{"id":69051,"date":"2026-07-16T05:16:59","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T21:16:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=69051"},"modified":"2026-07-16T05:16:59","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T21:16:59","slug":"mouthing-off-how-the-world-cup-has-given-tourists-a-new-perspective-on-american-food-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=69051","title":{"rendered":"Mouthing Off | How the World Cup has given tourists a new perspective on American food culture"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">At the 2026 World Cup, hosts United States went from underdogs to archvillains after one shady call to Fifa from Donald Trump, which led to a star player\u2019s red card being suspended.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">But outside the games, America seems to have made a much better impression \u2013 on social media at least \u2013 with plenty of international visitors and first-time tourists exhibiting fondness for the land of the free and the home of the brave. Football fans were especially wowed by America\u2019s food and its great abundance.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Over the last couple of weeks, my feeds have been full of wide-eyed Europeans marvelling at jumbo-sized Cheetos cheese puff containers and gargantuan packs of meat in Costco, Walmart and other supermarkets.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">I especially got a kick from people discovering the previously untried and unheralded flavour of ranch dressing. It is undoubtedly an American creation, made with buttermilk, garlic, onion and herbs. Some visitors even acted as if they were going to buy an entire shopping trolley of the bottled dressing to bring home. However, I suspect that is just a performative act. Ranch is good, but not that good.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Dr Pepper, on the other hand, is an American original I would stow a six-pack of in my suitcase.<\/p>\n<div class=\"image-inline-container e1a5rv550 css-1llrc1m e1yqhwb40\" data-qa=\"Component-renderMap-StyledDiv\">\n<div class=\"image-inline caption e1fvabeq0 css-19sk4h4 ea9pn0s0\" data-qa=\"Component-Container\">\n<figure class=\"image-inline caption ea9pn0s1 css-1qeofuq e1gf69pb0\" data-qa=\"ArticleImage-ArticleImageContainer\">\n<div data-qa=\"ArticleImage-handleRenderImage-ImageContainer\" class=\"css-bjn8wh e1gf69pb3\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Ranch dressing is quintessentially American and has proved very popular among World Cup tourists. Photo: Shutterstock\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/img.i-scmp.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/fit=contain,width=1024,format=auto\/sites\/default\/files\/d8\/images\/canvas\/2026\/07\/15\/8c7ba20f-4c47-4e5e-851b-514881ffe9d9_b3ee84ec.jpg\" title=\"Ranch dressing is quintessentially American and has proved very popular among World Cup tourists. Photo: Shutterstock\"\/><\/div><figcaption data-qa=\"ArticleImage-DescriptionContainer\" class=\"css-1bj5zno e1gf69pb1\">Ranch dressing is quintessentially American and has proved very popular among World Cup tourists. Photo: Shutterstock<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Other tourists are awestruck by American restaurants and diners. Instead of shock and awe, it is gawk and wonder when a mountain of cheese nachos and a T-bone steak bigger than their head arrives at the table. Naturally, who doesn\u2019t love being lavished with more than they need or expect?<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/lifestyle\/food-drink\/article\/3360619\/how-world-cup-has-given-tourists-new-perspective-american-food-culture?utm_source=rss_feed\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the 2026 World Cup, hosts United States went from underdogs to archvillains after one shady call to Fifa from Donald Trump, which led to&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69052,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[295,1332,2028,108,6157,6517,5593,526],"class_list":["post-69051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bored-interesting","tag-american","tag-culture","tag-cup","tag-food","tag-mouthing","tag-perspective","tag-tourists","tag-world","wpcat-33-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=69051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69051\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/69052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=69051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=69051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=69051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}