Unusual eating habits and Generalizing soul food

After reading "Reclaiming True Grits" (Terry)  and "Eating the Hyphen" (Wong) from Food Matters by Holly Bauer it made me realize how we Americanize food in a way that the cultures where the food originated may feel weird  for eating food they could have grown up eating. "Reclaiming True Grits" (Terry) focused on how we see "Soul Food" ( Terry,82) in such a negative fattening way because when thinking of soul food we think of the "Instant Soul Food" (Terry, 82) which is basically the well known high sugar, high calorie, low nutrient food commonly thought of even though that in now way depicts what soul food really is. Soul Food is interesting, after living in the south for nine years I got to taste some soul food, it can either be amazing or it can be absolutely terrible. Granted I haven't experience the true "Soul Food" Terry mentions in the passage considering what little food I've eaten has been the "Instant Soul Food" (Terry, 82) so it would be interesting to eat home cooked soul food and see the differences. In "Eating the Hyphen" Wong focuses on her unique style of eating dumplings. Although she later elaborates and eventually explains why she needs so many different utensils and ketchup to eat a few dumplings. Now I've eaten dumplings and they have to be my favorite thing to order from Chinese restaurants, yet I've never needed a knife, fork, chopsticks, and I've never even considered putting ketchup on dumplings. Everyone has their own little quirks with different foods they eat. I found it interesting that she accounts this unusual combination from taking her American culture and her Chinese culture and mixing them up in such a way to eat dumplings with ketchup.  I think both works are interesting and give a better understanding on how Americans can generalize an entire culture based on a few findings that help to further proof why that generalization is correct. It's fine to appreciate different cultures and try food from around the world or from different areas, but when it comes to making a food have a negative connotation like "soul food" (Terry, 82) does it becomes an issue in my mind. Food is a weird thing. Everyone needs it, Everyone eats it, and there are many forms of the same food reproduced all over the world. It truly is something that connects people and helps strangers form bonds.