May 29, 2016 Breakfast – BLT Sandwiches, Lunch – Clam Chowder and Egg Salad Sandwich, Dinner Party with the Phipps

May 29, 2016 Breakfast – BLT Sandwiches, Lunch – Clam Chowder and Egg Salad Sandwich, Dinner Party with the Phipps

I slept until 9:00 which is highly unusual.  Suzette made BLT Sandwiches on Fano baguette slices and we watched the Indianapolis 500 as we ate our sandwiches.  After watching the re-broadcast of Fareek Zacharia’s GPS at 11:00 I wanted to ride, so I heated a can of Progreso Clam Chowder and added Amontillado Sherry and cream and to thin it and flavor it,  since we were out of milk.  It tasted delicious. I also spread some of the egg salad Suzette had made yesterday on a piece of toasted baguette and Suzette joined me and ate the rest of the egg salad as we watched the Colonial golf Tournament.  

I used to attend Colonial with my dad when I was growing up in Fort Worth.  Those were the glory days of Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus.  Colonial was always a big event in Fort Worth because it was one of the the four major golf tournaments in the U.S.  Colonial was a tough golf course to play because it was nestled next to the Trinity River and had lots of trees and long fairways which put a premium on straight tee shots, as it still does.

At around 1:45 I rode 8 miles to the end of the fields south toward Rio a Bravo, then showered and met Shahin at his office do complete my biling.  

I then drove to Spouts to buy milk and apples and returned home around 5:00.

We started cooking dinner.  Suzette had already made penne pasta with fresh pesto, which we planned to combine with a sauce combining fresh garlic and peas from our garden mans Sauteed mushrooms that Suzette had already prepared when I arrived home.  So many began prepping the garlic by finely mincing four T. of fresh garlic and ½ onion for the pasta dish.  We were also going to serve an adaptation of the Catalanian Fried Spinach tapa from Jose Andres’ Tapa Cookbook that combines sautéed chard, piñon nuts, raisins and apples.  So I then chopped two apples into ½ inch cubes, while Suzette went to the garden to pick more chard, which I then de-stemmed and sectioned into 1 ½ inch pieces.  

While I was prepping the main courses, Suzette was making the appetizers, which were melon balls of the remaining ½ of the Tuscan melon I bought on Friday and the Caprese Salad Skewers made by skewering a piece of chard wrapped around a Mozzarella ball and a grape tomato.

By 6:00 we were ready and shortly thereafter Jonathan and Gloria and Will and Maggie arrived.  I served Nessa Albariño and Negra Modelo beers and we carried the appetizers out to the bocce court with a bottle of Spanish Cava Rose’ Champagne.  I drank a gin and tonic.  Willy organized the bocce match and raked the court and we played two games.

We then came back inside to make dinner.  The guests stood on the landing to the cellar while we cooked on the stove.  I took those who wished to the cellar to fetch a bottle of Wellington Mohrhardt Ridge Cabernet Sauvignon from northern Sonoma for dinner.  I also served the last ½ bottle of Clear Creek Meritage from Napa.

We sautéed the onion and garlic, then added the peas and mushrooms and 1 cup of Albariño and ½ cup of water to create a sauce.  When that was cooked Suzette added it to the pasta.

We the sautéed the apples and the Suzette added the piñon nuts and chard and finally the raisins and stir fried the ingredients quickly in the wok.

Suzette was grilling the four USDA Choice rib eye steaks I had bought at Sprouts and a handful of the scapes we had picked from our garlic plants in the garden.   She brought the steaks in when they were cooked to medium rare and the scapes were slightly charred and we let them rest while we stir fried the Chard and Apple dish.

I then sliced the steaks and Suzette plated the pasta and Chard dish and we each selected our preferred pieces of steak and carried our plates to the table in the garden gazebo.  We poured wine and ate our lovely fresh meal as night descended.

We had enough PPI steak and pasta for another meal.

We did not serve dessert, although we mentioned ice cream and clafoutis.  No one seemed to want dessert. My he interest of the younger generation was directed toward seeing the latest episode of Game of a Thrones.

This was a highly nutritious meal with lots of fresh ingredients.  Maggie is a vegetarian, so we wanted two strong vegetarian dishes and with the extra protein of the grilled steak.  Will had not had grilled scapes before and he liked them.

We talked a lot about the 1933 house Will had recently bought on Spruce in the Los Lomas area near UNM.  We made a date to go see it at 9:00 on Monday.  

Will and Willy then called their friend Leno who came over and hooked up the TV to record HBO and we watched the latest episode of Game of Thrones.

At 11:00 the adults said goodnight to Jonathan and Gloria and the kids and we went to bed.

Bon Appetit