Breakfast Should Be Enough For The Day
A Good Breakfast Sandwich To Start the Day
Food Review by Gary Gardiner
You would think that with all the fresh fruits and vegetables at the Saturday Market this week’s Eating My Way Through The Saturday Farmer’s Market (EMWTTSFM) would be more expressive in an appreciation of tomatoes, corn, blueberries, cabbage, peaches, potatoes, and lettuces. There will be time for that, but this week needs to establish that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and it can begin with sourdough bread, eggs, pork sausage, and cheese. And two strawberries, sliced.
A hardy breakfast sets the agenda for the day, requiring an orderly preparation, measured execution, and enjoyable consumption.
A scrambled egg sandwich with mayonnaise on white bread is the perfect breakfast. The eggs, slowly cooked in butter and bacon grease, are folded in the pan, making them thicker than the bread slices. Salt and pepper are added after the eggs are cooked and laid on the bread. The mayo should always be Dukes.
Don’t slice the sandwich. Grab it with both hands, taking the first bite at the center of the bottom edge of the bread. Then, eat your way around the perimeter, saving the last two bites at the center. Without the crust at the center, where the eggs are piled highest, and the mayo has blended into the bread, the flavor is more intense. These last bites have a stronger taste of the salt and pepper to complete the rich flavor.
But you won’t find white bread and mayonnaise at the market, so I made a sandwich with pan-toasted sourdough bread, scrambled eggs, grilled Baby Swiss cheese, and pork sausage. All from the market.
It doesn’t get any better than this, unless it were a simple white bread scrambled egg sandwich or a triple-cheese omelet, another favorite for breakfast.
The Green Grape Report
Food Review by Gary Gardiner
Aldi- 3C Highway
Brand - Green grapes from Mexico.
Price - $1.99 a pound.
Appearance - Bright color with few flaws.
Size - Back to the smaller sizes. Ten grapes weighed 43.9 grams. The average length was 24mm.
Crispiness - Good.
Taste - Ordinary
PLU Code - 4022
The Review
Shopped at the Major and Minor Triads and the Outlier, choosing Aldi for its $1.99 a pound pricing, as all the other grapes looked similar and cost $2.99 a pound everywhere except Kroger, where they are $3.29.
This is not a good time for green grapes. The reasons are not difficult to figure out.
The South American crop is over, with the ripest and most flavorful grapes having reached stores several weeks ago.
The Mexico crop is beginning to increase as the warmer weather moves north. Some Mexican grape farms have suffered due to a lack of rain, which has stressed the growth and ripening patterns. The American consumer has come to expect fresh grapes every day when they go shopping. Meeting that demand requires grape varieties that ripen more rapidly, larger farms, more workers, better warehousing and shipping, and attractive pricing.
If any one of those components suffers, the market becomes unstable. Today’s instability is a flavorful grape, probably caused by the weather.
As the harvest moves northward, California grapes will soon appear in stores, promising larger and sweeter grapes.
However, Aldi has Cotton Candy Grapes in a two-pound clamshell for $4.99. That’s 50 cents a pound higher than the less flavorful and less enjoyable 4022 PLU standard grape in all the other stores.
The Westerville News is a reader-supported publication by Gary Gardiner, a lifelong journalist who believes hyper-local reporting is the future of news. This publication focuses exclusively on Westerville—its local news, influence on Central Ohio, and how surrounding areas shape the community.
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