Yesterday, I was in Hofer, a grocery store in Tolmin, Slovenia, when I saw something I had not seen in years: Chicken Bacon.

I stopped for a second because it caught me off guard. Since moving from the USA, I have gotten used to Europe being pork, pork, and more pork. So when I got to the register, I asked the woman, “Is this really chicken bacon?” She giggled and said yes.

I told her I was amazed because it had been a long time since I had seen this kind of meat. She asked how long it had been since I had been back to the States. When I told her it had been about a decade, she was shocked. Damn, when I said it out loud, I was a little shocked too.

Then she asked me what it was like not having access to all the processed foods in America.

I laughed because I understood where the question came from. Yes, America has a lot of bad food. A lot. The cheap food system in America allows chemicals and ingredients that are banned in Europe, and that is real. America’s worst food is some of the worst food in the world.

But here is the part people miss: America’s top level is also incredible.

When you step outside the cheapest options, America has Whole Foods, farmers markets, health food stores, specialty shops, international markets, organic sections, vegan sections, gluten-free sections, and every kind of food lane you can imagine. The healthy food is there. The problem is that it can be super expensive, and that creates a different conversation.

That is what makes these moments funny to me. Europeans often have these ideas of what America is, and watching those ideas come out in real life is hilarious. One of my favorites is when people try to tell Americans we do not know anything about beer.

I live in the Czech Republic. Beer is their world. I respect that. Czech beer culture is real, serious, and deeply connected to daily life. But when I first moved there and went to my local krčma, I was shocked that they only had one beer on tap.

Coming from Chicago, that was wild to me.

I missed places like Binny’s, where the beer aisle felt like a trip around the world. There were sections from different countries, different styles, different moods, different price points. In Chicago, I used to drink a lot of Modelo and Golden Pheasant, which is Zlatý Bažant from Slovakia. Then beers like Pilsner, Hacker-Pschorr, Duvel, and others were for celebrations or big payday moments.

Binny’s gave me options. It allowed me to meet the world of beer before I ever lived in Europe.

That is the thing people sometimes forget about America. America is not a culture of one people. It is a country filled with people from everywhere, bringing food, music, language, religion, style, and tradition with them. Many Americans are open to old cultures, old recipes, and different dishes because we grew up around mixtures of people. We may not always know what to expect, but a lot of us are open to trying.

At the same time, I understand why people see America the way they do. As more and more fast food brands push into Europe, it is no wonder Europeans still believe the American food system is only burgers, fries, sugar, and processed everything. That part of America travels loudly.

But it is not the whole story.

That is why I love these road trips. I shop local. I stay in apartments. I cook for the family. We sit down and eat together more on the road than we sometimes do at home. And everywhere we go, I get to talk to people. These little conversations become live focus groups. You hear what people think, what they assume, what they have experienced, and what they have only been told.

And that is where the real lesson sits.

You do not really know a place until you live inside its everyday life.

You can read about a country. You can watch videos. You can hear opinions. You can repeat what people told you. But until you walk into the grocery store, talk to the woman at the register, cook in a local apartment, drink what locals drink, and see what people actually buy and eat, you are still guessing.

The world is what it is, but seeing it and experiencing it tells you what it really is.

So keep exploring. Keep asking questions. Keep discovering. Because nothing is exactly what they tell you it is.