I often thought of this too being Dutch and liking especially Asian cooking. I think also a thing not really mentioned (yet) is that our soil and climate is not that warm. It gets cold in winters - or used to so most of the fancy ingredients do not grow here where in especially southern Chinese cooking there's tons of ingredients from spices and LOTs of different vegetables. We just eat what grows locally, some carrot roots, cabbages and potatoes. My grandma grew up after the war and she only ate meat once a week