User:BrieDeChevre/sandbox
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A national drink is a distinct beverage that is strongly associated with a particular country, and can be part of their national identity and self-image. National drinks fall into two categories, alcoholic and nonalcoholic. An alcoholic national drink is sometimes a liquor drank straight/neat (as in the case of whiskey in Ireland), but is most often a mixed drink (e.g., caipirinhas in Brazil) or beer or wine. A beverage can be considered a national drink for a variety of reasons:
- It is a common drink, made from a selection of locally available foodstuffs that can be prepared in a distinctive way, such as mango lassi that uses dahi, a traditional yogurt or fermented milk product, originating from the Indian subcontinent, usually prepared from cow's milk, and sometimes buffalo milk, or goat milk.[1]
- It contains a particular 'exotic' ingredient that is produced locally.
- It is served as a festive culinary tradition that forms part of a cultural heritage—for example eggnog in the US during the holiday period.
- It has been promoted as a national dish by the country itself.
In some cases, it may be impossible to settle on a national drink for a particular country. In the realm of food at least, Zilkia Janer, a lecturer on Latin American culture at Hofstra University, says that it is impossible to choose a single national dish, even unofficially, for countries such as Mexico, China or India because of their diverse ethnic populations and cultures.[2] At the other end of the spectrum, sometimes different countries see the same beverage as their national drink (such as pisco sour in Peru and Chile).
The national drinks are categorized within geo-political regions modified from the United Nations' five "regional groups".[3]