Fun Fact Friday - The Macaroni Machine

Why, hello! You're looking lovely today. I am feeling quite loopy myself. And also thinking about pasta. There were reasons why I was thinking about pasta before, but I can't seem to recall any of the reasons I have been thinking about pasta. Whatever the strange explanation that has walked out of my brain at the moment, probably never to return, today's fun fact is about pasta.

Fun fact: Thomas Jefferson brought macaroni to America.

You see, when Thomas Jefferson was in France as an ambassador, he missed out on helping write the Constitution (bonus fun fact: the 17th Amendment calls for the direct election of senators!) but did spend a lot of time falling in love with pasta. Macaroni was evidently fashionable in France at the time and Jefferson sketched out plans for a macaroni making machine after a tour of Italy in 1787.

When Jefferson returned to America, he brought his beloved macaroni home. Then, after a nice afternoon of slave banging (for those of you interested, Jefferson apparently didn't fuck Sally Heming until after his wife died, so at least he's faithful, right?) Jefferson could settle back an enjoy a nice bowl of macaroni. I'm fairly certain the macaroni in America thing is why Jefferson made it onto Mount Rushmore. Sure, he wrote the Declaration of Independence, but he swiped most of those ideas from John Locke. Yes, he was the third President of the United States and made the Louisiana Purchase. Fine. But his greatest American legacy is gastronomical. For a moment, let's ignore his hypocrisy and plagiarism and just focus on the fact that your bright orange box mac and cheese is made possible by the obsession of one man with one meal.

I do not wear red, white, and blue on the Fourth of July. I do not complete patriotic word searches. But I do eat comfort food. So when you next open a box of macaroni and cheese at the end of a long day, stop and think about Thomas Eileen Jefferson and his contribution to America as we know it.