March 22, 2017 Lunch – La Salita. Dinner – New Recipe – Penne Pasta with sautéed shrimp and asparagus in a sorrel pesto sauce and toasted almonds

March 22, 2017  Lunch – La Salita. Dinner – New Recipe – Penne Pasta with sautéed shrimp and asparagus in a sorrel pesto sauce and toasted almonds

I met Mike at Mike at La Salita after an appointment with Dr. Eddie Bennett, who is my favorite doctor.  Smart, compassionate, well informed.  Dr. Benge had reviewed my history of complaints and knew why I was coming to see him and had a strategy selected as soon as I checked me to confirm the problem with my hip from being thrown out of a panga at Yalapa.  He ordered X Rays of the two hips and an MRI.

I really enjoyed returning to La Salita with Mike.  It serves the best Chile Relleno in Albuquerque.  We both ordered our favorite dish.  Mike ordered a sopapilla stuffed with shredded turkey meat with no cheese. I ordered a Chile relleno filled with Swiss Cheese and served with double garnish and onions.




La Salita also makes wonderful sopapillas.  I wait until the end of the meal to order to ordered mine.  Our waitress brought a steaming hot sopapilla.  As I squeezed honey into it, the walls collapsed and it became a soft beignet tart.  I used my knife and fork to eat the soft warm honey laden pastry; a real treat.

After lunch I went back home to edit the docketing statement, which took until 12:30 a.m.

Suzette saw a recipe for sorrel pesto today, so when she came home She immediately went out to the garden and picked a basket full of sorrel and then some lovage that is pushing out new sprouts for the pesto.  I was working, so this is indirect from Suzette.

Sorrel Pesto  (Sunset Magazine)
Suzette toasted 1/3 cup of sliced almonds in a skillet.  She the put ¼ cup of green raisins, three cloves of garlic  and the toasted almonds into the Cuisinart and processed the ingredients until they were a course meal.  Then she added the washed sorrel and a little lovage to the Cuisinart to the ¼ cup of green raisins, three cloves of garlic  and the toasted almond mixture and processed the mixture as she drizzled olive oil until the mixture turned into the consistency she likes for her pesto.

Suzette chilled a bottle of French Sauvignon Blanc and thawed the 1.4 lb.. of medium shrimp I bought at El Super last week and boiled most of them for our planned gazpacho and shrimp dinner later this week and shelled a dozen for dinner.  She then diced about eight stalks of asparagus and boiled a lb. of penne pasta.

When Willy arrived Suzette sautéed the shrimp and asparagus in 3 T. of butter and about 2 T. of olive oil in a large skillet and then added 1/3 cup of pesto to the skillet and tossed those ingredients together to heat them.  Then she added a couple of cups of warm cooked penne and tossed the pasta to coat it with pesto sauce.  It produced a delicious oily mixture.

I poured glasses of 2015 Belles Vignes Collection Sauvignon Blanc.  I think I bought at Trader Joe’s for under $8.00.  I was wonderful, a light citrus flavor with French Sauvignon Blanc elegance, not unlike a Sancerre meets lovely light New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.   There was little information on the label disclosing its origins other than an indication the it was produced by an exporter located Mouzilon, France, which is in the vast Loire Atlantique region near the mouth of the Loire River.

When the penne was cooked Willy came over to eat and we had a lovely meal.  He is attending a national training course being held in Albuquerque, so after dinner he left to meet some friends from the training for drinks.

We watched the unfolding saga of Russian hacking into our election and then went to bed.

Bon Appetit