what form of "split" turns a tab-delimited variable into an array with the first line as keys?

[Josh Mellicker]

Given a variable like this, where the first line is "headers":

name  [tab]  color  [tab]  food
Trevor  [tab]  green  [tab]  salad
Sarah  [tab]  blue  [tab]  pizza
Richard  [tab]  orange  [tab]  burgers
David  [tab]  purple  [tab]  fruit

What is the best way to turn this into an array, where the array keys are the first line of the variable?

I have tried various forms of "split by" ""split using" and ""split with" but haven't found the right formula. Personally I find the documentation on the various forms of the "split" and "combine" commands a bit scant.