Festivus Gastronomicus
Battle: Tortillas vs. Bread
Just to show all of you that the Festivus G doesn’t shy away from the hot topics of the day, I’m going to go ahead and chime in on one of the great questions facing eating persons everywhere: which starch is superior: Tortillas or Bread.
People are particular about bread and good bread is vastly different from Wonder Bread crap, so is it with tortillas. I swear to god it’s hard to find decent flour tortillas in Boston- and we lived in the “Latin Quarter!” If you’ve ever tasted a baguette in France or had a hot tasty tortilla fresh from the hands of wrinkled abuelita in Mexico, then you know these starches can be heavy-hitters and take those taste buds to the heights of ecstacy.
Bread is made by old guys in big white hats who get up at 3am - Tortillas are made by old Mexican ladies who can put in 16 hour days watching that Manteca sizzle. They both get my respect and I promise to be completely fair and objective during this battle. Despite my overwhelming desire to name tortillas the winner.
Bare Essentials
Bread - Starches usually play a supporting role and seldom have the kick to be the leading lad or lady. We’re not talking about kalamata olive cheese focaccia here, just a plain slice- untoasted. Sure there are great loaves out there that you can just peal away at, but how often do you usually do that. I’d say most of the time if you’re eating plain bread it’s just to get by until your meal arrives.
Tortilla - The tortilla thrives because of it’s adaptability and portability in any circumstances, but left alone it leaves you wishing you had just a little more carne asada left or that you’d bought the big block of cheese last week. Again, if you’re eating a plain tortilla it’s not because of the wonderful flavor- it’s just to absorb the alcohol.
Advantage: Draw.
Note: the tortilla chip is considered to be a deep-fried tortilla and even eaten plain, is equivalent to toast and is not eligible to battle in this category.
Cheese Factor
Bread - Grilled cheese is an after school favorite for kids in trailer parks across this great land. It is iconic American cuisine. But just because Bobby Flay can spice it up with goat cheese and artisan bread, doesn’t mean your standard Kraft single between two slices of Wonder bread is ever going to impress anyone who didn’t grow up addicted to the narcotic qualities of the preservatives found therein.
Tortilla - When the first tortilla was pressed and climbed from the primordial ooze (read: lard) it wasn’t ready to just run out and become a decadent tostada shell or serve as a crucible for an alchemic mix of carnitas and guacamole: it had to walk before it could run. Stuffed with melted cheese, dressed with Tapatio, and dripping with goodness, the quesadilla doesn’t stumble- it struts. It’s John Travolta in the opening scene of Saturday Night Fever. Pretty much every Mexican restaurant or taqueria has quesadillas on the menu, not to mention lots of other types of restaurants offering them as appetizers. The most fascinating interpretation I’ve ever seen are the deep-fried, crisp quesadillas my dad grew up eating at Nati’s in San Diego. I haven’t been back there since I started eating cheese, but even during this dark period I appreciated that they do something special there.
Advantage: Tortilla.
Salad
Bread - I’m not a big crouton fan. When I make them myself, they’re good. Those store-bought ones usually undermine all one’s efforts to make a special salad dressing with cheap, artificial, and overbearing flavors. Not a big fan of them in general.
Tortillas - You can fry up some sliced tortillas and add them to a salad making crispy tortilla strips a zesty treat for any salad lover. Lots of times it’s faster to make crispy tortilla strips and they have a far more subtle effect on the flavor while still surrendering their awesome texture to the salad.
Advantage: Tortilla.
Soup
Bread - It’s tough to eat a soup without any bread whatsoever. Even if you make it most of the way through the soup, you’re really gonna be aching for that bread when you get to the bottom of the bowl and want to sop up the last drops of flavor. You can also thicken a soup with bread crumbs. Technically you could be eating bread with bread, using the soup only as an intermediary. Bravo, bread.
Tortilla - In tortilla soup, the tortilla is the soup. It’s the best part of a very good soup. However, there’s really only one soup, maybe a small handful of soups, that you eat with tortillas. Options limited, but at least they’re tasty.
Advantage: Bread.
Appetizing
Bread - Bruschetta is about the best bread appetizer out there. It can be really good, but it’s never amazing. I had a chef come out of the kitchen one night and give the whole dining room these special bruschettas he had created and they were by far the best I’ve ever had, but I wouldn’t have ordered them against the other offerings on the menu.
Tortilla - It’s called chips, yo- and they win. I know I should wait until the next paragraph, but how can I when the answer is so obvious. Fresh hot chips and a tasty salsa are not only friggin’ amazing, they are also usually free. I’m not even taking into account nachos as an appetizer either. That would be completely unfair to bread’s sorry ass.
Advantage: Tortilla
Battle Royale
Bread - The sandwich is the bread behemoth that basically owns lunchtime across this great land. New Yorkers may prefer 3 inches of salted, cured pork to California’s 3 inches of sprouts, but the bread remains the same. There’s an infinite combination of ingredients you can put in between your slices, and no end to the variations of flavor. The sandwich simply has no lunchtime competitors that even touch it. Also, never trust a woman that doesn’t like a good sandwich.
Tortilla - If I could write songs instead of just sing them, all my songs would be about burritos. There’s not a single day or emotion that isn’t enhanced by a delicious burrito. I’m not talking a piece of shit wrap either. I’m talking honest to goodness burritos filled with loads of marinated meats, guacamole, beans, salsa, damn gimme a second to take a bite of this burrito, okay now I’m back, spanish rice, cabbage, cheese, and all of it wrapped in a warm, soft tortilla. Tortillas make your plato mexicano a burrito and let you take it with you to the beach.
Advantage: Draw.
Breakfast
Bread - Breakfast bread is French toast. There are plenty of other baked goods that people eat for breakfast, but were talking sliced off the loaf bready bread. French toast is just brilliant. I don’t want to talk too much about breakfast, but thank god for breakfast. Oh, what’s that? You like bread? Let’s soak it in egg yolks and poor maple sugar all over that shit. I seriously don’t know how it came to be that we all let each other get away with breakfast. French toast is part of the breakfast royal family and long may it rule.
Tortilla - I never ate huevos rancheros when I was growing up. I was damn stupid. That is one helluva way to start the day. Huevos rancheros gets all the best parts of Mexican food going: salsa, beans, tortilas, and adds fried eggs into the mix. It’s definitely not a light breakfast, but neither is French toast. Not only does huevos rancheros have a taste that’s supremo, it also allows you to start the day with a heaping load of hot sauce. Arriba!
Advantage: Draw.
Overachievers
Bread - Bakers must get really bored being up at 3am with nobody around and just crappy radio to listen to. So what do they do, they riff on badass bread recipes: garlic bread, banana bread, pumpkin bread, garlic banana pumpkin bread- you name it. There are nine-billion types of fancy bread and pulling a loaf of the good shit out at a dinner party tells your guests you put effort into every component of the meal.
Tortilla - Even if we consider Indian naan as a type of garlic Tortilla (and this is really stretching it) and we also considered all those flavored tortillas they have at Trader Joes or Planet Fresh, tortillas lose big time. They simply lack the sophistication of the fancy bread loaves. Sorry tortillas.
Advantage: Bread.
Simple Dessert
Bread - You’ve got an empty fridge and you’re jonesing for a sugar blast. You look across the kitchen and see a loaf of bread: instant cinnamon toast. It’s not just a crap cereal, it’s a tasty treat and goes fine with a sliced apple for a special snack time.
Tortilla - Same situation; you spy your friend/lover/housemate/moocher with cinnamon toast, but they ganked the last pieces of bread. Fortunately you’ve got tortillas and yes, a one-up on your counterpart. A hot tortilla with butter and cinnamon kicks the lame butt off of a piece of cinnamon toast. More importantly, I challenge anyone to eat just one of these convenient treats.
Advantage: Tortilla.
For Realsies Dessert
Bread - The only real bread dessert is panettone. Once you get more complicated than that, you enter the world of pastry and cake. Panettone is good, put ice cream on it and it’s better. However, it’s best when my grandfather pours armagnac all over the two of them. Thing is, you have to cover it in ice cream and drench it in good booze before it’s worth eating. (Don’t mention pan dolce either, cause that’s grade A crap)
Tortilla - I haven’t had fried ice cream since I was 12 years old. The reason why is that since adolescence I haven’t deserved it. The ice creamity, crispy, fudge coverity, cinnamon and sugary, deep-fried dessert is a sacrament to tasty. Amen.
Advantage: Tortilla.
Music
Bread - Bread was a rocking band in the 70’s. Even though they were from LA, they chose to forgo Tortilla as a name and went with Bread.
Tortilla - There’s no tortilla band that I know of. At least nothing that’s ever topped the Billboard adult contemporary charts.
Advantage: Bread.
Robots
Bread - Bread machines are a wedding gift standard and are becoming a universal feature of the American kitchen landscape. They are very convenient and make surprisingly good bread. You can be very creative with your ingredients and let the robot do all the heavy lifting. Concerned about destroying the planet with your thirst for honey oat loaves? Pedal power your bread machine!
Tortilla - Despite years of work, the Mexican government has yet to build a Tortilla robot that doesn’t thirst for human flesh.
Advantage: Bread.
Longevity
Bread - Even if you put it in the fridge, bread goes bad in a couple days, even the store-brand loaves packed with carcinogenic preservatives have trouble making it a week. Your loaf goes from bread to brick no matter what you do.
Tortilla - Though Tortillas are best fresh, they’ll last and last if you seal them up and keep them in the fridge. Tortillas may be soft going around the contents of a burrito, but they are tough when it comes to holding up against the forces of time.
Advantage: Tortilla.
And the winner is . . .
Tortilla - God (and by God I mean the people of Mexico) created the tortilla for ultimate flexibility, portability, tastiness, longevity, and most importantly, compatibility with Tapatio. Sure you can eat bread with just Tapatio, but you don’t exactly feel good about yourself doing it. Tortillas win- hand down.
May 22nd, 2008 at 9:02 am
That was fantastic! As a die hard tortilla man myself I’m glad to see my flat little friend come out on top. The tortilla is the most versatile food since butter in my opinion, and yet it is so misunderstood. I was once at a Hard Rock Cafe with a bunch of Midwesterners who all ordered Fajitas. A girl from Minnesota wanted more tortillas and called over the waiter and asked him for some more “taco shells” I damn near cut that bitch!
I would say that since the whole “low-carb” craze has hit I do see the tortilla in more places that ever before. However most of them don’t taste like much, the lack of lard and kneading leaves their flexibility like my legs after a long plane ride, and worst of all, they are often called “wraps” or, worstest of all, “wrap-coverings” (I saw those in a gourmet store in New York once) Yet another scheme of the Man to put the brown man down.
Not to amend your deduction any further, but I would also suggest that the tortilla is better for the environment. A tortilla never has to be baked to be made. Think of all that oven energy that is going to waste. You could make a stack of tortillas as tall as a tree in the time it takes you to bake one loaf of bread.
June 25th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
[…] I feel pretty strongly about tortillas as you should already know. The fresh tortillas from Lario’s made it all come together. The flavor, the fluffiness, and the fact that they were .59 cents made them fantastic. Just look at how good they look shining in the sun. Behold their awesome force. […]
June 27th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
This is awesome sauce. I might have to agree with you on the tortilla winning thing, though I am a very serious fan of that overachieving bread. And hey–when did you start eating cheese? I’m so proud of you! Oh and, um, freakishly? We have a loaf of bread in the pantry that has been there, unrefrigerated, in the hot hot heat, for over six weeks and it is still not moldy. How much does that terrify you when you think about what must be in that shit?