Fridays of Intestinal Fortitude: Brain Bytes

Note: Fridays of Intestinal Fortitude is a weekly(ish) feature about food, food and more FOOD. No, I am not an expert, but I do enjoy talking about food prep, cooking food, eating food and making sweet love to food.  Okay, maybe not the "sweet love" part. After all, this is not meant to be an homage to 9 1/2 Weeks.

Recipe Index can be found here. 
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Still in a rut!

However, here's some fun food-related stuff I read over the week!

1. A fun article about Mexican food and its variants -- How the Taco Gained in Translation (Hat Tip, Lucky Fatima!)

2. Then....  Fatima shared another GREAT article on the History of the Taco titled "Where did the taco come from?" (my favorite part about Fatima's share was her comment that the taco "came from heaven")

2. Meagan over The Happiest Mom wrote a fun article titled Whatever You've Got Chicken Salad.  I have posted my Avocado Chicken Salad recipe before, but I love that Meagan's article points out that you can make chicken salad with just about anything in your kitchen -- a sort of mix n' match scenario.

3. Over at Throwing Things, the question was posed on whether to tip on take-out at restaurants or not.  Do you tip on take-out from restaurants?  I generally don't tip on take-out that I personally pickup for myself (to clarify) but I do tip on deliveries.  However, the comment section on that post was utterly fascinating and has me rethinking how I tip.  I usually overtip at sit-down restaurants, but tend NOT to tip at places like Starbucks and Sonic.  Are you a tipper at places like that?  If so, how much do you throw in the jar?

4. Over at Casual Kitchen, a reader posed a question to Daniel regarding the cost of eating healthy

As someone who is at this time below the poverty line AND eats healthy, I can assure you all, it is with sacrifice to the wallet. Take into account that my partner and I can't go through food as fast as a family of four could- So for example I bought bananas the other day- they were green, and today they already started to go bruised looking. Had I bought granola bars instead- I'd have a pack of them for a very long time-they won't go bad. Each town and city is different with costs and each family thinks about more then the initial cost.

You can eat healthy! But it does cost.

The comment section on that post is well worth the read -- in particular, many folks offered a variety of ways the reader could use that excess banana.  In my experience, my food bill is significantly higher anytime I stray to the inner aisles.  Furthermore, I am not convinced that a granola bar should even be considered "healthy" -- not all granola bars are created equal and many of them are loaded with high-fructose corn syrup and artificial food coloring.  When I give my kids a granola bar, I always consider it a "lesser than two evils" option, considering the other crap they are always begging me for!