No Clever Title: The Journey of Two Peppers

          I went home after receiving this assignment. I would be able to eat how I wanted for a week at least, and I had all the fixings for it in my fridge already. Bell peppers from my parent's garden have been used in nearly all of my meals for the past two weeks, and I had some bell peppers from Winco that my roommate had bought on Thursday. Today, September 17th of the year 2012, I decided to take one of each finally, slice two chunks off both, feed them to my roommate in a blind taste test, and vice versa.

          

          Before this all happened, I took a look at the two specimens I had in front of me. There were no stickers on the Winco pepper, and of course, none on the one straight from the garden. Within this picture, the slender pepper on the left was the natural vegetable while the fat, oddly colored and hard plump pepper on the right was straight from the produce aisle. I decided to cut the garden pepper first, and the knife collapsed it a bit, and when it finally ripped through, a little juice had sprayed and a distinct pepper smell filled the air. When pushing the knife through the Winco pepper, a lot of juice covered the cutting board, and no smell was to be found. As you can see with the picture below, with the pepper slices in the same order as their parents, the thickness difference was huge. And later, I found out why. 

         I brought the strips out to my living room, where my roommate was sitting, doing his homework, and not expecting me to feed him some vegetables. With a beanie over his eyes, the first bite was taken of the garden fresh pepper. All he said was that it had a "good taste, was crisp, and the taste lingered nicely." Next bite was of the Winco pepper, and he said that it "tasted like water." He guessed which was which, and mentioned that there was "no competition." 

          Next, it was my turn to wear the beanie. The first strip I ate was exactly how my roommate describe the Winco one. I'm not one who particularly likes to eat his water, and this pepper had nothing going for it other than a decent crunch. I knew from the start this was the store bought, but decided to see what the other one was like. And as I would have thought, it had actual flavor to it. It was much better, but in the end, I ended up just eating the rest of both as a snack.

          Was it hard at all to tell the difference? No. Nope. No (this was the Spanish no, it's different, give me a break.) Normally, I wouldn't pay too much attention towards the vegetables I was eating, whether dipped in some ranch, grilled, or baked. It has always been deeply rooted in my mind that something out of the garden will always be better, and it still holds true. It seems so far that all in the group so far prefers the garden/ farmer's market version of their food of choice, but how many of you will still eat the "fresh" veggies out of the produce aisles of Walmart or Winco? I know I will.