Last week I went food shopping with my dad. We went to one of the Carrefours in Gdańsk. Don’t ask me which one, I don’t know, I have absolutely no sense of direction.

Anyway, while walking around that Carrefour and looking for balsamic vinegar (ocet balsamiczny), I ended up in their “foreign foods” section. And, oh dear… Take a look, because I don’t know what to say:

That “kuchnia chińska” (Chinese cuisine/food) label and stacks of Japanese products caught me off guard. Right next to sushi rice and wasabi paste, there were Thai curries and Vietnamese hot sauce. All dutifully labeled as “kuchnia chińska.” There was Malaysian sambal oelek, and Japanese soba noodles, all dumped under “kuchnia chińska.” There were surprisingly few Chinese products available, apparently due to the recent restrictions on food imports from China.

Still, wouldn’t “kuchnia azjatycka” (Asian cuisine/food) or even “kuchnia orientalna” (Oriental cuisine/food) be a better way of describing it?

“Nah,” said my dad, “if it’s to be eaten with rice, then it surely must be Chinese.” He was joking, of course. Well, was he? Apparently, that’s how the great majority of Polish people I talked to thought about Asian cooking. And they looked at me funny when I explained it’s like dumping Polish, Ukrainian, Czech, Bulgarian and other Eastern European cuisines under a common Russian label. I mean, they all eat borscht and potatoes and drink vodka, right? Same, same. “Oh, no,” my friend would answer, “it’s different in Europe.” Well, is it?

And while we ponder this contradiction, let’s take a look at the word “kuchnia.”
It’s an interesting, all purpose word in Polish.

• kuchnia (fem., pl. kuchnie) – kitchen, as in – that room in your house/apartment where you prepare your meals. audio

But, it also can mean:

• stove, cooker – kuchenka (a diminutive form of “kuchnia”), or
• cooking, as in “good cooking” – dobra kuchnia, or
• cuisine, as in “Chinese cuisine” – kuchnia chińska.

And there are a few other words derived from the same root:

• kucharz (masc., pl. kucharze) – chef, cook (male) audio
• kucharka (fem., pl. kucharki) – cook (female) audio
• kuchenny – an adjective describing something to do with “kitchen,” for example: sprzęt kuchenny – kitchen equipment, or pomoc kuchenna – kitchen help. audio

But I think it’s more fun to talk about different cuisines of the world, wouldn’t you agree? So, here we go:

• kuchnia polska – Polish cuisine
• ~ francuska – French cuisine
• ~ włoska – Italian c.
• ~ hiszpańska – Spanish c.
• ~ sródziemnomorska – Mediterranean c.
• ~ grecka – Greek c.
• ~ japońska – Japanese c.
• ~ tajska – Thai c.
• ~ indyjska – Indian c.

And now I’m totally hungry… Kuchnia koreańska (Korean food) for dinner tonight!