America is full of beans… ‘edamame’ that is
After being blasted 24/7 with the above television advertisements for McDonald’s “Asian Salad” here in the States, I started to wonder….Does any American even know what a ”a blend of crisp greens, orange glazed chicken snow peas, edamame” is? That is, I thought that most Americans would not have a clue what edamame is, the Japanese name for soybeans.
I googled around and found out about americanization of edamame. Yikes! There’s mini-boom in edamame going on in the States. The Asian chicken salad costs was $4.69 — about the same as the cost of one of their sandwiches— but it has only 290 calories for a huge salad. Now I have something I can order in McDs without feeling defiled.
Check out the McDonald’s i-am-asian.com that offer “Asian langauge’ commererials in Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, Vietnamanese but not Japanese (since they don’t like to think of themselves as “Asian”). Also watch the youtube video of Margaret Cho – Asian Chicken Salad.
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June 27th, 2006 at 8:55 am
hi.. I am a regular browser of your blog. nice work! but i think the link where you refer to a spot of chicken salad is kind of wrong? it links back to this blog itself not Youtube?
June 27th, 2006 at 9:24 am
Thanx Gigi!
Yes, the Margaret Cho – Asian Chicken Salad is linked recurvsely, D’oh!
July 7th, 2006 at 8:28 am
THIS IS NOT THE SALAD OF MY PEOPLE!
I guess Thai people (and other cultures such as Hmong) have a sort of version of it (Larb/Laap Gai) but I can’t think of any popular Asian cuisine that has a chicken salad dish.
July 7th, 2006 at 1:28 pm
Yep, the “Asian Salad” is rather bizarre, ain’t it?