Bread Basket

Little History Lesson for today (sorry - I'm a history teacher, I can't help myself!)

In the U.S., at many restaurants, a free basket of bread is delivered to your table while you're waiting for your food. There is often butter in this basket. In Europe, bread is also often available, but no butter. At "Mexican" restaurants, we often get a basket of fried tortilla chips with salsa.

Most North Americans are often shocked to discover that Mexicans love bread and butter, too. In fact, we often get a "bread" basket full of rolls, butter, tortilla chips, and salsa - but the salsa is actually a sauce, not a chunky tomato dip.

This is the history part - the Spanish were sent to Mexico to look for gold, and while they did find some, what they found more of was edible gold - corn. Mexicans had survived on corn for hundreds of years. While the Spanish king strongly encouraged the colonists to Mexico to grow wheat, teach bread-making, and eat only "civilized" food, most of the colonists just couldn't do it. At their fancy Spanish dinners they would eat bread, but then after hours they would sneak into the "ghetto" side of town to eat tacos made from corn tortillas. The men were "slummin' it" in more ways than one!

Today, Mexicans just embrace both sides of their heritage - the Spanish part and the American part. The basket is just a small example of their Mestizo heritage.