February 20, 2018. Airport Food
I never thought I would write this type of article, but we found some airplane food we really liked today.
We woke at 4:00 for our 6:30 flight and after a drive that can only be described as a miracle of intuitive navigation through back roads we arrived at the Europcar rental lot in Mérida. We took the 6:30 flight to Mexico City.
When we arrived in Mexico City, we found a small restaurant in the airport for breakfast. This shows you how accommodating Mexicans are. We ordered the cheapest item on the menu, scrambled eggs,
Mexican style, which means with fresh, chopped tomatoes, onions, and chili (in this case slices of fresh Serrano). Then we handed the waitress the styrofoam container containing the PPI duck in Tamarind Sauce and Spanish rice from our meal at Recova several nights ago and asked her to ask the cook to cook the duck and rice into the eggs like Machaca.
The result was fabulous, Huevos con Pato. The restaurant made their own soda bread, but we asked for warm corn tortillas, which were soon brought and we ate warm duck and egg tacos dabbed with the refried beans served with the eggs.
Few people as a culture express the cooperation and desire to help that I see everywhere in Mexico. For example, the most common response I hear uttered in Mexico is “Mande”, which I
think means “what is your command?” As if
the culture is pre-disposed to follow your command. My response today was, “Necisitamos tortillas de Maiz, por favor.” “It is necessary that we have corn tortillas, please.”
Suzette drank a cup of great Mexican coffee and I enjoyed a cup of hot chocolate made with wonderful Mexican chocolate, one of the most famous foods in the world originating from Meso-America.
We left Mexico City at 1:00 and arrived in Dallas in a storm at about 3:30. Our flight to Albuquerque was not scheduled to depart until 7:02, so we decided to go to a wine bar in DFW Airport named Cru. It had an extensive wine list with flights of all types of wines. We also looked at the food menu and were attracted to a dish called lollipop lamb. When I asked we were told there were four to an order and when I asked if they could be cooked to medium rare, the waitress confirmed that also, so we selected flight number nine, which was 2 oz. pours of three red Pinot Noirs, a Chilean Reserva named Max. Here are the wine-notes on it.
Winemaker Notes
An intense ruby red color, the Max Reserva Pinot Noir offers sweet aromas that recall rosehip, cherries and pomegranate, along with notes of wet earth and tobacco. A smooth Pinot Noir with refreshing acidity, underpinned by subtle spicy, smoky flavors.
Critical Acclaim
JS90James Suckling
A bright and fruity red with dried berry, cherry and hints of balsamic character. Full body, pretty and savory finish. Delicious.
WS90Wine Spectator
A suave red, with a silky mouthfeel and medium-grained tannins behind the flavors of cherry, plum and hazelnut. The spicy finish is long and rich, revealing accents of sandalwood. Drink now through 2019.
The other two pinots were from the Willamette Valley in Oregon, a Van Duzer and a Siduri.
Here are the notes on them.
Winemaker Notes on Van Duzer
On the nose, the wine emanates fireworks of dark red fruits including dark cherries, blueberries, and wild strawberries. Sensual rose petal scents are laced around spicy notes of licorice, ground pepper, and eucalyptus. A viscous attack leads to a bright mid-palate where silky tannins are wrapped around a creamy, velvety structure. The wine finishes with a juicy cherry cola flavor, draped with licorice and barrel-driven spices, leaving an exciting, mouthwatering sensation on the back palate.
Critical Acclaim
WW90Wilfred Wong of Wine.com
Beautiful and delicate, the 2014 Van Duzer Pinot Noir offers excellent balance and style. The wine's bright red strawberry and light spicy notes pair it supremely with rosemary and black peppercorn accented roast leg of lamb. (Tasted: December 1, 2017, San Francisco, CA)
And Siduri
The most complete and complex Willamette Valley Pinot Noir that Siduri has ever produced. This is a wine that shows the character of the full Willamette Valley. Darker berry and currant flavors, along with hints of cherry joined by earth, dried brush, and even tobacco flavors.
We liked the Max and Siduri better than the Van Duzer with the lamb riblets.
The lamb riblets were cooked to medium rare to rare and were sauced with a red wine demiglace sauce with a few pieces of crisp bacon thrown in, a deeply dark and delicious sauce.
After finishing our wine tasting and app at Cru, we Airlinked to Terminal A for our Albuquerque flight.
When we arrived at the gate for our flight, we saw that it was delayed so we decided to eat some oysters at Pappadeaux’s Restaurant, which was located about ten gates from our gate. When we arrived at Pappadeaux’s we took an escalator down one level into a full restaurant. We sat at the bar so I could watch the USA men’s hockey team beat Slovenia or Slovakia. We ordered 5 oz. pours of a Grüner Veltliner, which was drier than the Albariño I initially ordered and a dozen Gulf Coast oysters.
The oysters were served in a tray of ice on a wire rack fitted to the tray filled with a dozen fresh oysters on the half shell along with small metal cups filled with horseradish, mignonette sauce, and cocktail sauce plus several slices of lemon. I immediately dumped a fork full of horseradish into the spicy catsup and squeezed lemon juice into the sauce to create the type of cocktail sauce Suzette and I like, sort of my standard Texas cocktail sauce.
After asking for several more slices of lemon from the bar man, I got the balance of flavors right and we enjoyed some of the best Gulf Coast oysters I have had in years.
This confirmed my need to reassess airport food. I will never dismiss it again as bland and nutritionally lacking. It appears we have entered a new era of airport dining supported by vendors of fresh ingredients that equal the quality of any good restaurant.
The rest of the evening proved interesting. After several more delays, by 7:45 our flight was cancelled, so we took a cab to Billy’s house with a talkative Kurdish driver named Dlawar.
Elaine and Billy welcomed us and served us glasses of Cote de Beaune Pinot Noir and we watched the Winter Olympics with them until 10:00, when they lent us t shirts for pajamas and we went to bed. Billy offered me a small bowl of lamb stew with strips of onion and red and yellow bell peppers, which was very delicious with the red wine.
We were thankful to be with family instead of relying on the mercy of American Airlines’ Flight Assistance, which when we boarded the taxi appeared to have over 200 stranded travelers waiting in line.
We tried to secure our luggage, but were told it would be a three hour wait, so we took a taxi to Billy and Elaine’s house and our usual guest room accommodations and excellent hospitality, food, wine, and spirits. I finished with a German pear brandy after my light meal of lamb stew.
Bon Appetit
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