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Comment by danudey | Hacker News Reader

I have a Taiwanese friend who says that she always halves the amount of sugar in any western recipe she makes so that it's palatable, since she hasn't grown up eating the over-sweetened garbage food that a lot of Western kids grew up with.

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Anyone making food from 'recipes' in the West is likely not eating 'garbage'.

Though we do eat 'too much sugar' - the 'garbage' I suggest is really over-processed, too much hydrogenated oil etc. etc..

Anyone that made their diet out of things 'they cooked themselves' could very well use the recipes as they are and do pretty well. Most dinner dishes do not even call for sugar. Mostly only cakes and what-not. Maybe muffins are a culprit? :)

The entire conversation here is about cakes and pastry. No sensible 'Western' recipe tells you add spoons of sugar to a steak or a mushroom soup.

Have you not tried milk steak with raw jelly beans?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZfCyTpAlg8

I wish Americans would stop assuming their issues are universal to the West. Excessive sugar in recipes is a specifically American problem. I grew up in Europe, and the difference is huge.

I'm in Europe and my Chinese friends thinks a lot of stuff here is too sweet.

Same in Australia.

Europe is a big place. Ever been to a Monoprix in France? It's not exactly unprocessed wilderness in there.

Thanks! I was wondering the whole thread whats going on. I dislike american food for exact that reason (and over use of fats). Not because i think its unhealthy but because growing up in central europe i am simply not used t these fatty suggary treads.

Icelander here. We generally do this for American recipes, European recipes are usually not as sweet.

On the other hand when I was in Japan I found that all their takes on 'western' baking was ridiculously sweet. As in it tasted like they'd used twice the sugar they where supposed to.

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