The older I get, the more I view identity as a sort of trap door. There's no there there that can stand up to sustained scrutiny. Everything has a history, everything is made of something other than what it is. In the context of food, I laugh at notions of authenticity and tradition - unless the time scale is over 1000 years there's not much interesting to talk about.
There’s a lot to be said for shared culture and customs. I am a second-generation American, and I love the familiarity and uniqueness of my family. I think people get really wrapped up in this idea of food as a proxy for culture, which makes sense, because food is really important! But shared culture really shows its value in the hard parts of life: for example when someone dies, there is a shared script, a defined way of making space for grief, a shared way of remembering the dead, etc.
Anyway, obviously cultural identity isn’t inherent: you know what you grew up with. And it can easily turn toxic when we move from appreciating our own culture to putting down others’. But my life would be a lot poorer without it.