I love bread, I think it’s great. Getting home from the shops with a freshly baked loaf, it’s a little treat to have the crust after I’ve packed away all my other food. This joy is only to be found with the whole loaves, none of this sliced rubbish. Which leads me to wonder about the saying ‘the best thing since sliced bread’.
Firstly I find that sliced bread is NOT the nicest bread, and secondly, in this day and age, surely sliced bread is a rather outdated benchmark of excellence?
This point does raise the issue that a more modern example of technical excellence is difficult to quantify, especially if you want to retain the snappy punch of the original saying. For example; ‘the best thing since the cheap and efficient mass production of the internal combustion engine’ does not roll off the tongue with quite the same grace.
I invite you, gentle reader, to suggest a modern day equivalent to sliced bread, and await your suggestions with interest (that is, after all the whole point of the comments system).
Back to staple foods though.
It is my personal opinion that the only staple food to top bread in the all time favorite staple foodstuff of the world top 5, is potatoes. This is mainly for their culinary flexibility. In fact I may well be in a unique position in that I enjoy potatoes in any cooked form they may come in; be it boiled, mashed, baked, sautéed, roasted or chipped, I love the potatoe.
Bread does have the quite obvious advantage of speed, grabbing a slice of toast, or slapping together a quick sandwhich illustrates this nicely. But where would some of the classic British dishes be without the humble potatoe. Bangers and toast? Sunday roast with a few croutons? Fish ‘n’ …?
Well you see my point.
So the current top five according to Rob starts like this:
1. Potatoe
2. Bread
… Haven’t actually thought beyond this. Pasta and rice would be there of course although perhaps not in that order, but then what?
randomtask 