Bread is the king of the table

Someone said “Bread is the king of the table and all else is merely the court that surrounds the king.” Many years ago on one of our trips to Taiwan we were treated with sumptuous banquet with exotic and scrumptious dishes (山珍海味), and one of our girls (I believe Josephine was the guilty one) asked the waitress a bowel of plain rice; she felt so offended or even insulted saying in a condescending air “in our restaurant, we do not serve rice.”

The opposite is true for American restaurants; they take pride in the bread they serve and breads are even the main attraction for some. Maggiano’s Little Italy (the one Joy and we used to frequent in Chicago and Skokie, IL) served at least 5 or 6 different kinds of breads, if you cannot find even one that suits your taste; the problem is yours. We usually have two loaves of wonderful dark brown bread that loaded with fiber, thanks to rye flour at Outback restaurant (this comes from a doctor who preaches low-carbohydrate diet).

Janice is fascinated in making bread from scratch; she once boasted her ciabatta was much much better than the average bread one can buy in the store. I am hoping one day I can say, as Henry James did “And the best bread was of my mother’s [Janice’s—in my case] own making—the best in all the land.”

Yesterday we went to Carnegie Library (at Pittsburgh) and then to the Italian market and Lotus Food (Chinese grocery) at the Strip District—food for the mind and the body in one trip—and got my beloved Walnut Rasin bread (see the picture)