MUNDANE MYSTERIES: What Are Bacon Bits Really Made Of?
One of the most delicious-yet-mysterious parts of any salad or baked potato is the bacon bits. You can use them anywhere you might otherwise use real cooked & crumbled-up bacon. But, while they may look & taste a lot like bacon, what are bacon bits really?
While ingredients in bacon bits vary from company to company, a lot of so-called “bacon” pieces don’t even contain actual meat. One of the most popular brands, McCormick’s “Bac’n Pieces”, are actually 100% vegan. Instead of cured pork, their bacon bits are made up of textured soy flour & canola oil, then mixed with caramel coloring, red 40 dye, maltodextrin, lactic acid, yeast extract, and flavor boosters disodium inosinate & disodium guanylate (to give them their meaty look & taste).
But there are several other bacon bits on store shelves that aren’t as vegan-friendly. Hormel’s “Real Bacon Pieces” are actually made from real cured & salted pork, along with other preservatives that are also used to cure the genuine strip bacon. Some other flavors and preservatives are also added, including smoke flavoring, sugar, and more. It’s pretty much the same story for Oscar Mayer’s “Real Bacon Bits”, which are another pork-based product.
All that stuff can be confusing to the average consumer, so here’s a rule of thumb to follow when you want bacon bits that aren’t meat (or even when you want ones that are). Containers that say “real bacon” actually contain real bacon; meanwhile, labels that spell bacon differently (such as McCormick’s “Bac’n Pieces”) are usually made with meat alternatives. Always double-check the ingredients, though, to make sure there aren’t any animal products involved (if that’s a sticking point for you). And, if artificial additives are your primary concern, go with nitrate-free bacon & then make your own crumbled bacon at home.
One thing to know for sure, though: the true ingredients of a product aren’t always evident from the products name. So always check the label.
Got a Mundane Mystery you’d like solved? Send me a message via Twitter (@AndyWebbRadio), or shoot me an email at [email protected].
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MUNDANE MYSTERIES: Why Are They Called “Piggy-Back Rides”?
Catching a ride on the back of a pig isn’t really a thing, right? And yet, people love horsing around & giving others what are called “piggyback rides”. But why are they called “piggyback rides”? I mean, people walk on two feet, right? Pigs, on the other hand, hoof it on four. What gives? Where did the term come from?
“Piggyback Rides” started with a different phrase in the 1500s that simply implied someone’s back being involved. It actually has nothing to do with pigs at all, as a matter of fact. That phrase was: “pick pack”. The word “pick”, at that time, could also mean “pitch”, so the theory goes that “pick pack” originally referred to a pack pitched on your back for easy hauling. Before long, people began using the phrase to describe carrying other things on your back (things like other people).
How “pick pack” eventually became “piggyback” isn’t totally clear, but we do know that, somewhere along the way, “pack” got changed to “back”, possibly because “pack” was so regularly misheard as “back” (especially since the back was a major facet of the whole “pick pack” process.
Experts also believe that “pick” became “pig” because the words are also so similar sounding. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the earliest notated mention of “pig back” was in 1736. Pick pack, pick back, and then pig back gradually led to pick-a-pack, pick-a-back, and pig-a-back. And that last one seems to have gotten mistaken regularly enough for piggyback that, sometime in the mid-1800s, piggyback eventually became the most widely used form.
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MUNDANE MYSTERIES: Where Do Truckers Sleep?
If you’re anything like me, one of the big questions you have about a truck driver anytime you see him or her driving their big rigs is: “where do you guys sleep?” Well, contrary to popular belief, being a trucker doesn’t always mean you’re destined to make long, cross-country trips with nights & nights away from your own home & bed.
First off, not every trucking job requires the driver to be away from home. Some gigs are totally local, meaning that those local drivers never have to drive farther than a day’s trip away from home. Local drivers will also usually drive what are called “day cab” trucks, which only have seats in their tractors, or engine-bearing front sections.
But O.T.R. (or “over-the-road) and regional truck drivers, meanwhile, can spend many days away from home. And while regional drivers can usually return home on the weekends, O.T.R. truckers can be gone for weeks at a time. And because of that, their rigs are usually feature what are called “sleeper cabs”. And honestly (at least in my opinion), those sleeper cabs can be pretty dang awesome-looking (certainly better than just some cot or sleeping bag).
Sleeper cab mattresses usually run about the same size as a twin mattress, somewhere around 80 inches long by 40 inches wide (though that can vary across different trucks). Meanwhile, sleeper cabs can also feature more than just a place to sleep, with some even having a fridge, a microwave, a TV, and more homelike comforts. There are even some swankier customized cabin models that sport sinks, stoves, a shower, and even a commode!
Sure, some truckers may spend a night or two in a hotel here & there; heck, some trucking companies even pay for their drivers to stay in hotels or motels every night they’re away from home. But where do the large majority of truckers park their rigs when they need to catch a few winks? Not usually on the shoulder of the highway, that’s for sure, since the roadside is only for emergencies. Truckers, instead, often head to rest stops or parking lots that are owned by, or are in a partnership with, their trucking company and/or their customers.
So, if the question is “Where do truck drivers sleep?”, the answer really depends on the type of job & the company’s business strategy. But one thing’s for sure: they certainly have options.
Got a Mundane Mystery you’d like solved? Send me a message via Twitter (@AndyWebbRadio), or shoot me an email at [email protected].
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