I’ve not heard these jokes. I love my Indian food. Taco Bell jokes are 10x more prevalent. What are your sources for Indian food hate?

Do they? I rarely see jokes about it and if I do see jokes they are spicy diarrhea related which I will admit is odd because Americanized Indian food is not spicy at all.

Do they?

Do they? I don’t watch much TV and nobody I know makes fun of Indian food, it’s awesome.

It’s not just Indian food. A number of mostly older Americans like to make fun of any spicy “foreign” foods that are more adventurous than the local Taco Bell. They do it because their tummies can’t handle anything that’s not bland to the point of being tastless. These are the same people who think salt and pepper are exotic spices. For the record I am American and I love Indian food

Casual xenophobia/racism. Much like the whole MSG thing here.

I haven’t seen too many shows make fun of Indian food, but to be fair my taste in TV often isn’t very mainstream and doesn’t tend to include a lot of comedy, so I may not be the right one to answer this.

When I do see it, usually I see them joking about the smell, and I can kind of get that. Don’t get me wrong, I love Indian food, I love the flavors and smells and all that goes with it. But all of those wonderful spices can create a powerful smell, it can kind of cling to clothing and such, if you live in an apartment it’s very likely you’ll smell when your neighbors are cooking Indian food, etc. and I can get how that can be annoying or unpleasant for some people. Honestly, if I was constantly smelling Indian food wafting into my apartment through a shared vent or something, I’d probably get sick of it too.

There’s also the fact that a lot of Americans just have a very bland palate, and all of the spices, not to mention heat, can be very overwhelming to people who aren’t accustomed to it. Personally when I see these jokes, and again, my experience may not be typical, it tends to be more at the expense of the American having boring taste in food than actually making fun of Indian food itself.

And since I mentioned that people may not be accustomed to it, let’s not forget that America is a big, diverse country, and not every part of America has a big Indian population, which means a lot of the country doesn’t necessarily have a lot of exposure to indian food. I do happen to live in an area with a lot of Indian families, but you only need to drive maybe about an hour away for your options to dry up pretty quickly. I have friends who genuinely do not have any Indian restaurants anywhere near them, and their grocery options are sometimes kind of limited which may get in the way of making it at home if they wanted to (and not everyone is a great cook or willing to risk messing up dinner with unfamiliar recipes) And that much spice and flavor when you’re not used to it can be a bit off-putting. I’m a fairly adventurous eater, but I didn’t grow up eating Indian food (my mom is one of those kinds of people who thinks a McChicken is too spicy,) and I know the first time I had Indian I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it, I didn’t dislike it, but I had to have it a couple times before I really came to appreciate it.

Personally, in my circles the people who don’t like Indian tend to be the odd ones out that get made fun of, but again I’m not necessarily representative of America in general, that’s just been my own experience. I even know some people who love indian food but can’t/shouldn’t eat it due to all of the spices and such not sitting well with their stomachs (and there may be a discussion to be had about many American’s bland, super-processed diets having negative effects on their gut microbiomes possibly making it harder for their systems to handle certain cuisines, but that’s well outside of my depth to really go into, I’m a foodie, not a nutritionist, so take my speculation with a heaping helping of some coarse finishing salt)

I honestly can’t think of seeing anything like that.

If anything we might make fun of some of us who can’t take anything spicier than mashed potatoes.

Dang. Now I’m hungry for some saag paneer.

Hollywood and reality are very different. Hollywood makers can be slightly out of touch. In reality people here love Indian food. Many people I know tolerate decent spice levels too.

Any time I used to bring anything with so much as a waft of cumin for lunch, the bitchy conservative office manager would complain.

I now happily WFH.

It’s so common people don’t even see it. But it’s the same thing as Mexican food. The perception is it is spicy and will give you diarrhea.

I firmly believe this is because American people in general don’t understand what spices are. Spiced does not mean spicy hot. Spiced is flavourful and they just can’t have that. I have dined with Americans that truly believe black pepper is too spicy. We had a Starbucks chai which is absolutely terrible, and they’ve said “it’s too spicy”… What? Their brains equate flavour to spicy heat to bad.

It’s stupidly infuriating.

Dunno what you’re talking about there champ

Worldwide? I don’t think so. Idk I tried Indian food before it was good but I prefer Peruvian food.

2 things.

1. It’s food that is prepared in India (not essentially the cultural food). They have sanitation issues like other developing nations. Mexico- “don’t drink the water”.

2. White people with their sensitive tummies think salt is spicy.

Am American and eat Indian food several times a month. Even here there’s hole in the wall restaurants that have sanitation issues and you have to do some investigating before choosing to eat at a new place.

My problem is with a specific, hyper common ingredient of Indian food: Cumin

I’m sorry, but garlic, onion, cloves, etc don’t even come close to the clinging, pervasive staying power of cumin.

I don’t like to smell what I cook or eat for days after the fact.