Balance of Food

What's Tempting: Free food if the food tastes good

Even when food is free food, there is an undercurrent of marketing to get you into a place to then get you to come back.

Thanks to the coverage in our sibling site, CanadianCrossing.com, we knew a certain Mexican-type restaurant chain was giving away free tacos earlier this week.

The marketing went deeper since people could get that free taco anytime on Tuesday if they ordered online or downloaded the app. You could get a free taco by coming into the store but only between 2 pm-6 pm local time. I sadly have the time and not the money to pull off this experiment.

The deal was for the regular version of a specific taco that features the word "locos" and a corporate cousin. The novelty of the nacho cheese outer shell ensured that there would be some taste in the snack.

The free deal got me into a Taco Bell for the first time in awhile. Would the deal get me to come back?

Celebrate National Doughnut Day by blowing off free donuts

The true price of 'free food'

I ate the free food

What is the price of free food?

We've dealt with the world of free food long ago. Our take on free food many years ago fit where we were in our own personal growth. We've debated about calories and the price of eating something only because the food is free.

This week's adventure was about the free part since finances are bad these days. I like tacos, but rarely go in a Taco Bell because their tacos don't have me running for the border.

The argument behind cheap fast food is that you don't get much but you don't pay much. Here is what you get for $1.99:

Beef ("beef"?), iceberg lettuce, and cheddar (?) cheese (hopefully) that is mild and without flavor.

The Doritos hard shell doesn't taste as good as an actual Doritos chip. The shell does technically have taste but not the whimsical nature of nacho cheese Doritos.

The supreme version is 60¢ extra with tomatoes and sour cream. The lettuce in the marketing picture is green (unlike the actual lettuce) so the tomatoes likely wouldn't match either. Sour cream helps if you have spice, something you won't find in the taco, even with mild sauce.

If you are starving, this is food. This taco has virtually no taste, Doritos shell or otherwise.

The most memorable sensation in eating the taco is the warmth from the "beef." The quality of this chain's food has come under criticism. We don't know the percentage of beef in its "beef."

Temptation of the Week: Doritos Tacos Locos

Stephen Colbert opens up can of sand as Taco Bell lawsuit gets more publicity

Taco Bell lawsuit, like the 'beef' at Taco Bell, may not have enough meat to it

Make Taco Bell disclose the true cost of its new $2 value meal

What's Tempting: Triple the steak

BalanceofFood.com fast food coverage

The taco al pastor that I see where I live is a very simple taco with the tortilla, marinated pork, cilantro, and onions. You get a lot more meat in the local version, plenty of cilantro and onion. Every bite has flavor. I'm neutral on cilantro and not crazy about raw onions. I will eat that taco any time and enjoy the experience because flavor is the key.

If your outer shell needs to be atypical to be somewhat "locos," then you have a problem with the quality and flavor of ingredients. By the way, you can get that al pastor taco for about the same price.

Good promotions only work if you can back up the product. Taco Bell fans can tell me that some of their products have flavor and even spice, more than the Doritos Locos Tacos, and they might be correct. I can only go based on what I saw and ate.

If I lost my taste buds and got them for free, I might eat a Doritos Locos Taco. Otherwise, I would be "locos" to pay for one.

photos credit: me

What's Tempting: A blendie bowl for your nutrition needs

The food world is bowl-shaped, to borrow from XTC's Senses Working Overtime. Food somehow tastes better when combined in a bowl.

A bowl where the first 4 ingredients are kale, broccoli, white beans, and seaweed may not be that appetizing, even if the food is in a bowl. Somehow a blendie bowl can make that group of foods taste good, even like chocolate.

The blendie bowl is not a term you would likely use to describe your breakfast in a casual conversation. My first exposure to a blendie bowl came with not having the sense of what I was eating but more about the taste.

My logic was simple: if the taste doesn't work, who cares about how much nutrition is contained within the bowl. The taste was kind of like chocolate pudding but you knew you weren't eating chocolate pudding. You didn't want to eat it because it was so good but you definitely didn't mind eating it all.

The ingredients list looked pretty solid. Fairly simple, basic ingredients. You could wonder about pure sugar in the list but the taste wasn't too sweet.

There are only 142 calories in the 5.7 oz. bowl with 8 grams of dietary fiber and 8 grams of protein. Not huge for protein but a nice source of dietary fiber. Hard to find a processed food with only 86 mg of sodium. The bowl has a better than 3:1 ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6 (1229 mg/405 mg).

The label points out that top allergies are avoided: no dairy, gluten, soy, and nuts.

This was good and good for me.

Your humble narrator is as shocked as you are that these ingredients in a bowl doesn't taste like those ingredients.

If your significant other was going to make you breakfast in bed, and that person said you were having kale, broccoli, white beans, seaweed, bananas, and sweet potatoes, you might not know if you can finish all of that food.

You don't get huge portions of any specific food in a blendie bowl. You don't have any issues with any specific food in a blendie bowl.

The cherry and chocolate flavors are on the label but are further behind in the ingredient list. Yet you taste the cherry and chocolate more than kale or broccoli.

At $3.99, you may not be able to eat this 3x/day. As a supplement when traveling or as a snack, you can do much worse.

You might be tempted to wonder about a bowl that gives you some nutrition without sacrifice. Is it too good to eat even with some nutrition? Well, no, it's not. You don't have to feel guilty to have these bowls every so often.

BalanceofFood.com What's Tempting coverage

This is not meant to be an endorsement of the Worthy Superfood Blendie Bowl or any other blendie bowl. The idea of the story is to make you aware that companies are trying to present nutritious foods in more appealing packaging inside the bowl.

I did try several flavors from Worthy and the dark chocolate cherry was the best taste for your humble narrator. Your tastes may vary.

The reality is we eat a lot of vegetables with fat or dressing or some other tastier food. This isn't that much different. Cherry and cocoa are more palatable for most people than kale or broccoli.

We do need to develop a palate for the real taste of vegetables. Having a palate tuned to sugar will not work out well over a longer period of time. Some sugar, sweetness is good but not all the time.

The average life is built to have moments where a blendie bowl gives a boost of nutrition where you otherwise might not eat well. You can't live your way just on these products. A blendie bowl with a healthy salad is a better option than just the bowl.

photos credit: me

What's Tempting: All you can eat at Long John Silver's

As a scrawny kid who was fixated on the fine cuisine of Long John Silver's, if you had told me that someday I could have an all-you-can-eat Long John Silver's dinner, I would cry with joy.

Like most things kids wish for, the reality as an adult is not as exciting.

If I were an adult who needed to gain a few pounds, the reality of an all-you-can-eat Long John Silver's dinner would be an ideal invitation. Unfortunately, these days needing to lose a few pounds is the reality.

Despite the current weight status, I came across those words that would have made me happy as a child. On Sundays, you could get all you can eat at Long John Silver's. I decided to indulge the kid within me to experience an all-you-can-eat Long John Silver's meal.

The deal was fish or chicken with 2 sides and 3 hush puppies. The 2 piece fish dinner with 2 sides and hush puppies was $7.29. The all you can eat special was $7.99.

The kid in me would have picked chicken but I actually went for the fish. In recent times, the chicken pieces haven't always been consistent. The other logic was that fish would be lighter, even with the breading, and I could eat more of the fish.

They started me with 2 pieces of fish with the fixings. While I ate Long John Silver's 1-2 times a year even as an adult, I had ordered fish or chicken by the piece. So this was my reintroduction to fries, cole slaw, and hush puppies.

The fries were hot and average with little taste. The cole slaw was slightly above average but perhaps was more appetizing since this was the only portion of the meal that wasn't deep fried. I remember the hush puppies being darker than the ones I got. Darker usually means tastier with fried food.

The fish was what I came for and most of the focus was on the fish. I paced the fries so that most of the fries would be gone through 2 pieces. I only nibbled on the hush puppies since they didn't offer much satisfaction. I ate most of the slaw through 2 pieces.

The fixings can slow down the momentum of the all-you-can-eat experience. But they were also part of the challenge. I did wonder if the fixings were unlimited, but I had no interest in eating beyond the servings I received.

The spirit of the unlimited is that you can't take anything with you. The crumblies are the exception to the rule only in that they are barely food. For those who aren't Long John Silver's fans, crumblies are the leftover pieces of deep fried batter. They are not healthy by any definition but they do taste good.

The chain has served crumblies for years but in recent times, they have acknowledged the crumblies as part of the experience.

The best moment, perhaps even more than the food, was going to the counter to get another piece of fish. I waited for what seemed less than a minute and I had a piece of fish to add on to my meal. No money was transacted.

I realized in the middle of the fish piece #3 that the meal was going to stop at 3 pieces of fish. If I had been younger and weighed less, maybe I had a shot at 4 pieces of fish. I wasn't going to suffer over the deal, especially since I had beaten the system. Without the fixings, I might have had 4 pieces of fish but we'll never know.

I might have had 4 pieces if we could choose a mixture of fish and chicken. I realized that the setup was geared in one direction for a reason.

Traditions can go on, even if we cut down on their foods

BalanceofFood.com fast food coverage

BalanceofFood.com What's Tempting coverage

I did this for lunch instead of dinner so that might have cut down on the amount. I also walked a mile to the restaurant and would walk a mile back. I also drank water to make up for the salt and not spend calories on soft drinks.

The Long John Silver's approach to all-you-can-eat doesn't fit the typical pattern. Everything was deep fried except for the cole slaw, though you can choose 2 non-fried side dishes. A true all-you-can-eat dining experience should have a bit more variety. But fast food offers very few all-you-can-eat options. Red Robin offers bottomless steak fries. Olive Garden offers unlimited soup, salad, and breadsticks.

You might think an all-you-can-eat experience is a roadblock on a good eating program. Sometimes having such an experience can free you up on how you think about food. This meal did offer a bit of variety; a non fast food option can provide more extensive variety of different flavors and textures.

While this might seem a horrifying curveball on the way toward better eating, sometimes the most unusual detour can make you appreciate the progress that you made.

photos credit: me

What's Tempting: 6 French fries

6 French fries. There was a lot of screaming on the Internet over 6 French fries. But they were really screaming the fries that weren’t there.

If a person ate 102 French fries in a setting, that person probably could have quit at 78 French fries. The person who stopped at 78 French fries could have walked away at 56 French fries.

56 French fries seems like a lot to the person who ate 42 French fries and didn’t go on. The person who ate 42 French fries might have been happier with 24 French fries.

The person who stopped at 24 French fries felt unsatisfied but would have been overwhelmed at 78 French fries or, dare we say, 102 French fries.

If you know how many French fries you ate in your last sitting, you are a scientist in this study or a liar. Nobody counts French fries, which is a good thing and part of the problem.

There is no more small size fries at McDonald’s: you can get medium, large, or Super Size. The measurement is based on how many fries you can cram into a fries box. You might know calories in a serving but you would have to ask how many ounces you are being served.

Being served French fries in a pub or restaurant may depend on how many fries you can gather on the rest of the plate, likely next to a burger, or possibly in a basket or bowl.

Preserving the integrity of Belgian frites

Happy Meal gets happier with smaller French fries bags and more apples

BalanceofFood.com fast food coverage

Professor Eric Rimm of the T.H. Chan School of Public Health at Harvard University mentioned in The New York Times article that eating 6 French fries was the healthiest way to eat them.

Getting caught up in the idea of 6 French fries misses the point. Eat fewer French fries. You don’t have to eat all the fries on the plate just because they are there. Offer some to your friends. Get more friends to come out with you to eat those French fries.

If those solutions don’t sound fun and you want all the French fries you can have in a single sitting, have French fries less often. If you gorge on French fries once a week, cut back to 2x/month.

“If you take a potato, remove its skin (where at least some nutrients are found), cut it, deep fry the pieces in oil and top it all off with salt, cheese, chili or gravy, that starch bomb can be turned into a weapon of dietary destruction.”

The New York Times article paints a portrait of the destruction of potatoes into French fries. You can make them healthier.

• If you buy frozen French fries, cook them in the oven or broiler as opposed to deep frying them.
• Fries are tempting with “salt, cheese, chili or gravy” but you could spray them with malt vinegar to add flavor.

If you are starting from scratch:

• Keep the skins on.
• Soak the potatoes to reduce the starch.
• Fry them in a way where the least amount of oil is absorbed.
• Buy a really expensive air fryer to avoid or significantly reduce the oil involved.

Even if French fries are not your kryptonite, use the philosophy whether your weakness is spaghetti, chocolate, pork rinds, or cheesecake. Eat less. Use better ingredients. Savor every bite. Minimize toppings or dips to truly appreciate the dish.

photo credit: me

What's Tempting: Picturing a donut but not eating the donut

This is the donut I did not eat today.

I took a picture of a donut, the last one in the box from the most recognizable donut brand in the United States (rhymes with punkin). Strawberry frosted is not my favorite, but I was tempted. I took a picture of the donut. I went to the bathroom, thinking about the donut.

A few minutes later, I returned to the donut. The donut was gone. The person who grabbed the last donut was gone.

All I had was the picture of a strawberry frosted donut.

A picture says 1,000 calories. Well, maybe not a thousand, but a few hundred calories.

Vision and smell of a donut do not replace the taste of a donut. The desire for flavor. Sinking your teeth into a greasy baked good.

An hour later, I still had a picture of a strawberry frosted donut. I didn't have the taste, the feeling of the dough into my mouth. I didn't have a few hundred extra calories that I did not need.

Even if you are swayed by the next donut or cake or whatever truly tempts you, know you did survive getting past that donut.

I have a souvenir of that moment. A picture of a lonely strawberry frosted donut. And the knowledge that I did not eat that donut.

photo credit: me

What’s Tempting: Avoiding extreme foods

Eating poutine, donuts, macaroni and cheese, and Cheetos separately can be an occasional source of calories, and you would get a lot of calories per gram of any of these foods. The need to combine foods into other foods isn’t interesting or creative or a good use of junk food points.

If you are going to eat poutine, eat a really good plate of poutine, not potato wedges, cheese curds, and gravy on a relatively bland donut. If you are going to eat a donut, find one with flavor and real taste.

If you are going to eat macaroni and cheese, make a good quality plate. A good macaroni and cheese does not need Cheetos as a shell.

Tim Hortons offered up a poutine donut on Canada Day (July 1) to Americans to celebrate Canadian independence. Tim Hortons is owned by Burger King, the creators of Mac n' Cheetos, macaroni and cheese with a dusting of Cheetos on the outside.

The poutine donut might celebrate Canada if Canadians somehow would eat a poutine donut, which they would not. They might eat a poutine with donuts, but only if it was really cold outside (not really).

The Canadian chain also offered maple TimBits. The TimBits are the hole of the donut, similar to Munchkins at Dunkin' Donuts. Maple and donuts do speak to Canada. Tim Hortons is offering up the maple TimBits for the rest of July, but the chain should make this a permanent fixture on both sides of the border.

A maple TimBit is indulgent but reasonably so. You get a taste of Canada in the process (pronounced PRO-cess in Canada). If I could find the recipe for the maple bacon shortbread sandwich I had on Canada Day, that would be a nice indulgence with maple bacon filling between a pair of thin shortbread cookies.

What's Tempting column collection

For more on this story, click here to read the full version from our sister blog, CanadianCrossing.com.

photos credit: Tim Hortons; me

What's Tempting: Making Italian pasta your own

Amatriciana. Carbonara. Gricia. Cacio e pepe.

This is not a new Italian singing group. These are the 4 primary pasta dishes centering around combinations of bacon, cheese, and pepper.

Amatriciana adding a tomato sauce with guanciale, red pepper flakes, pecorino romano, and pepper
Carbonara adding an egg to pancetta, pecorino romano, and pepper
Gricia bacon, pecorino romano, and pepper
Cacio e pepe pecorino romano and pepper

These are the basics of these sauces. Ask any Italian nona and you will get variations within variations. Some will swear an amatriciana sauce gets onions; some will swear that there are no onions. Carbonara can get peas but mostly don't.

Bacon comes in 3 different names: lardo, pancetta, and guanciale. Lardo consists of thin strips that don't add much flavor or taste. Pancetta is cured Italian bacon. Guanciale comes from the jowls of the pig and is much harder to find.

Adding new cultures to our food regime can awaken sluggish, repetitive takes on food. Most people have had Italian food, so the country's food is not new. However, most Americans have had variations on Italian-American food. For most people, this is a little new.

The great things about these Italian pasta dishes is that the foods are not complicated, hard to find, or unusual. You might find after trying these dishes that Spaghetti O's is no longer your sweet spot for Italian food.

After traveling to Italy last fall, I wanted to replicate the experience I had with these pasta dishes. I dragged home several pounds of Italian pasta. I scoured out to the farthest reaches of Chicago to get really good pancetta. I looked for bucatini, pici, spaghetii alla chitarra, and other similar pastas. I hunted for the best tomato puree that I could find. I brought back really good red pepper flakes from Italy.

In Rome, Florence, and scattered places in Tuscany, I found many outstanding plates of pasta and some okay plates. The good plates have meaty, salty goodness; sweet but not too sweet tomato taste; the burn of red pepper flakes; and the salty goodness of a fine percorino romano. I had one cacio e pepe that was so intense I struggled to finish a medium-sized plate.

I also had plates with lardo that you could barely see and definitely not taste. I had dishes that were supposed to have the spice of the red pepper flakes and found no spice in the dish. I was shut out of a few places that perhaps had wonderful plates that I may never taste.

After considerable practice, I could honestly say I could not compete with the best plates I had. I could do better than some of the plates I had in Rome and elsewhere in Italy.

I experimented with different variations as to how much pasta water to add or red pepper flakes to throw into the sauce. The best guanciale I had might have been in Toronto and not Rome. The pancetta I found in Chicago was very nice but didn't compare to what I had elsewhere. The tomato products varied in consistency and most were too thin. It's easy to use pasta water to thin a sauce but most of the sauces I had were too thin to start.

The pastas were good but none really excelled in taste. The best spaghetti I found in Windsor, Ontario in the city's Little Italy neighborhood. But I found ones better than I have had at home.

The best plates in Italy had rich beautiful sauces that needed wine or Coca-Cola to cool the heat from the red pepper flakes. The consistency was ideal and the meat was plentiful. I had a few meals where I cooked the food in a limited kitchen setup. I couldn't duplicate that well in the kitchen in Rome but would be curious what I could do in a real kitchen in Italy. The fresh porcini mushrooms were really amazing.

The bucatini I had in Italy was supreme. The bucatini I had here didn't work out too well. A hearty spaghetti will do just fine.

You also have to consider that if Italy is your destination, Italian food labels are more precise, listing percentages on the ingredient list. European Union standards are much higher than in the United States. Italians really care about the quality of their food.

The top picture is my attempt back in the United States. The other picture was from a really nice place in Rome.

Two things in the good dishes aren't on the recipe: love and patience. The Italian nona does add a lot of love to the dishes. Patience requires knowing that your dish will take time to make and knowing when to do what to do thanks to patience.

Traveling and eating would be something I could do for the rest of my life. The memory of those meals can get you through until the next trip. Bringing back that education can help you try and match what you found. Even if you don't match what you found on your travel adventures, trying is also part of the fun. You may find that your meals at home will be better as a result.

photos credit: me

What's Tempting: Building a bowl of food

Eating food in a bowl is one of the new crazes. After all, apparently food isn't just what you eat but how you eat it. If eating healthy food in a bowl gets you to eat that healthy food, then bowls away.

In a time where I do very little eating out, I do love the poké bowls. The premise is that you get seafood (tuna, salmon) and brown rice with other vegetables and toppings. I usually get pickled ginger, cucumber, avocado, crunchies of some kind, and a beautiful sesame vinegar.

This is not a dish I would have had 20 years ago when I ate so much more poorly. But I like this bowl and I do feel more full even if it tastes light.

The drawback to this bowl is there isn't much room to move ingredients around. I love using the chopsticks given with the meal. But they don't stir things well. I do get better with the mixing and the chopsticks each time I get the poké bowl.

Fast food has not ignored this trend. Harvey's is a burger chain in Canada with a new build a bowl deal. The base of the bowl is salad, fries, or even rice. The idea of getting rice in a burger place is still a bit foreign but let's ride the wave.

You can get grilled or crispy chicken, original or angus burger, or a veggie burger. Then you can add on 21 classic toppings and 9 new toppings: corn and black beans, salsa, guacamole, Greek dressing, Asian sesame dressing, sweet chili Thai sauce, crispy noodles, croutons, and shredded cheese.

I haven't eaten at a Harvey's in a very long time. But I have to admit that this bowl would be tempting. Not more tempting than the poke bowl, but better than grabbing a burger.

Quite frankly, having salsa, guacamole, and shredded cheese on French fries would be fun. Explaining poutine to Americans requires telling the specific combination but as La Banquise in Montréal shows us, fries, cheese, and gravy is a starting point.

Whether KFC gets some credit for sparking a trend based on its Famous Bowl is a question better answered by Patton Oswalt. To recap for our readership that eats healthier food, the Famous Bowl has mashed potatoes, sweet corn, and crispy chicken with "home-style" gravy and topped with a 3-cheese blend.

I have tried a few crazy fast food items, including the infamous Double Down, but couldn't make myself eat the Famous Bowl. The idea of chicken, potatoes, and gravy sounds wonderful. Corn offers a vegetable even if it a starchy vegetable. The 3 cheeses feels way over the top. This might be a southern American poutine in a sense. Some Americans freak out over real Canadian poutine but that still tastes better than what the Famous Bowl could be in my mind.

I didn't give much thought to this picture I took of Cafe Kitsune in Vancouver in the summer of 2013. The carbohydrates and protein look similar to the poké bowls. The cafe, near Granville Island on 2nd Avenue, is closed now. This is proof of an earlier version of a healthy bowl.

photos credit: photos 1, 4: me; photo 2: Harvey's; photo 3: KFC
video credit: Harvey's

What's Tempting: Not cooking with alcohol

Holiday festive cooking often involves dishes where alcohol is added to the dish. But many people would prefer not to cook with alcohol for a variety of reasons.

Why do we cook with alcohol?

Alcohol is a part of certain dishes such as coq au vin and beer can chicken. Often, alcohol is used in sauces to add flavor and liquid to a dish.

Those who like the taste of alcohol find all kind of dishes to use alcohol whether that be vodka-infused pasta sauce or beer-battered fish.

Some will argue that alcohol brings an intense flavor that can't be matched with a non-alcoholic liquid.

Do you really have to cook with alcohol?

You see a great recipe where alcohol needs to be added. But you don't want to cook with alcohol. You could skip the step but are concerned that the dish will fall short without the ingredient.

Those who enjoy cooking with alcohol are adding flavor within a liquid to the dish. So the ingredient brings a liquid and flavor. Water is a liquid but doesn't add flavor.

Alcohol has properties that other liquids do not have.

Are there alternatives to cooking with alcohol?

Some recipes such as coq au vin or beer can chicken really need the alcohol or a reasonable facsimile. A non-alcohol beer or a sparking wine will come close enough.

The easiest answer is to use a stock, such as beef, chicken, or vegetable. Flavor and liquid are what stocks are all about. And you can add that flavor for a lot cheaper.

As a substitute for rum, you can use white grape juice, pineapple juice, or apple juice/cider. Ginger ale or sparkling juices work instead of champagne.

Since cooking with wine is very chic, you can pinch-hit pomegranate juice or red wine vinegar for red wine. White grape juice, lemon juice, and white wine vinegar can step in for white wine.

What if you don't like the taste of alcohol?

I don't have a principled stance in using alcohol personally. No religious, no moral objection. In fact, you might serve me a sauce with alcohol in it that may be better as a result. But I don't like to use alcohol in dishes because, well, I don't like the taste.

The maxim is to use an alcohol that you would want to drink. Wine is a logical choice, but most wines are okay in terms of taste. I can drink chardonnay all day long but most wines aren't comfortable with my palate.

I do enjoy alcoholic ciders for the taste but haven't seen too many recipes where you can cook with cider. The fruity taste of ciders may clash in a dish, but if you thinking fruit juice as an alternative AND you don't have any other objection to alcohol, ciders are a nice option.

You have good options with alcohol or can make non-alcohol choices to add liquid and flavor to a dish. Add for what you think will taste well in a dish within your own personal parameters.

photo credit: BettyCrocker.com

What's Tempting: Salt in your bread

Salt is easy to spot as part of the taste in processed soups. You can taste the salt in the soup and you would know instantly if the salt disappeared.

Short of a highly sophisticated palate, you can't pick up salt in bread. Yet if the salt were to disappear from bread, you would definitely know.

You don't give much reason to think about salt in bread until you get to Tuscany and find that the bread doesn't have salt. This is not an accident. Saltless bread in Tuscany has been part of the culinary landscape historically in that part of Italy.

I did my research before going to Italy, so I knew the bread would not have salt. But even when you know, eating a piece of saltless bread, well, you can't prepare for the moment. You are eating the bread but there is no taste.

The saltless bread isn't designed to be eaten by itself. The rich sauces are supposed to make up for the lack of salt. You don't get much confidence using the saltless bread when your taste buds realize that you previously used regular crusty bread to sop up rich sauces and enjoyed the experience.

I even tried starting with the crust of the bread since there is more taste (and fiber), but even eating the crust of saltless bread is not satisfying. You would need a lot of sauce to drown out the taste of the lack of salt in bread. I never found that level of sauce.

I certainly used bread to sop up sauce in my meals in Rome. The combination of those sauces with bread containing salt was beautiful. Without the salt in the bread, the taste couldn't catch up. 

In a lot of restaurants in Italy, bread is a charged service so you don't have any guilt taking the bread home with you. In those restaurants with saltless bread, they weren't tasty enough to put in the backpack.

In a fancy restaurant in Florence, I did get the saltless bread with my meal, but I also got a puffy bread roll that tasted extra salty. Perhaps by comparison, the puffy bread tasted extra salty but there did seem to be more salt than normal.

I dipped that bread into the sauce. Wonderful! I saved the rest of the puffy bread for a ideal late-summer picnic in Lucca that included boar prosciutto and a very intense cheese from Siena.

Tripe is a big deal in Tuscany. Chitlins are a part of soul food in the southern United States. These dishes stay around, similar to saltless bread in Tuscany, because of the impact of food history. Celebrating food history is about keeping those choices alive, even if we don't choose to order them.

Some people enjoy tripe and chitlins but their staying power is history. The parts of the pig that people wouldn't think to eat became part of the diet due to circumstances in that era. The history of saltless bread in Tuscany goes very far back.

We applaud the idea of food history as a way of tying ourselves to our past. Food history allows us to see the different emphasis on food: more likely to eat organ meat, such as liver; more likely to be canning and pickling vegetables to make them last for months.

Sometimes, food history has some anomalies along the way, adding a historical perspective even if you never try the dish.

What's Tempting: Salting the pasta water Part II

We are featuring a few articles related to salt toward the end of 2016. This is by design as we are taking a new look at some of the habits involving salt. Stay tuned for more articles in the next few weeks.

photos credit: me