What ‘foreign food’ do you remember as a child?

I was fortunate enough to have a Greek Cypriot mother, we lived in a road with families from India, Malaysia and Germany and Italy. My mum would give tasters to neighbours and the ‘foreigners’ would reciprocate (never the Brits, sadly) so we had a fantastic introduction to world cuisine.
I probably now cook more Middle Eastern food than British food and absolutely love going to east London to stock up on herbs, spices and fresh ethnic foods.

I was an army brat and spent part of my childhood in the Far East, so from an early age, early 1950s, Indian and Chinese food formed a part of our normal household diet. My mother was also open minded about trying new dishes and the cookery pamphlet that accompanied her Prestige Pressure Cooker, when she bought it, included a recipe for Hungarian Goulasch - and that is still a family favourite. Spaghetti Bolognaise at home also dates back to my hcildhood.

When we lived in the Far East my mother frequently visited the markets to buy herbs and spices and look for other food stuffs.

I love Indian curry but struggle to get a decent recipe
We never had foreign food when I lived with parents.

Vesta Chow Mein!!

None at all until Vesta came along in my late teens! I was the only one in the family who would eat it but thought it was wonderful!

My mother was French so we had garlic and mediterranean style dishes, but always home grown veg and fruit which she bottled and canned..

Chinese food. The Chinese supermarket always fascinated me and I still remember the smell.

Nothing apart from Vesta Chow Mein and Curry. My mother was a farmer's daughter who cooked mainly good meat and veg meals, which I still prefer to this day.

My parents had both lived in France before the war, so we were well aware of ‘foreign food’. The difficulty was finding the ingredients - even garlic was hard to come by in the 1940s and 1950s. My mother had a herb garden where she grew everything she could. We were inhibited for several years in the late 1940s and early 50s by the fact that my grandfather lived with us. He had visited my mother in France, and been shocked that he could not get rice pudding! Not an adventurous eater, so our food was very English at that time - good, though, because my mother was (unlike me) an excellent cook.

We had a couple of holidays in France in the1950s, where I eagerly ate everything. The first foreign food that I remember eating at home was spaghetti bolognaise, which my mother made for a group of visiting school friends in about 1957. It went down well.

In the early 1960s I lived in Liverpool, where I discovered Chinese and Greek food. We all tried, as young married people, to emulate Elizabeth David’s ‘French Provincial Cooking’ as far as we could.

My mother made a curry on Mondays sometimes, with leftover meat from the Sunday roast.

The first time I ate Spaghetti Bolognaise was when visiting a friend's house whose parents were away and she cooked it for a few of us. I was 18 at the time.

At 18 I went to France and the French mother served what I thought was steak but it was viande chevaline, so when they told me I couldn't eat it.
The same thing happened a few years later when a friend cooked rabbit, my throat closed up and I couldn't swallow.

Callistemon21, when I was a small child in wartime my mother tried to make me eat rabbit. I think perhaps it was unrationed. I wouldn’t eat it. I had read too much Beatrix Potter! Anyway it has a very strange, strong flavour.

My sister went for a visit with our uncle and aunt when she would have been seven. She told us about yogurt when she came back.

When I was sixteen, doing O-levels and coming home for lunch after an exam, my mum bought me a kiwi fruit – first time she'd ever seen one. She couldn't eat any herself but wanted to know what it was like. She suggested I 'cap' it as one would a boiled egg and eat it with a spoon, which I did.

Yoghurt was a strange novelty when it arrived in our house in the 70's, treated with great suspicion by my very conservative Dad.

My first taste of "foreign" foor was when a Greek takeaway opened near our house when I was 12. At 14 I got a part time job there so we were never short of a hot supper when I came home. I worked there on and off for over two years and was always paid in cash straight from the till. It was a bit of a shock when I began my first full time job and had tax and NI deducted.

There were, of course, Chinese, Indian and other ethnic restaurants in the center of Liverpool. Liverpool has a very extensive Chinese quarter and Ive always enjoyed Chinese food. I can remember back to when pizza and Italian food was considered a novelty. I had a staff night out in a new Italian restaurant for my 17th birthday and to celebrate passing my first librarianship exam. That was the first time I ordered wine in a restaurant.

Yoghurt was delivered by the milkman in the late 50s in glass jars. Just plain and strawberry . My Italian aunt cooked spaghetti bolognaise for us again in the late 50s. What fun eating the spaghetti.
A friend's French mother used to eat very very ripe Camembert. Yuk. Love it now.
Vesta curries and Nicholas wine anyone?

Hawaiian mince. Mum experimented in the 60s. It was mince with added tomato paste and pineapple chunks. It was vile

I had an Italian aunt who lived on the same street. I wasn't keen on mum's early 50's ration food so ran up the street and sat down with the minestrone and parmesan which I grated for her and put in a fancy holder. She was a fantastic cook my love of Italian food lives on.
The two fish and chip shops were owned by Spanish couples maybe the batter was different? The coffee bars were all Italian. I can remember cappucinos and semifredos.

My meals as a child were very plain - meat and veg, egg and chips etc.

Like a few of you my first "curry" was Vesta. We had no takeaways where I lived that sold anything other than fish and chips, faggots and chips and the like.

Saturday night we always had faggots, peas chips and gravy from the local chippy.

Ailidh

Vesta Chow Mein!!

Same here Ailidh so exotic

Grandma70s

Callistemon21, when I was a small child in wartime my mother tried to make me eat rabbit. I think perhaps it was unrationed. I wouldn’t eat it. I had read too much Beatrix Potter! Anyway it has a very strange, strong flavour.

My mother used to cook rabbit but I don't remember eating it, perhaps I was too young. Then along came myxomatosis and she never touched it again.
I did have a pet rabbit.

My dad worked in marine insurance for a Greek company based in the city of London . We were frequently taken to Greek restaurants in London where they did the plate smashing .
Otherwise it was a Chinese restaurant near where we lived . I was fascinated by the lazy Susan and the heated things with tea lights .

We lived in central London until I was 12, I remember Indian, Chinese, Italian & French restaurants and trying most things.

A Chinese restaurant opened in our town when I was in my late teens. The food was excellent.

I remember olive oil came in small bottles from the chemist. It was used medicinally, certainly not to cook with.