Fry Oil

I was in Rome for a week with my daughter over the Thanksgiving school break. Everyone asks, instantly upon hearing this, How was the food? The answer is... well, good, but honestly, we weren't much focused on eating, but rather spending 12 hours a day in museums, historical and archaeological sites, and churches. We loaded up on granola bars, fruit, and yoghurt at the supermarket for breakfast, and we'd stop to share a pizza or plate of pasta for lunch, take a gelato break mid-afternoon, then grab another light bite for dinner or, gasp, even a plate of fries at the Scholars Lounge Irish Pub right around the corner from where our hotel shuttle bus was picking us up. The food was freshly made from simple ingredients and fabulous cheeses -- but I have to admit, we are spoiled here in Addison County, as all of our food is like that. So I'd have to say the food was good -- just about as good as it is at home. (Except the gelato--sorry, Italian food fanatics, but Ben and Jerry's or better yet Strafford Creamery ice cream is really much better than the over-sugared sticky stuff being served from downtown Rome gelato shops. This may not be the case elsewhere in Italy, outside the tourist mob circuit, and I suppose if we weren't from Vermont maybe we'd of been more impressed.)

Truth be told, I didn't think alot about the food, until we stepped off the plane at JFK. The minute we stepped into that corridor that the hook up to the plane door---I smelled fry oil. We weren't even in the airport yet, but the overwhelming smell of cooking oil permeated every molecule of air. That's when it hit me that the food in Italy--and at home--really was good, and that (other than running into the McDonalds next to, of all things, the Pantheon, to use the bathroom) I hadn't experienced this fry oil smell in over a week.

This, then, is the essence of American cuisine which greets visitors arriving from all over the world, and welcomes Americans home: burger grease and french fry oil.

Just something to ponder. Speaking of which, I've been pondering used fry oil cars lately... more on that tomorrow.