Street food is ready-to-eat food or drink sold in a street or other public place, such as a market or fair, by a hawker or vendor, often from a portable stall. While some street foods are regional, many are not, having spread beyond their region of origin. Most street foods are also classed as both finger food and fast food, and are cheaper on average than restaurant meals. According to a 2007 study from the Food and Agriculture Organization, 2.5 billion people eat street food every day.
Today, people may purchase street food for a number of reasons including "ethnic taste, nostalgia, and the opportunity to eat quickly obtained, reaonably priced and flavorful food in a sociable setting." Historically, in places such as ancient Rome, street food was purchased because urban poor did not have kitchens in their homes.
Read more about Street Food: History, Street Food Around The World, Cultural and Economic Aspects, Health and Safety
Famous quotes containing the words street and/or food:
“Think of admitting the details of a single case of the criminal court into our thoughts, to stalk profanely through their very sanctum sanctorum for an hour, ay, for many hours! to make a very barroom of the mind’s inmost apartment, as if for so long the dust of the street had occupied us,—the very street itself, with all its travel, its bustle, and filth, had passed through our thoughts’ shrine! Would it not be an intellectual and moral suicide?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Thought product and food product are to me
Nothing compared to the producing of them.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)