Salsa

Every time I watch football, I feel a powerful force drawing me to the store.

This force directs me into aisle three, where stacks and stacks of bottles are sitting on the shelf, next to the chips, ready to satisfy.  It can be hard to make a decision, because of all the brands and varieties, but I usually choose one with an authentic Mexican flavor: Corona.

If I'm feeling hungry, I'll also grab some chips.

It is a good idea to serve some snack food to guests watching football at your home. If one hand is occupied with chip-eating, they will be less likely to booze it up with both hands.

The problem with corn chips is that they are almost inedible straight out of the bag. The corn factory squeezes all the oil out first, leaving them hard, dry and salty.

The best solution is to leave the chips soaking in warm water overnight. Another option is to buy some salsa.

Preparing for the big game, Brooke and I wondered how many chips we could dip into a 24oz. jar of Salsa. Much like the bag of chips, salsa isn't much good all by itself. We needed to make sure the salsa and chip quantities were matched.

We laid plans to find out how much is inside.

This 24 ounce jar of Pace was $3.99 at Albertson's supermarket.

Salsa is a chunky sauce. Think of it as a tomato-based chutney or relish, with many varieties, from mild to extra-spicy.

I grabbed a scale and weighed a few chips. They were about 3 grams each.

Brooke started with the first dipping. She used the curvature of the chip to hold a smidgen of salsa.

Everyone likes a different amount of salsa on their chips.

I prefer 6.8 grams of salsa, while Brooke favors 5.7 grams. We weren't eating them yet though.

We dipped each chip in salsa and set it down. We were sure to follow the nine rules of chip dipping:

1. Keep fingers and jewelry out of the salsa
2. No double-dipping 
3. No straws
4. Keep off the new carpet in the living room
5. No morsel-dredging
6. Sanitary rubber gloves must be used (Korea only)
7. No wading
8. No submariners
9. Tortillas made fresh, on "El Machino" (Chevy's Fresh Mex only)

The table filled up quickly and we maneuvered to keep out of each other's way. We were slide-stepping around the table not unlike a spiced-up version of an Afro-Cuban dance.

In about nine minutes, the bowl was empty.

In the final tally, there were 79 salsaed chips.

The four dollar jar of salsa only covered about a fourth of the chips in our two-pound bag.

After the experiment, we couldn't wait to snack on a few of the chips. Brooke prefers hers served with vegetarian caviar, pepper and a cocktail onion.

I devoured about 25 before Brooke stopped me.

Kickoff was still two days away, and so she squeezed the chips into a faux Tupperware box and moved them into the pantry.

There were a lot of chips left, but I didn't want to shell out another four bucks for salsa.

Cans of tomato paste were on sale at Smart and Final, so I splurged and got the big one. I had plenty of tomato taste for all the remaining bags of chips, and I could hardly tell the difference in flavor.

I guess Brooke threw out the rest of the chips while I was at the hospital.