There was an article in the newspaper today about how "hashing" has become popular in Chicago.

I hadn't heard of it. It apparently started about 70 years ago in Malaysia. Bored British expatriates put a twist on a schoolboy game where a lead runner left a trail of shredded paper for his comrades to track. In the end, there was a tub of cold beer.

Most hashes begin with a course designer, known as a "hare," and he/she lays down chalk arrows to direct runners. Deception is part of the game. Split arrows send runners in different directions, and solving the puzzle is a group effort, thus keeping the focus on socializing.

Has anyone played this game or know anything about it? Being a product of the '70s, "hash" has a whole different meaning to me!

The original game I know as steeplechasing. There's also a game called hare and hounds, which I would guess is the same. I say I 'know' it as that, but I've never heard of it actually done, and only encountered it in old children's stories, such as The Railway Children. There the hounds run individually, I gather, and the hare is also a runner who drops clues. I have no idea whether this is right in detail.

We used to do it in the Boy Scouts but we called it "tracking". There were several signs used along with arrows; the one I recall most clearly was the "end of trail" sign which was a large circle with a blob in the centre.

I don't know whether the sport still happens these days.

I've always thought of "Hashing" as a computer science term. You have a hashtable(not sure on correct spelling/spacing/hyphenation, probably because there is no official way), and you use a hashing function to decide where to put an item in the table.

hashtable

Yes, hashtables (aka associative arrays or dictionaries) are a kind of data structure in CS, where the items stored are indexed by words (or other kinds of objects) rather than by indices.

Then there's the drug hash from hashish (whence also assassin) and hash the food product consisting of diced meat and potatoes. (Interestingly, ground meat (or hamburger) is called Hackfleisch in German.)

Then again, there's the culinary meaning of hash, meaning a mixture of chopped meat and potatoes; that gives rise to the metaphorical meaning "mess", as in "he really made a hash of that project". There's also the meaning "discuss, review", as in "we worked together and hashed out a plan".

Hash, the food, is much maligned (and often rightly so, I suppose) because it's often a catch-all for any and all leftovers. A cook who firmly believes in the adage "Waste not, want, not" will undoubtedly serve hash from time to time.

I assume most of us are at least aware that there once was a time (in the States, at least) when waitresses in some diners (usually not your higher end Five Star establishments) used to call out orders to the cook using colorful phrases or numerical shorthand. When I was a kid, I used to go into a local greasy spoon just to order the hash because every time a customer did so, the waitress would call out, "We gotta hero in the house!" meaning you had to be fairly brave to order the hash there.

I thought this was absolutely wonderful but then I made the mistake of telling my mother about it and she made me promise never to go back into that place again. By the time I was old enough to do as I pleased, the diner had fallen in on itself from years of neglect. To its credit, however, the hash, while seldom tasting the same way twice, was never bad.


"We gotta hero in the house!" Ah... childhood memories.

I have always been easy to please. My mom always asked us what we'd want for our birthday dinner, and I'd choose either hash or meatloaf!

The fact is, some hash can be darned good!

Leftover roast beef hash w/potatoes... yum yum

Hash browns are now a standard item on most hotels' breakfast menus. Is this the first time a foodstuff of genuinely US origin has made its way onto the world's tables?

Waldorf Salad made some of the world's tables, if not Torquay.

a foodstuff of genuinely US origin

Not according to some Swiss. They offer Rösti as a prior claim.

Well, they certainly say so but I would like to see some dates and other evidence before accepting the claim.

After all, potatoes did originally some from the Americas!

After all, potatoes did originally some from the Americas!

Oh, yes, I know. Just thought the board would be interested in the claim. It's a fine line between hash browns and latkes (or as they're called in the Rheinland, Rievekoche, delicious with Kölsch).

Hash browns come in small pieces and latkes come in big pieces? The differences between Fried Potatoes, French Fried Potatoes, and a dozen more names all describing very similar things are not completely apparent.

Hash browns come in small pieces and latkes come in big pieces?

Yes, I was joking, but now that you mention it, the pieces in question are not the grated potato (which come out of the grater pretty much of the same size), but the mass aggregated during the frying phase, I suppose. Now home fries come with larger chunks.

quote:

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Originally posted by Richard English:
Is this the first time a foodstuff of genuinely US origin has made its way onto the world's tables?

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Modern breakfast cereals originate in the USA, at least, according to this site. Of course, the raw materials originated elsewhere. Corn (maize) came from Mexico.

Tinman

Modern breakfast cereals originate in the USA

Oh, but wheaties, along with the telephone and the electric lightbulb originated in Russia. Everybody knows that.

Oh, but wheaties, along with the telephone and the electric lightbulb originated in Russia.

It's a fine line between hash browns and latkes

There is a very fine line. I have made both. In fact, I have a funny story about that. When our kids were little, they attended a very Goyish school, and, as a good mom, I came every so often to teach the kids about Jewish customs. One year I was teaching about Hannukah, and we played dreidle, lit the menorah, and I made latkes for them to eat. They were about 5 years old and just mesmerized. Finally, as we finished and served them with apple sauce, one little boy exclaimed, "OH...they're hash browns!"

quote:

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Originally posted by jheem:
Oh, but wheaties, along with the telephone and the electric lightbulb originated in Russia. Everybody knows that.

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Really? The little bit of sleuthing I did indicated that Wheaties was invented in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA IN 1921:

"Like many great inventions, Wheaties was discovered by accident. In 1921, a health clinician in Minneapolis [Mennen Minniberg ] was mixing a batch of bran gruel for his patients when he spilled some of the mix on a hot stove. The gruel crackled and sizzled into a crisp flake. Tasting the very first Wheaties prototype, he decided this delicious accident had promise. He took the crisped gruel to the people at the Washburn Crosby Company.

"The head miller, George Cormack, took on the task of trying to strengthen the flakes to keep them from turning to dust inside a cereal box. Cormack tested 36 varieties of wheat before he developed the perfect flake. A company wide contest was held to name the new cereal. The winner was Jane Bausman, the wife of the export manager. Wheaties was chosen over numerous other entries, including Nutties and Gold Medal Wheat Flakes."

Wheat, as far as I can find out, is believed to have originated in south­western Asia. Wikipedia says, "It is thought that wheat was first domesticated in the Fertile Crescent area of the Middle East", and one source traced the origin of Red Fife (a variety wheat) to Galicia (a province in Ukraine). Red Fife was crossed with Hard Red Calcutta (a type of wheat from India) to produce Marquis Wheat.

The telephone and the electric lightbulb are not generally considered "foodstuffs" in the USA, although eating light bulbs was a brief fad in 1973.

Tinman

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tinman,

Quote "...Modern breakfast cereals originate in the USA, at least, according to this site. Of course, the raw materials originated elsewhere. Corn (maize) came from Mexico..."

Of course. I'd forgotten the famous Dr Kellog and his corn flakes!

I never eat the things myself which is why they had slipped my mind.

Really?

I was joking, but never mind.

The telephone and the electric lightbulb are not generally considered "foodstuffs" in the USA.

Who said they were? I said they were all invented in Russia, not eaten in the US of A. Oh, I see: you're kidding, too. Cum grano emoticonae.