Do the Chinese Really Eat Chinese Food ?

Never Having Been There, I Don't Really Know. How About Italian?

I recall having been told one time, many years ago, that what is called in American Chinese restaurants, Chop Suey, is not known to or eaten in China - That is was/is, in fact, a creation of Chinese Americans based on economics and available ingredients here in the US. With this tad of semi-information, I couldn't help but wonder. Is any of the food sole here and identified as being Chinese, Italian, Hungarian, French, etc. actually representative of the food eaten in those countries by the people who actually live there. I have determined, based on my own relatively limited experience, that "... it ain't necessarily so!"

I love Salades Nicoise. You know, the 'French' salad that is topped with tuna. Particularly, I felt as though I was getting the real thing when the tuna on top was fresh grilled Ahi. Delicious. Flash! While in France I ordered it at several places and discovered that the French actually use - that's right - canned tuna to top their Nicoise salads! I have not been to Italy, but have been told (often and by many people) that the Italians do not make or eat what we call "Pizza." That this food, as it is known and sold here is an American distortion of an actual Italian item that is significantly different. Do they really eat spaghetti or lasagna?

The reality is that, in most instances, I just don't know - and I suspect that only those who have actually spent time traveling around the world and eating the native fair in other countries really do. We take people's words for a lot of things. If it's on the menu at a Chinese place we like, we presume it is somehow genuinely Chinese. Likewise with any other dish in any other 'ethnic' place to eat. But, for the most part, it is about belief rather than about knowledge. If Chop Suey is not from China and Pizza not from Italy and Grilled Ahi not used on a Nicoise Salad in Provence, then what are we to believe?