Posted on September 10, 2008 Posted by John Scalzi 58 Comments
It is:
Most edible things are better when wrapped in a tortilla.
Really, that’s about as deep as my brain’s getting today.
I think I’ll spend the rest of the day watching cartoons.
Taunting the tauntable since 1998
John Scalzi, proprietor – JS
Athena Scalzi, editor – AMS
About the site
What's the Big Idea? Authors explaining the the big ideas behind their latest works, in their own words. See the latest Big Ideas!
Authors/Editors/Publicists: for information on how to participate, click here.
I like to think that anything containing pasta is awesome. I need to marry an Italian woman.
What about ice cream? Sushi? Other tortillas?
“I think I’ll spend the rest of the day watching cartoons.”
John, telling us you’re thinking about watching cartoons is not *watching cartoons,* it’s just blathering. If you’re going to be watching cartoons, you have to actually *be* watching cartoons. There are any number of things that people are actually doing when they claim to be “watching cartoons,” but only watching cartoons really qualifies.
I think it depends on the tortilla. When I was in New Zealand earlier this year, my travel buddy insisted on making breakfast burritos, so we trundled off to the store and actually found tortillas and salsa. But we were due for disappointment, because those tortillas were made in Australia. They just tasted wrong.
Call me a snob, but if that tortilla isn’t made in the American Southwest or Mexico, you’re better off without.
Go play Spore. Watch the creatures Athena built in the creature creater come and destroy you new creatures. Also watch out for the teddy bear spaceship.
On the Tortilla discussion. Do no buy cooked ones from the store. Buy them uncooked. Cook on Griddle. Tortilla awesomeness.
Evan: What is a waffle cone but a sweet, corrugated tortilla? As for wrapping other tortillas, the Bell has you covered.
Bacon? Check. (Preference to add eggs, cheese, beans, salsa)
Ice cream? Fry a flour tortilla in a bowl shape, you’re in.
BBQ Brisket? Check.
Pizza? Not so much, but barely harmed.
Chinese Food? Whatcha think Mu Shu is?
Sliced Turkey, Spicy Peanut Sauce, Julienned Cucumbers and Home-Grown Tomatoes? Check.
It’s the General Theory of Fast Food: some form of bread wrapped around a tasty filling.
Have you read Don Winslow’s latest – ‘The Dawn Patrol’? That tortilla meme is a saying of the hero. I just read it 2 days ago. (I recommend anything by that guy).
My father in law has a food truism he’s rather fond of.
“All foods can be improved by the addition of either salsa or chocolate”
I think this means he doesn’t eat enough Asian food.
Flour tortilla or corn tortilla?
What about a rye tortilla?
Not sure you can wrap St. Louis ribs in a tortilla successfully.
Food wrapped in a tortilla is much like food on a stick.
It doesn’t get much better than that.
I still get fun of for the time when we were in Mexico and we went to the grocery store and I bought 2 kilos of tortillas. For around 50 cents. And proceeded to eat them straight with hot sauce.
But they were warm….
I love tortillas…
{walks away drooling in search of mexican food}
Have you had a Smoretilla™?
http://reviews.posterous.com/the-smoretilla-810
Mmmmmmm… :)
Do we all see what buying his books leads too? Sloth. When will we learn, people: the best situation for artists is starvation.
This is where the French get their love of filled crêpes.
/would sell soul for a crêpe au Nutella about now
I am so with you, man.
(My brain is pudding today too.)
Although I wonder what happens if you combine chocolate (which makes everything taste better) with a tortilla (which makes everything taste better). With whip cream.
hmmm.
My younger brother once tried yogurt with a tortilla. He couldn’t eat yogurt or tortillas for a long time after that.
Having grown up in the Southwest where you can get, yanno, _real_ tortillas, all I can say is Amen, Brother!
And, having made a deadline today and having nothing else *immediately* pressing, I’m futzing away the afternoon baking cookies–oatmeal ones with dried cranberries, pecans, and dark chocolate. Oh yeah :)
I recommend Justice League or Batman the Animated Series.
Yes, but one caveat: they have to be warm tortillas. I am so not down with the whole cold tortilla “sandwich wrap” fad.
Hot, freshly made tortillas with butter… mmmmm.
Scalzi – are you stoned?
I see problems with recursion and a tortilla-(gravitational)singularity.
It might be the best way yet to deal with the Korean live octopus appetizer.
There are, as always exceptions. As an example, my wife’s amazingly tender baking powder biscuits would not benefit from a tortilla wrapping, and sausage gravy is far better on biscuits than in a tortilla. Especially when we have some goose grease or duck fat around to be the shortening for the biscuit (which happens about once a year, after we’ve roasted the holiday bird).
Ditto, Ian @ 20 — Batman the Animated Series = the best Bat-show.
My daughter disagrees, b/c “The Batman” has regular Batgirl appearances, but she’s only 7 and doesn’t fully understand.
Actually, everything’s better with either gravy or ranch…
Prawn cocktail!
Without the glass, obviously.
TKay@19: Yep; the ready availability of fresh handmade tortillas is one of the nice things about living in L.A. It may be one of a very short list of perks, but a perk it is nonetheless.
Nicole TWN @28: Say “Hi!” to my birthplace!! And, agreed–there are only so many perks about LA, but the abundance of REAL Mexican food is definitely one of them. Mex food in OH? Somehow, like much else here that passes for cuisine, it also ends up being rather plate-of-beige.
@17 Arachne Jericho
Well, if you deep fried it and topped it with powdered sugar, you’d get a chocolate chimichanga. A local restauratuer pioneered here in PHX some time ago. Yumm.
I put onions on everything.
I find most things taste better with apple sauce. It works for sweet or savoury. Must admit I haven’t tried it with sushi, and not in a hurry to do so.
Hmmm…. A Spam and Velveeta burrito! Yes!
Leftover Indian food makes a great burrito!
I have to disagree slightly with you John.
Edible things are better wrapped in a naan.
Warm, delicious naan.
I think naan and tortilla are just two different words for basically the same concept. So, naturally, I’m inclined to agree with you.
So when will we see Ghlaghghee wrapped in a tortilla?
now that’s just peverted!
MMMmmmmm…….
BaconCat Tacos.
EVERYBODY CHANT
BaconCat!
Tacos!
BaconCat!
Tacos!
BaconCat!
Tacos!
Please.
BaconCat burritos.
“tortilla” in the abstract just means “flat bread or pastry product made from the local staple.” By that definition, crepes qualify if you’re feeling a bit french.
Flour or corn tortillas?
Next time you are in Austin, try the beef fajitas in flour tortillas with guacamole, lettuce, and salsa at Enchiladas y Mas on Anderson Lane.
Living in an ethnically diverse neighborhood here in Atlanta has its perks…there is a Mexican tortilla factory nearby and I can get fresh, authentic tortillas & flat breads just around the corner. With a little leftover meat, cheese, grilled onions and a dab of sour cream and you’ve got lunch! Yum!
I feel so much better that other adults admit to spending part of their days watching cartoons. Whenever I’m home at my parents on Saturday mornings, my dad always says I’m the only 30+ year old he knows who still watches Saturday morning cartoons, though I’m more a fan of Nickelodeon (namely Fairly Oddparents and Danny Phantom) and Cartoon Network (Total Drama Island) these days. But yes, have to agree that Batman: The Animated Series is the best of them :)
Or listening to the McCain campaign. It has about as much intelligence as a tortilla.
We don’t have to inject politics into every thread, Jerry.
Bacon, lettuce, cheese, and salsa;
wrapped in a warm flour tortilla..mmm..
I have a even better proposal.
Get some of those Vietnamese rice wraps, grill some meat, and combine…
Or try some flat Korean rice cake + meat, that works fine too.
I’ve come out of lurking the comments to say this incredibly important thing;
In college, we decided that meat and/or chocolate could make any food better.
We would spend hours trying to disprove this.
When you think you have the perfect food that disproves the meat/chocolate theory, you are either forgetting to check it fully against chocolate (sauce, chunks, M+Ms, cocoa powder, etc), or you are forgetting the Swiss Army knife of meats, bacon.
In college I gained 20 pounds.
Nick @9: Have to agree about the Winslow books, and that was also the first thing I thought about when I read this post.
I feel compelled to point out that if you lived farther to the north and west, you might be saying that about lefse instead of the tortilla. I think the theroy is similar though, just potato based not flour based.
Sweet stuff works when wrapped in a crepe — same principal, slightly different texture.
John is coming out as a Texan…we wrap everything in a tortilla, put a little salsa, some jalapenos…instant buffet.
Every culture has some kinda of taco/tortilla food: my Indian friends don’t like it much when I call dosas Indian tacos…I guess I could call tacos Mexican dosas for a change.
Tasty food wrapped in an edible holder as a generic. What’s not to like?
Mmmm, breadbowls!
Hey.
I totally forgot.
You do not need tortillas.
Chupaquesos!
And if you have no clue what I am talking about: http://www.chupaqueso.com/
Trying hard to imagine something that wouldn’t go well in a tortilla, but would go well otherwise. The only thing I could come up with: Oreos.
I think everything tastes better smeared in peanut butter!!! (This I discovered while I was craving popcorn and peanut butter simultaneously: I got both out, did my dipping, and was pleasantly surprised!!!)
Don’t you mean wrapped in a tortilla, deep fried, put on a stick and sold at the State Fair?