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Culinary Arts

Date: Jan 27 2006

Intro

1. Learn Vocabulary - Learn some new vocabulary before you start the lesson.

specialty

2. Read and Prepare - Read the introduction and prepare to hear the audio.

A common food in Northern Thailand is insects – locusts, crickets, scorpions, etc. In parts of Colombia and Australia, ants are a delicious side dish. Some Japanese chow down on hachi no ko, boiled wasp larvae. And in France, some folks eat brains and frog legs.

Differences in food is one of the many interesting things to explore about other cultures.

Listen to Didi and I talk about cooking.

Dialog

1. Listen and Read - Listen to the audio and read the dialog at the same time.

2. Study - Read the dialog again to see how the vocab words are used.

Dave

Didi

Dave: Didi, are you, do you like to cook?

Didi: Yes, I do.

Dave: Yeah? What do you prefer, baking, cooking on the stovetop?

Didi: Um, let’s see. I like baking, but I, ah, I don’t usually eat the things I bake. I bake cookies and cakes for other people, and I like it, it’s fun.

Dave: Do you pick at it while you’re eating, or while you’re baking?

Didi: No, I try not to do that.

Dave: No?

Didi: Yeah.

Dave: Why do you make it?

Didi: I just enjoy it, I don’t know. It reminds me of my mom.

Dave: Okay. So you like to bake sweets?

Didi: Yeah.

Dave: What’s your specialty?

Didi: Oh, ah, um, I don’t really have a specialty. I’m not actually that good at it. I just, I just enjoy it.

Dave: Yeah. But, that’s, ah, do you use the web site Allrecipes.com?

Didi: Mm hm. For, let’s see, the last thing I looked up was miso gravy.

Dave: Oh!

Didi: And, it was a good recipe.

Dave: It turn out okay?

Didi: Mm hm. It was really good.

Dave: That’s what I like about the site, there’s all kinds of exotic recipes, ah…

Didi: Mm hm.

Dave: ...that, if you’re willing to take a risk and try to make something you’ve never had before…

Didi: Yeah.

Dave: ...it can turn out pretty well.

Didi: Yup, I know. You just look for things you have in your kitchen and try to make something out of them.

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Lesson MP3

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Discussion

The U.S. has its share of strange food customs. People in the south eat crawfish; in the west, people eat rattlesnake. Some of my Japanese and Thai friends think oatmeal is strange and disgusting.

What strange foods have you eaten or heard of?

If you like to cook, there are a lot of web sites that provide recipes on many interesting dishes.

All Recipes

Recipe Source

Betty Crocker

Comments

Staisy

Russian Federation

Actually, I am rather indifferent to culinary delights, and eating exotic foods such as larvaes or rattlesnake seems to me wierd and disgusting. But anyway, the lesson is interesting.