The Greatest Food You've Never Heard Of

once upon a time, a wise, wise man introduced me to a magical food known as a pupusa. this man was zach oliverson, and with him, we created a weekly ritual known as pupusa monday. today, i resurrected that weekly holiday, and it was glorious.

for those of you that don't know what a pupusa is, it is an el salvadorian food made from a corn tortilla filled with either cheese, refried beans, chincharron(pork ground to a paste), or cheese with lorroco(an herb). Or you can get a mix of these called revuelta. Then you put mixture of lightly fermented cabbage, lettuce, carrots, and peppers on the pupusa, and pour a watery tomato salsa over it. fold that sucker up, and chomp down on it.

the best one is the cheese. sometimes, just for the sake of diversity, i'll get a bean or revuelta, but the cheese pupusa is where my heart is. it isn't a complicated flavor. some foods i like to be complicated, with layers and phases of flavors hitting my taste bus at different times. this one hits a far more basic, possibly profound pleasure center. as i ate my pupusas today, i relished the greasy nature of something created just to make me fat. it left my fingers dripping with oil, more like oil drops hanging from my fingers begging me to lick them, adding an exclamation point to the flavor assault occurring in my mouth. the only complication to the flavor is the tangy zip of miracle whip. sorry, i had to say that. really the tangy zip of the cabbage and salsa can make or break the pupusa. it ties it all together if well done. if not well done, it can leave you overwhelmed by the massive power of greasy cheese and tortilla. that is the power of this dish, you can be overwhelmed by a tidal wave of awesome. as i mentioned in my review of the kfc double down, you can have too much of a good thing. the veggies keep this from being that way.

now, this isn't something you should eat as part of a balanced diet, so don't bother with sides. sides will only take up precious stomach room from the pupusas. the drink can compliment the meal though. the best i've found are mountain dew code red and dr. pepper. i am usually not a fan of mountain dew, but somehow, it is the perfect compliment to this hotness known as pupusa. probably the citrus balance for the heavy greatness, i mean greasness. it does have to be code red, really, that should be unspoken.

as you can tell, the love of this epic food has lead me to wax poetic. you should have stopped reading this a long time ago, and gone to your local pupuseria. really, why are you still reading this? go establish your own pupusa monday, in honor of laney, oliverson, naz, hinckley, and volz. for those of you in the provo area, el mexsal on freedom blvd is the best place for pupusas around here. now if you'll excuse me, i need to go have a food coma.