Just Hungry

[Update:] Comments are now closed, since I'm no longer actively updating my blogrolls. Thanks for your interest.

While going through the entries for Food Destinations #2, I was struck by the number of people who are expatriates. Alanna Kellogg wrote about this briefly on BlogHer a while back too. I am myself an expat, even several times over: born in Japan, American citizen, lived for some time in England, living in Switzerland now, but who knows where I’ll be in 5, 10 years? In my case it’s not like I set out on purpose to become a world wanderer - my father’s job required that we move around quite a bit when I was growing up, and when I became an adult I just sort of continued in that way.

Anyway, I became intrigued by the number of people who were in a similar situation to me. I think that when you are an expat, and a food lover, your senses become attuned to food on two levels: nostalgia for the things you used to take for granted, which you can’t get that easily any more, and a newcomer’s appreciation for the things that are perhaps taken for granted in your new home. That’s certainly been my case, and is perhaps what best defines my food blogging persona. Reader Jesse recently sent me an email which described this much more eloquently than I could.

I am finding it increasing entertaining that you have so much to say and do with food. I think I get it. I have been an expat off and for almost nine years. You’re walking down the street and suddenly you catch a whiff of something… You know that smell, but you look around and nothing should be creating that smell even though you’re not quite sure what it reminds you of. Then it hits you. That’s the smell that used to emanate from that tonkotsu ramen shop near your house. It comes to you all at once. You want that ramen, but you know that it’s at least 7000 miles away. Now you really want it, because you know you can’t have it and you start to try to find ways to recreate it home, alas unsuccessfully. You always fall short.

I live in Japan and so I know what that’s like. It used to happen to me and Mexican food, and when I’ve been home (US), I would get that way about zaru soba.

(Emails like this really make my day, and keep me motivated to continue writing here. Thanks, Jesse!)

So, I have started to compile a list of fellow expat food bloggers, which I'll update periodically. My list (after the fold) is rather short so far - please let me know who I'm missing, by leaving a comment here or emailing me at maki (at) makikoitoh dot com.

Expat food blog list

(Unless noted otherwise all the blogs below are written in English.)

• 1x umrühren bitte: A German-language blog by Swiss expats in Andalusia, Spain
• Becks & Posh: English girl Sam, aided by French guy Fred, residing in San Francisco, CA, USA
• Chili & Vanilia: Mostly-Hungarian language blog by Hungarian expat in Belgium Zsofi
• Chocolate in Context: By Emily, former New Yorker, via Guatemala, now living in Melbourne, Australia
• Cook sister!: South African Silverbrow lives in London, England
• David Lebovitz: American cookbook author/chef/teacher living in Paris
• English Patis: Filipina Celia lives in London, England
• Eating Asia: By Americans(?) Robyn and David living in Malaysia
• Il Forno: Italian nice guy via Napoli living in Germany
• Lucullian delights: Swedish Ilva writes and takes beautiful photos in Tuscany, Italy
• Ms. Glaze's Pommes d'Amour: Ms. Glaze is an American woman working in a 3-star restaurant in Paris
• noodlepie: Brit Graham, formerly in Vietnam, now in Toulouse, France
• Nordljus: Beautiful, gorgeous, outstanding food styling and photography from Japanese Keiko living in Bury St. Edmunds, England
• Phnomenon: food in Cambodia: American in Cambodia
• posie's place: Pamela, via Glasgow, living in Basel, Switzerland
• savoury snark: Amanda, an American in Brighton, UK
• the passionate cook: Johanna, Austrian in London, England
• Too Many Chefs: Partly expat, since Meg is from Chicago and now lives in Paris (not sure if Barrett's recent move from Chicago to Baltimore qualifies him as an expat too :))
• The Traveler's Lunchbox: Melissa via Washington State in the US, now in Edinburgh, Scotland
• Veggie Way: Isli, from Istanbul now in Algiers
• we must eat: Motoko, Japanese (married to a Frenchman) now living in Pasadena, CA, USA
• whistlestop caboose: not a food-only blog, but a lot of great food-related posts. By Ellen who hails from Iowa, spent lots of time in Paris, and now lives in a beautiful lakeside town in the Romandie (French-speaking) area of Switzerland (married to an Englishman who grew up in Zimbabwe!)

Added Sep 11th:

• Frenchless in France: Linda, an American living in a beautiful area of France
• Garlic Breath and These Days In French Life: Riana, a 'food-driven, travel-loving American residing in the south of France with her French husband'
• The Golden Shrimp: the very well travelled Eva is from the Netherlands, currently lives in Scotland, is about to move to Basel
• the red kitchen: a New Zealander living near Zürich
• La tartine gourmande: Béa is a Frenchwoman living in Boston, USA

Added Sep. 13th:

• The Expatriate's Kitchen: by an ex-expatriate/world traveller
• sooishi: a French blog by a Japanese girl living in Switzerland. Very cute!

Added Sep. 16th:

• Lucy's Kitchen Notebook: American Lucy is married to a French man and lives in Lyon
• Blue Moon: A Canadian girl eats her way around Tokyo

Added Sep. 18th:

• Tummyrumble: by Magnus, a Swedish guy living in London
• Hungrig in San Francisco: A German food blog by Ralph in San Francisco

Added October 2nd:

• Reality Bytes: by Caryn, and American in England
• fleur de sel: a Japanese woman living in La Rochelle, France (in Japanese)

Added Jan. 7th:

• Berlin Reified: Berlin, Germany based blog by Sylee who is from Washington, D.C.

Added March 12th:

• Field to Feast: A wonderfully written foodblog by Carolyn from Zimbabwe, Africa
• Oyamake Stoneware blog: Mike and Tomoko in Kobe, Japan blog about Japanese food (with video podcasts) on their company blog (they sell stoneware)
• Homesick Texan: Okay Ms. Homesick Texan hasn't left the country, technically (she's in NYC), but she sure misses her Texas home. (and I guess you could argue that Texas is a different country...) Wonderful recipes and writing, and photography.