Spices and seasonings add flavor and variety to foods. A good cook knows how to properly use them, a bad cook doesn't.
The quest for herbs and spices over the millennia has led man to exploration, to financial success, and even to war. Every kid is taught that Columbus discovered the New World, but few are taught why. Columbus was seeking an alternative route to India in an attempt to break the monopoly that Venice held on the world spice trade. Thanks to there being a whole 'nother continent in the way, the world now has vanilla ice cream. Yes, I know that the vanilla "overwhelms and significantly changes the taste" of the ice cream, but vanilla ice cream made without vanilla tastes like crap, and bland crap at that. So does spaghetti sauce without
marjoram, thyme, rosemary, savory, sage, oregano and basil.
Food cooked with seasonings, such as the aforementioned onions or pepper, will taste completely different than the same dish with those seasonings added after cooking, like at the table. Salt is another one that changes whether it's used in cooking or at the table. It is a flavor enhancer, but when used after cooking at the table, it requires 3 to 4 times the amount of salt for the same enhanced flavor as when used during the cooking process.
Properly used, seasoning and spices add flavors, sometimes many layers of flavors to foods. That's not the same thing as ruining good food by camouflaging it. Bacon grease adds depth and flavors, as well as enhancing the natural flavor of green beans, for example. Cooking them plain and then adding butter does the same thing, just with different flavors.
Garlic butter doesn't ruin or camouflage bread, it instead makes it garlic bread. Ever had garlic bread without garlic? It tastes like... bread. Ever had garlic chicken without the garlic? Like everything else, it tastes like chicken.
Garlic, incidentally, is insanely good for you. In addition to its antibacterial, antifungal, anti-parasitic and antiviral properties which can protect you against a wide variety of harmful, disease-causing microbes and organisms, garlic contains enzymes, calcium, copper, iron, manganese, phosphorus, potassium and selenium. Vitamins in garlic include vitamin A, vitamin B1 (thiamine), vitamin B2 (riboflavin), vitamin B6 and vitamin C. It also helps lower blood pressure (thins the blood same as aspirin does), strengthens blood vessel walls, and reduces cholesterol levels.
The selenium in garlic helps to boost the effectiveness of a network antioxidants, vitamin A, vitamin E, glutathione, lipoic acid and coenzyme Q-10, which puts garlic off the scale of the antioxidant-rich foods.
You need 3 cups of raw spinach or 4 cups of raw broccoli to equal the antioxidant punch of a single clove of garlic. Or 4 tablespoons of onions. Or 1½ cups of raw kale. Raw, cooked or powdered, garlic retains nearly all of its antioxidants and vitamins.
So, the TA should use garlic in everything. The more the better.
Seriously, the TA should try and not have every restaurant have essentially the same menu. There should be regional dishes, using local suppliers if possible for the produce, instead of living out of a #10 can or the freezer, and then cooking the veggies all day long on a steam table or a pot on the grill. There's nothing wrong with sautéing fresh green beans or asparagus to order.
There are ways to cook broccoli other than boiling it to the texture of egg noodles. Steamed is good, so is roasted. Cut into bite-sized pieces, blanche for a minute, drain and then toss with olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper and paprika, then roast in a 450 degree oven for 8 or 10 minutes. Can be done on a roasting pan, or even in individual ramekins, covered or not. Quick and easy, cooked to order.
Personnel (and local vendors) can be a problem, but in locations where you can get a good cook that knows how to prepare a menu and obtain good local ingredients, there's nothing wrong with having something special available on the menu for a few hours or until the "catch of the day" or whatever runs out.
Comfort food will always be popular with truckers and local alike, so some items will be the same everywhere, but my recommendation is to abandon the cookie cutter menus as much as possible and get truckers back to talking on the CB about how good the food is here or there.
