Dan Wallach was recently near me and we met up. Initially, we were going to grab breakfast somewhere, but that ended up being impossible, which was too bad, as I was going to take him to a local place (Big Ed's) that served great local food breakfast.

Anyway, I mentioned to him that they had brains and roe, but that I usually got the country ham. But he had no idea what country ham was, something I hadn't considered. (For the record, it's a dry, salt-cured ham. Very salty -- you have to soak it in water before cooking it, and even then there's still a lot of salt left in it. Same thing as a Virginia ham.)

Here in North Carolina, we also have our own peculiar brand of barbecue. (Actually three, usually pulled pork with either a somewhat spicy vinegar-based ``sauce'', a tomato-based sauce, or a mustard-based sauce.)

What other regional foods are out there that we've never heard of? (And I think we've covered the barbecue issue before, really.)

Another thing that I think is a regional peculiarity is that a real Southern breakfast (although you seldom see it anymore outside Big Ed's) is served with a tomato slice, like in England. No Heinz baked beans, though.