Unit 5 Food and Drink  饮食—  Passage (1/4)

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"You are what you eat." Nutrition experts often use this saying to promote better eating habits. What we put in our mouth does become a part of us. But we can look at this statement another way. What we eat reflects who we are - as people and as a culture. Do you want to understand another culture? Then you ought to find out something about its food. As a foreign traveler can prove, the relation between food and national identity is close and strong. Not only do citizens of most nations come to perceive some aspect of their cuisine as distinctive, but nations themselves are typically associated with particular food. Countries are what they eat, or at the very least, people tend to think of nations in culinary terms. Thus, learning about American food can give us a real taste of American culture.
"你吃什么就成为什么样子"营养专家经常使用这句话来倡导更好的饮食习惯，入嘴的东西确实成为我们的一部分。但我们也可以从另一个角度来看这句话，我们所吃的反映出我们自己——不论就人或文化而言。你想了解另一种文化吗？那么你应该去认识他们的食物。就像外国旅游者能证明的那样，食品和国家性质之间的联系是紧密而坚固的。不仅大多数国家的民众认为他们的烹饪在某方面的与众不同，就连国家本身也总是典型的和某一特色食品联系在一起。一个国家的饮食代表这个国家的特征，或者至少可以这么说，当人们想起一个国家时脑海里浮现的是些烹饪名词。因而，了解美国食品能让我们品尝到真正的美国文化。