I thought you were kidding about the Jeebus. Wow.
Celery is lousy on a taco. Or a burger.
First of all, the danger of eating a bay leaf is vastly exaggerated. You can even buy it chopped up. It’s best to remove it, but you’d have to be pretty determined to swallow it – it’s far too stiff to be appetizing.
Second, bay leaf is not the first thing you find in a spice rack; many people cook for years without it.
The issue isn’t that they didn’t know what it was as much as it is that they never considered it might be there for a reason.
I’d be really surprised if you haven’t.
This is untrue. Iceberg lettuce does, in fact, contain measurable amounts of vitamins A and C, calcium, iron, fiber, protein, carbs, and trace amounts of potassium, folate, vitamin K, magnesium and phosphorus. Granted, you DO have to eat a LOT of iceberg to get a decent amounts of them, and other lettuce varieties have more of them, but to say it’s without nutritional value is factually incorrect. You are correct that the flavor is so mild as to be non-existent for many and it’s primary benefit to a salad is the texture, but there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s doing what it was bred to do in that case.
But while we’re on the topic of food ignorance, I have to relate the story of the woman who came to my check-out line with the complaint that her organic potatoes had traces of dirt on them. Apparently, she had no clue what potatoes grow in.
Be surprised. I’m strictly a fast-food restaurant drive-thru-window, 2 or 3 buck meal type. Even Chipotle is too swanky and expensive for my tastes.
And so is iceberg.
It may not be your preferred leafy green vegetable, but it’s certainly not lousy as a moist and crispy and mostly tasteless sandwich ingredient. One might argue that it is the best for a hamburger.
Obligatory link: “Waiter! There are snails on her plate!”
I actually don’t understand the surprise here, that people would not know what a bay leaf is.
Would you be surprised to learn that a great number of people under 25 had never cooked anything that required a bay leaf? Even if you have been served food seasoned by a bay leaf every day for your entire life, if the chef removed it before serving, you’d still not be familiar with it.
I never saw one until my late teens when I started working at a catering company. I would not be one bit surprised if my peers weren’t familiar with it. And teens/young adults are no doubt the cross section of people eating at Chipotle and Tweeting. So to see a handful of them being perplexed at the inclusion of a bay leaf in their dinner - a bay leaf which we all can agree should not be there in the first place - is, to me, as much of a non story as anything.
I guess I’m saying I find it weird that you find it weird 
As you said, they’re usually removed before serving, so maybe they haven’t seen one.
But thinking they were oak leaves, basil or tree stems? Surely they should have known what those things look like/are.
My mom used a bay leaf in her spaghetti sauce and pot roasts.
I knew what they were by age 4. It was up to us to remove it from our plates.
She certainly wasn’t going to waste time searching for it.
I see a bay leaf in this yummy pot roast.
https://goo.gl/images/Pw2uto
I can see them not knowing what basil looks like, since most people will encounter basil leaves only shredded into tiny bits. Then again, mistaking it for a different leafy herb isn’t that big of a mistake in the first place.
Yeah, if I’m putting lettuce on my burger or taco, it had better be iceberg or accept romaine, as well. (Though the majority of the time I take my burger without lettuce and tomato, and my tacos, if they get a green, are more likely to shredded cabbage. But I usually don’t put a salad green or cabbage on my tacos.) While I like other salad greens, too, I have no idea why iceberg gets such a bad rep. It is absolutely refreshing in the way arugula or escarole is not. It has a mild leafy green flavor and cool, crisp watery crunch to it that is the perfect complement to hot & fatty foods.
I guess you’ve never been to California. Some oaks have leaves that look pretty much just like that.
Are you suggesting that most people have never been to the produce section at the grocery store?
:dubious:
To be fair, there are like 120 kinds of basil, with leaves of all shapes and sizes. I’ll bet you could find one that 90% of people wouldn’t recognize by sight.
Yes, those are fairly similar. Learn something new every day. Thanks.
Me too, although I expect more of my family and friends. If I happen to notice it when I’m dishing up I’ll toss it. Otherwise, it lands where it lands when I’m cooking at home.
Huh! Ignorance fought. I knew some limes and figs had a similar leaf, but had never seen one on an oak. I honestly wonder sometimes what makes an oak an oak, as the diversity is ridiculous.
Acorns. As in, “Mighty oaks from little acorns grow”.