Willy is leaving for Europe on Saturday, April 20, so we
wanted to have a Bon Voyage party for him.
Also, since he will be gone for his Birthday on May 8 and because he was
recently accepted to graduate school at Dublin Institute of Technology, we used
the Bon Voyage Party as an excuse to celebrate all three occasions. Willy and Suzette discussed the menu and they
came up with tacos as the theme. Eli,
Willy’s friend, who is a vegetarian, asked if there would be any vegetarian
dishes, so I decided to make beans and squash, because I had a large
institutional size can of Ranch Style Beans in the pantry and had bought four
Mexican squashes at Pro’s Ranch Market.
I have been busy this week with a trial on
Monday in Santa Fe and a hearing on my motion to set a stream issue in the
Lower Rio Grande Adjudication on Tuesday in Santa Fe. I stayed in Santa Fe on
Monday night. Also, I went to the
NAIOP/EF water task force meeting at 7:30 am on Wednesday and then stopped at
Pastians’s Bakery on the way home and bought one white and one chocolate 8 inch
round cake and they decorated the chocolate one with “Happy Birthday Willy” and
the white one with “Enjoy Dublin” and “Bon Voyage” and bought a whole wheat
baguette, a dozen butter flake dinner rolls, and a loaf of French brioche ($.75
each for the breads). Then I went home
and started drafting a Motion for Summary Judgment for the LRG adjudication that
was due on Friday. On Thursday I revised
and filed a Response in a new divorce case and tried to catch up on several
other matters.
Luckily, I was able to
get my Thursday tasks completed by noon.
So I then made French Toast with the French Brioche I bought at Pastian’s
and went to the Courthouse and filed my Response and then to Pro’s Market to
buy 4 mangos, two green chiles, four zucchini, 2 lb. of Swai filets, small corn
tortillas, more avocados, a twelve pack of Negra Modelo, and 2 lbs. of ground
beef. I got home at around 2:00 p.m. and
decided to use a short cut strategy for the beans and squash. I made a mirepoix by dicing 1 onion, 4 stalks
of celery, 3 large carrots, and two green chiles and added about 1 Tbsp. of
dried oregano and 4 bay leaves. I put
the ingredients into a large stock pot and sautéed them in two Tbsps. of butter
and 2 Tbsps. of olive oil (Pompeian Robust flavor extra virgin olive oil from
Costco, I like it) for about thirty minutes until they softened. Then I ladled one-half of the mirepoix into a
large Le Creuset enameled casserole and added the quartered and sliced squashes and a bit of salt and more oregano and slowly
cooked the squash.
True to her promise
Suzette arrived a little after 4:00 and Willy arrived shortly after that. Suzette wanted to add corn to the squash for
a more calabacitas like combination, so she went to the basement and found a
large bag of roasted corn from last summer an thawed it a bit and put it into
the squash dish. I had started on the
guacamole and Willy took on that task and I fetched the fish strips and ground
beef for Suzette and put a couple of more bottles of champagne into the
fridge. Suzette took over the meat
prep. She had brought home a roasted chicken
that she cut up and put into a ceramic baking dish. Then she sautéed the 2 lbs.
of ground beef in a large skillet with about 4 Tbsp. of taco seasoning (Costco)
and coated I lb. of the fish with crushed panko and fried it in a large skillet
filled to a depth of about 1/3 inch with canola oil. I started on the Mango Salsa at around 5:30
and had prepped only about 2/3 of the ingredients by 6:00, when the party was
due to start and Suzette made me stop, so she could set the table and set up
the plates and silverware to serve dinner.
Willy went to the store to get ice and he iced an ice chest and put some
Sessions lager and Negra Modelo beers into it, and we were ready. I put the two cakes on the dining room table
and Suzette put out crema and I chopped two cucumbers into 2 inch stalks and a
bunch of radishes and Suzette chopped a head of romaine and we put them into
bowls as garnish. Soon the guests
started to arrive, so we heated tortillas and were ready to eat. Willy’s friend Will’s parents Jonathan and
Amy, Jim Graff and Diane Souder arrived with a bottle of Gruet champagne, Mike
came with a bottle of Lescombes Syrah. Then
Charlie and Susan from across the street and Eli and Greg Hicks came. About ten or twelve of Willy’s friends also arrived,
like Emily Sambano, and Allen and his girlfriend and Ahmed and Will and Eli and
several more who I met. After eating tacos and beans and squash for about an
hour, we asked everyone to go to the dining room and we started pouring
champagne and cut the cakes and toasted Willy and talked until about 8:30 or 9:00
p.m. when folks started leaving.
Mango Salsa recipe
½ red onion finely diced
4 mangos diced
4 avocados finely diced
2 Tbsp. of fresh cilantro minced
Juice of 3 or 4 small Mexican limes
Dash of salt.
The reason for not putting any chili into the salsa was
because the beef had lots of seasoning and I wanted something a little sweet
for it and the fish and chicken. I could
have made double the amount of salsa and it would have all been eaten. Everyone loved it.
Bon Appétit
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