Tube food!

OK, I learned to eat in Wyoming. Meat, potatoes, salad (iceberg and store tomatoes), tuna casserole. Like that. Mexican food, sure. But I didn't have Chinese food until I was 19. And certainly we never had this world-food/Thai/sushi/curry/Vietnamese/Mongolian-barbecue stuff that everybody eats now. (OK, I tried a bite of eel sushi once. Gah. And raw fish sounds like a good way to bring parasites and pollution to the table.)

So I'm not adventurous in the food department. I don't do the '60s Wyoming meat-and-potatoes diet any longer, but I rarely eat in restaurants. I eat mostly out of the garden. No meat. Spuds and peas and beans. Pasta. Eggs. Brown rice. A little salad. Chocolate. You know: like a hippie, only more conservative.

But I had some spring rolls at the middle grandson's 26th birthday party the other day. Like salad in a tube! Way cool!

So why is ordinary salad so boring (crunch, crunch, crunch, bleh) – yet the same salad rolled in rice paper is awesome? Maybe finger food is more fun. Maybe flavor is improved when everything is squished together. Maybe the transparent container makes everything taste more colorful. Maybe it's the peanut sauce. Yeah, probably it's the peanut sauce. (Do they make peanut-sauce salad dressing? Why not?)

I've been making spring rolls from various combinations of rice noodles, garden greens, carrot slivers, cooked egg, snow peas, tomato and cucumber. My wrapping still needs work – they tend to be a little loose, and lose integrity toward the end. (Annie the dachshund is usually nearby in case of tubular explosion.)

These tube salads are tasty. Especially for something so completely adventurous. So wild and crazy. (Don't tell me they are healthy, and spoil it for my bad-ass self.)