Monday, February 25, 2013

A gift for your mouth



The other day, just  as I was putting the finishing touches on the Channa Masala, (a garbanzo bean curry), that I was making, I realized that I didn’t have any rice or naan to eat with it- Totally dismaying right? A lesser person might have just thrown a fit, chucked the curry against the wall and gone to bed without dinner at that point, but I am slight neither in appetite nor character and I certainly am not easy to deter when it comes to dinner, so I hopped up on the counter plunged elbow deep into my cabinet and quested for an appropriate accoutrement to escort my Channa Masala into my tummy. “SCORE!” I exclaimed, when after a couple minutes of rifling through the various pastas, canned goods and cereals in my cupboard, I stumbled upon an unopened bag of tortillas, which I had no recollection of ever buying.

Having taken a botany class in college one time, I happened to know that, like traditional burrito fodder:  pinto and black beans, Garbanzo beans are a member of the Fabaceae family. Since Garbanzos and Mexican beans are just cousins from different continents, I figured my Masala’d chick peas wouldn’t mind snuggling up in a nice warm flour tortilla that night like their black and pinto bean brethren. As it turned out the tortilla and Channa Masala got along famously. It was cross culturally scrumptious!

 Since the Channa Masala had made such a mighty fine burrito, and since I had discovered that bag of tortillas, which according to their packaging would have been “best” eaten a couple weeks prior, I decided I better make use of them quickly. Thus a week long international burrito festival ensued. Despite the fact that I was the sole attendee of said festival, it was a delight!

On Tuesday, I had a veggie-burgerito  (veggie burger + cheese and coleslaw wrapped in a tortilla), which, if you can believe it, was even more delicious than the Channa Masala had been! The night after that I had another curryito: Thai style yellow curry with potatoes, peas, cauliflower and coconut milk in burrito form – yum!  And I think everyone can already guess what I ended up with on Thursday when I raided my fridge and wrapped up scrambled eggs,  cheese,  Greek yogurt, sautéed bell peppers and onions inside a warm tortilla… If you guessed ONE BAD ASS BREAKFAST BURRITO FOR DINNER, then you’re right!

Once I figure out a way to make cereal and milk into a burrito that doesn’t leak or get soggy, I think I will pretty much just switch over to an all tortilla all the time diet. I feel like I’ve been depriving myself for  years by eating food with forks and spoons when I could have just been using a tortilla to swaddle all of my main courses. Not only is wrapping foods up in a tortilla like a gift for your mouth, but it also eliminates the hassle of washing cutlery which in turn saves on water.  Burritos are just magical-The perfect combination of food and vessel in one! Hooray for Burritos!

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