Americans have a global reputation for being too disinterested in food to develop a complex national cuisine.

But just because it's harder to define than the famed cuisines of France or Italy does not mean it doesn't exist.

Ritual meals and specific dishes are undoubtedly part of American culture. According to a survey by the National Retail Federation, 144 million Americans planned to host or attend a cookout, barbecue or picnic on Independence Day this year -- about 44 million more than the number who planned to watch fireworks displays.

The Fourth of July isn't the only U.S. holiday to put food in the spotlight. What would Thanksgiving be without turkey and all the accompaniments?

But do those meals add up to a national cuisine?

A year ago, the James Beard Foundation reported the results of a survey in which it asked: Does an American cuisine exist? And, if so, what is it?

More than 90 percent of the participants in the survey, which primarily targeted home cooks, answered "yes" to the first question. No one seemed to agree on an answer to the second.

They came up with many foodstuffs that they considered to be uniquely American -- hamburgers, apple pie, macaroni and cheese, barbecue, fried chicken, pot roast, brownies, pancakes and ketchup. But a cuisine must be made up of more than just a dozen or so common dishes.

They also emphasized comfort food and home cooking, and mentioned regional diversity and the importance of native ingredients as components of the national cuisine.

In separate responses, culinary experts also weighed in.

Laura Shapiro, who writes about the effect of the food industry on what we eat, stressed the new technologies in the 1950s and '60s that introduced convenience food to the American diet. She views that period, with the emergence of string bean casserole assembled from canned goods and the sudden availability of strawberries year round, as most representative of purely American cookery.

But doesn't the way we cook today take priority over the way that we cooked fifty years ago?

Walter Scheib, "The American Chef" who served as White House executive chef from 1994 to 2005, believes an American cuisine has developed in the last 40 years.

Mr. Scheib, who said his now-trademarked nickname was bestowed by then-President Bill Clinton, was hired by then-first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton to bring American cuisine to the White House. While making a toast during his first state dinner, Mr. Clinton told French President Jacques Chirac: "We have a new American chef who is cooking our American cuisine."

"Great, simple, intrinsic flavors really are the core of American cuisine," said Mr. Scheib, who attributes its roots to the 1970s, when food enthusiasts such as Alice Waters -- the California restaurateur known for promoting fresh, local and organic ingredients -- refocused on simplicity in cooking and ingredients over technique.

These chefs and restaurateurs spread standards that influenced cooking across the country. But local ingredients, traditions and ethnic influences also have determined the characteristics of regional food.

"As this idea sort of bumped around the country in the early-to-mid -'80s, chefs in regions all over the country picked up on it, and they looked to see what was being grown or raised or produced in their area that was unique to their area," Mr. Scheib said.

A controversial element of his definition, however, is the idea that chefs and culinary tastemakers in a few large cities played the dominant role in creating American cuisine, with little influence from home kitchens across America. That idea goes against the instincts of many people who believe that home cooking has played an equally important role.

And not all chefs are seeking credit for creating American cuisine, even if they're hard at work preparing the very food that Mr. Scheib believes defines the cuisine.

Andrew Lise, executive chef of Willow in Ohio Township, also said he is certain that there is an American cuisine, but is equally certain that he can't define it. Examining his own food, he said: "Sometimes there's Mediterranean influence, sometimes there's an Asian influence, but the heart of the dish is American driven."

"To say what American food is, is kind of hard," agreed Keith Fuller, executive chef of Six Penn Kitchen, Downtown.

Both Mr. Lise and Mr. Fuller emphasize the importance of using local ingredients whenever possible.

Mr. Fuller also uses elements of foreign cuisine, often reinterpreting those elements until his dishes wind up being strikingly American, such as a BLT risotto the kitchen recently created. Other dishes featured at Six Penn are refined versions of American classics, such as meatloaf and other dishes that Mr. Fuller grew up eating.

This kind of borrowing suggests that American cuisine doesn't have to be defined solely by home cooking or restaurant cooking. When influential chefs today speak of being inspired by childhood flavors, and many Americans seek dinnertime advice from cooking shows starring chefs or cookbooks written by chefs, American cuisine could be shaped from the bottom up as well as from the top down.

While it might be tempting to put Mr. Scheib's definition to a vote, there are good reasons why so many people instinctively resist that idea.

Defining American cuisine might enhance its presence in the international culinary scene, but would also impose limits in a culinary scene where before there was only freedom.

Perhaps Americans would rather choose the freedom of experimentation over the tyranny of strict demarcation? It might not be the answer we were seeking, but it's worth considering, even celebrating.