Sandwich Mechanics: Um, What's Chia?

Welp, that's enough about toppings. Back to basics, and that means bread. This post is dedicated to my good friends CT and COM, who sent me a Christmas card that implored me to write more blogs about sandwiches. But don't worry; if you are tired of bread (how can you make a sandwich without it!?) I have a few other topics coming up eventually. Patience, young sandwhopper.

Let's take it back to that oh-so-familiar bread aisle at Safeway, looking at the wall of Oroweat flavors. What's this? Huh, I see Whole Grain and Chia.. Chia? What the heck is chia? Er, well, okay, let's try it out. Why not, right?

So I took the stuff home and opened it up in preparation for making a sandwich. The Dill Rye taught me to sniff deeply of the flavors, so I did that in this case, too. WOAH! This smells great. It was unmistakeably sweet and aromatic. I made my sandwiches and eagerly awaited lunch.

And as I took that first bite it was there to greet me again, like a wonderful new friend you've just seen for the second time. The bread was tinted with a sweet taste on the back that was enough to make its presence known, but not so much to be sickly or sugary. This is pretty incredible stuff, to have such a distinct flavor that is actually noticeable through all of the other strong flavors I use in my sandwich.

Aside from the distinctive and delicious taste, the other properties of the bread are quite favorable as well. Sometimes whole grain breads tend to be very fibrous and kind of soft, but this stuff was reasonably sturdy. I used it in sandwiches and dipped it in tomato soup--though the sweet taste didn't go very well with it--and its absorbancy is quite good.

It's been a few weeks since I had it, but the crust is not too thick either, if you're one of those people who counts the crust as an unwelcome tagalong for the bread.

But we still haven't answered the mystery: what is chia? Well, let's just look it up here... What's this? Saliva hispanica!? Spanish spit!? Oh wait, it's salvia. Whew. So apparently it's a seed. No wonder I haven't heard of it. Who cares about seeds? I'll say one thing: nice job, chia; you taste pretty pretty great.