanics, and African Americans. This was interesting to me because I would never just go to a restaurant like this ordinarily it would just seem strange to me. These people however looked like they came here often because they knew which foods they wanted. This shows that for the workers that the reason they are working there is not to be apart of their heritage it is to make money so it is a monetary reason. This one experience at a Pakistani and Indian restraunt is not enough of a picture to really understand alot about the cultures, but it does kind of give an insight to what it is like.