Advertisement
Dublin: 5 °C Saturday 23 November, 2024

What's a Tootsie Roll? 11 American foods explained

Finally, we have answers.

GROWING UP, YOU probably became accustomed to hearing a lot of American foods referenced in TV/movies that had you scratching your head and generally thinking, “What is that?”

Fear not, because we’re here to help.

1. Meatloaf

Shutterstock-153299108 Shutterstock Shutterstock

Aside from being the go-to dinner on American TV, meat loaf is basically ground beef, egg, breadcrumbs, onion and whatever else you have lying around that’s formed into a loaf shape and served up. Bon appetit.

2. Twinkies

Twinkies Comeback AP / Press Association Images AP / Press Association Images / Press Association Images

A golden sponge cake filled with vanilla cream. (Fun fact: they were originally filled with banana cream until rationing during WW2 meant that they had to revert to vanilla filling.)

3. Pork rinds

pork-rinds-southern1 blisstree blisstree

Pork rinds are a traditional southern snack. Perhaps you grew up thinking they were like Rancheros crisps?

youre-wrong-gif gifsec gifsec

They’re actually deep-fried pig skin. Yum.

4. Graham crackers

1280px-Graham-Cracker-Stack Wikpedia Wikpedia

Graham Crackers are essentially the US equivalent of digestive biscuits: sweet, but ultimately a bit bland. Commonly used in baking recipes and to make the campfire stalwart S’mores. (Roasted marshmallow and chocolate between two graham crackers.)

Fun fact: they were originally conceived as a bland food eaten to combat and suppress sexual urges. No, really. 

5. Corn dogs

Shutterstock-121098199 Shutterstock Shutterstock

Corn dogs are hot dog sausages coated in sweet cornmeal batter. As you can imagine, they are incredibly healthy and are known for their life-extending properties.

LOL jk, it’s basically a clogged artery on a stick.

6. Milk Duds

milk_duds_1 Old Time Candy Old Time Candy

Relatively unexciting when compared to other American sweets, Milk Duds are chocolate-covered caramels that are popular amongst cinemagoers.

( ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

7. Sloppy Joe

Shutterstock-125572838 Shutterstock Shutterstock

You may remember that sloppy joes played a pivotal role in It Takes Two, the classic Olsen Twins movie, but did you know that it’s just mince meat served in a sandwich?

sloppy-joe1 armadillas / Wordpress armadillas / Wordpress / Wordpress

Mmmmm.

8. Candy corn

Shutterstock-121921993 Shutterstock Shutterstock

Candy corn is basically a sugar-flavoured sweet that is yellow, orange and white to represent the appearance of corn. Oh, did we mention that it tastes like sugar?

Bonus: Google reckons it tastes like crayons.

candycorn

9. Tootsie Roll

tootsie_roll-2iyqczf Edublogs Edublogs

Chewy chocolate-flavoured sweets with the consistency of caramel or taffy. No more, no less.

10. Lucky Charms

General Mills Sugar AP / Press Association Images AP / Press Association Images / Press Association Images

Most Irish kids can probably relate to hearing about or seeing Lucky Charms on TV and being like:

iwantthat thechive thechive

But just what are they? Well, it’s basically an oat cereal (think Cheerios) with multi-coloured marshmallows in the shape of  hearts, stars, clovers, horseshoes and more thrown in.

Magical.

11. Kraft Mac & Cheese

MacAndCheese1 alpha-phonics alpha-phonics

A dietary staple if movies and television are to be believed, macaroni and cheese is basically pasta and cheese. The Kraft variety is arguably the most popular and comes in a box, with each box containing a few servings of pasta and powdered cheese sauce. (Yes, powdered.)

Kids love it.

tumblr_mrj5affcu51qlv134o1_500 therooster therooster

Peaches are being sold with tiny knickers on them in China >

15 people expose the horrors they’ve seen at urinals >

Close
133 Comments
    Submit a report
    Please help us understand how this comment violates our community guidelines.
    Thank you for the feedback
    Your feedback has been sent to our team for review.