December 8, 2025 Breakfast - Everything bagel with red onion, cream cheese and white fish salad. Snack - Sautéed Pasta with Sausage, mushrooms, red onion, requeson, and egg Dinner - Pork Enchilada Casserole

December 8, 2025 Breakfast - Everything bagel with red onion, cream cheese and white fish salad. Snack - Sautéed Pasta with Sausage, mushrooms, red onion, requeson, and egg  Dinner - Pork Enchilada Casserole

 

I awakened at 4:00 and went through the month’s mail and registered for a seminar and went back to sleep at 6:30 and slept until 8:30. 

Willy walked to his first day at his new job at 8:45 while I watched the market trend downward except for Nvidia that closed $3.14 higher that made me a slight winner on a day when all the indices ended down at 2:00.

At 9:00 I toasted two slices of bagel and spread them with cream cheese and garnished them with slices of red onion and white fish salad.  Suzette ate the remaning half bagel and whitefish and then left for work.

I worked at my desk until 1:45 when I watched Man Union beat Wolverton 4 to 1 and rested in bed and watched the stock commentators on CNBC, At 3:00 breaking news reported that Trump had decreed that Nvidia and AMD, and Intel can sell their less powerful chips in China, which sent the price of those stocks up over $4.00 each Nvidia in after hours trading. Nvidia reached $190 per share.

When Suzette arrived at 3:30 we drove to El Super to buy produce, including corn and flour tortillas, cilantro, avocados, zucchini, broccoli, green onions, a bunch each of spinach and beets, poblano chilis, apples, onions, limes, lemons, an acorn squash, three ears of corn, tomatoes, oranges, requeson, cojita cheese, sour cream, and carrots. This leaves one more shopping at Smith’s to completely refill our ingredients with the addition of milk, cream cheese, bagels, and fresh salmon for Gravad lax.

We decided to make pork enchiladas for dinner. When we returned home at 4:30 I was hungry and weakening so I made a quick snack of pasta, sausage, two sliced mushrooms, about 1/4 cup of red onion, and a clove of garlic in butter and olive oil with two eggs and a spoonful of requeson added after the ingredients were cooked. After we ate the snack, at 5:30 we started dinner prep.

Dinner - I recalled that we had a bottle of chopped green chili in the garage fridge.

I diced an onion and minced four cloves of garlic. I fetched a quart of chicken bone broth we had bought yesterday for Willy at Costco and Suzette minced about 1 lb. of pork tender, and sliced two zucchini and four mushrooms with the new knife we bought in Kyoto. Suzette then sautéed onion and garlic in two skillets. To one skillet she added the pork, to the other she added 1/2 jar of medium green chili, and chicken bone broth. She then emulsified the green chili mixture to make it more emulsified. When she tasted the green chili mixture she found it to be too piquant, so she added about 1/2 cup of sour cream to the green chili mixture and emulsified it again to mix it thoroughly.

We were then ready to construct the enchilada casserole. We lay a layer of the still warm corn tortillas on the bottom of a 9 x 13 inch Pyrex baking dish. We should have put some butter or green chili sauce on the bottom of the dish before the tortillas. Also we did not sauté the corn tortillas in sauce before laying them in the dish, because the sauce did not penetrate them on the bottom, they stuck a bit to the dish, which I found pleasant to have a soft fresh tortilla base but it  lacked any joinder to the rest of the dish and required being pried off the bottom with a spatula when served.

Suzette then spread the pork, onion, and garlic filling on the first layer of tortillas and added about one half of the container of requeson (Mexican cottage cheese) and some green chili sauce.

Then we lay another layer of corn tortillas on the pork layer and Suzette added the sliced fresh mushrooms and zucchini and the rest of the requeson and more green chili sauce. 

Finally we added a third layer of tortillas and added the rest of the green chili sauce to the dish and pushed it into the crevasses at the edges of the dish to fill the dish with sauce on all the edges. We then lay a layer of thinly sliced cojita cheese squares on top of the sauce and baked the dish on a cookie sheet in a 350 oven for 35 minutes until it bubbled, the cojita squares browned, and we thought the zucchini and mushrooms had cooked.

Willy joined us and we served squares of the enchiladas with Negra Modelos for dinner

We then watched Philadelphia an the LA Chargers play Monday Night Football  . It became a comedy of errors such as an interception and two fumbles on one play, so at 8:30 I checked my portfolio and found it now stood 2.2% below its level on November 3, so close to the same level when the surge in after hours trading of AMD and Nvidia. It had been a big day of activity for all of us so we went to bed at 9:30 before the game ended.

We now have three excellent PPI’s to eat for the rest of the week, smoked trout, tomato couscous, and green chili enchiladas.

Bon Appetit

December 7, 2025 Breakfast - 2 men on an island. Lunch - Costco - hot dog. Snack - Peanut butter and honey sandwich. Dinner - Smoked Trout Piccata and Tomato Couscous

December 7, 2025 Breakfast - 2 men on an island. Lunch - Costco - hot dog. Snack - Peanut butter and honey sandwich. Dinner - Smoked Trout Piccata and Tomato Couscous

I did not sleep well and woke up from 4:30 to 6:30 and then slept until 8:30.

Then Willy and I watched West Ham tie Brighton and Crystal Palace beat Fulham in added time to go into fourth place in the standings.

At 9:00 I made two men on an island: a slice of sour dough bread toasted with butter and then an egg is fried onto the other side with a cup of chai.

At noon we dressed and Suzette and I drove to Costco to refill the larder. We ate hot dogs and then we shopped, buying three fresh trout, eggs, cream, Kirkland 10 year tawny port, Kirkland Premier Cru Chablis, a liter of Kahlua, and a bottle of Kirkland Chianti Classico, a kilo round of brie, a brick of Dubliner cheddar, two goat cheese logs, and wedges of Manchego and Jarlsberg, chicken bone broth for Willy, two baguettes, asparagus, romaine lettuce, white mushrooms, and gourmet blend lettuce, blueberries, and dark chocolate truffles. 

We then drove home at 2:30 and I rested and watched football.

I made a peanut butter and honey sandwich for a snack around 4:00 and Willy ate a wedge of Brie with slices of baguette for a snack.

Then Willy went to a party at Jane’s at La Luz.

At 6:00 we started dinner and watched 60 Minutes and then the Houston v. Kansas City game on Sunday Night Football.

Suzette went to the garden and picked a basket full of fallen cherry tomatoes, a few sprigs of fresh lemon thyme, a few leaves of sorrel, and a handful of fresh parsley.

I chopped the herbs plus three cloves of garlic, and three mushrooms for a butter, olive oil, garlic, herb, and mushroom sauce for the smoked trout.

I then diced 1/8 red onion, and halved about 12 cherry tomatoes and cut the heads and tails off the three fresh trout we bought. 

Suzette then smoked the trout on the grill while I made couscous . I first melted three T. of butter in a sauce pan and added the red onion and tomatoes and cooked them in the butter for a couple of minutes. Then I added 1 cup of couscous and tossed it with the ingredients. After a couple more minutes I added 1 1/2 cup of boiling water and covered the pot and cooked the ingredients for about ten minutes on low heat while Suzette was grilling the trout.

Suzette had melted three T. of butter in a small skillet and added good olive oil and the garlic and mushrooms and sautéed them until cooked.

When she brought in the smoked trout she added the herbs to the sauce.

I filleted the three trout and lay the fillets on a platter and Suzette drizzled the herb, mushroom, and garlic sauce over the trout.

I poured out the remaining 1/2 bottle of Kirkland Pinot Grigio and Suzette spooned a pile of couscous onto each plate and we each took some trout from the platter and squeezed lemon juice on it.

This is the type of elegant and simple dinner that we love. And we have lots of trout and couscous left for salads and additional meals.

It is great to be back home where we can cook the type of food we like.

After dinner Suzette filled cordial glasses with crushed ice and some of our homemade limoncello for a dessert drink.

Bon Appetit

December 6, 2025, Honolulu to Albuquerque Breakfast - Starbuck’s sandwich. Lunch - Everything bagel with cream cheese and white fish Dinner - Casarecce Pasta, White Lima beans, sardines, anchovies, tomatoes, and fresh chard

December 6, 2025, Honolulu to Albuquerque Breakfast - Starbuck’s sandwich. Lunch - Everything bagel with cream cheese and white fish  Dinner - Casarecce Pasta, White Lima beans, sardines, anchovies, tomatoes, and fresh  chard

We got up at 5:00 in Honolulu and drove to the airport. We shared a starbuck’s English muffin, scrambled egg, and sausage sandwich. Suzette drank coffee and I drank chai. We boarded the flight to San Diego at 8:10 and shared a everything bagel smeared with cream cheese and white fish salad at 12:30 about one hour before we arrived in San Diego. When we arrived in San Diego we switched planes to an Albuquerque bound flight and arrived in Albuquerque at 7:15.

Willy picked us up and drove us home. While I watched the Big Ten Championship game between undefeated No. 1 Ohio State and undefeated No. 2 Indiana, which Indiana won, Suzette and Willy put together a very delicious dinner by combining Casarecce pasta, white Lima Beans, a can of diced tomatoes, a can of sardines, a can of anchovies, red onion, garlic, and chopped red chard. We garnished the dish with Grated Manchego and Parmesan cheese and drank Kirkland Pinot Grigio with dinner. It was wonderful to have a dinner made with ingredients of one’s choice that are compatible with one’s dietary interests instead of trying to guess what dishes created by restaurants will meet one’s food criteria, which is difficult even at the best restaurants.

I then watched Duke beat Virginia in overtime to win the ACC championship and then UCLA beat Hawai’i in the last minute of a tied score game. 

Our heating system started making a terrible sound and we turned it off and went to bed at 11:00.

It is great to be home even though we have to deal with some problems.

Bon Appetit

December 5, 2025 Lunch - Moke’s in Kailua Dinner - Istanbul Hawai’i.

December 5, 2025 Lunch - Moke’s in Kailua Dinner - Istanbul Hawai’i.

We woke up and I talked with Rahim and Dan in the morning. I had awakened several times in the night to check the market and it slid into losses as the day progressed with Meta and AMD being the only bright spots as the market did its Friday derisking sell off.

We drove across the island to Kailua to a highly rated breakfast restaurant place named Moke’s. Hawaiian couple was eating as we entree and I asked what she was eating and she’s said, “Loco Moco and it is really good.”

So I ordered Loco Moco. 

Loco Moco*

$17.95

An island classic with our home-made beef patty
Served over white rice with two over-easy eggs and topped with our home-made brown gravy.An island classic with our home-made beef patty

Served over white rice with two over-easy eggs and topped with our home-made brown gravy.

Suzette ordered her favorite, Corn Beef Hash that was homemade.

Our impression was that the food was average, not very exciting.

After breakfast Suzette walked down the street to a coffee roaster and bought a bag of Hawaiian coffee.

We then walked across the street to Tali’s bagel shop and bought two everything bagels, 8 oz. of white fish salad and a container of cream cheese for breakfast tomorrow on the flight back to Albuquerque.

Suzette checked and found that there were over ten coffee roasters located in and around Kailua. We wanted to visit a coffee roaster but first we wanted to walk the beach. Kailua like many towns on Oahu has beach front parks maintained by the city and County of Honolulu. 

We then drove to the beach and walked the beach a bit.

                               This rather lovely cardinal has been introduced 

Then we drove to an industrial park just north of town to Tradition Coffee was located. It was a coffee shop and sales store for its coffee. Suzette bought 2 12 oz. Bags of roasted Hawaiian coffee for $100.

We then were told that a chocolate company two doors away so we walked there and one of the owners was at the door and was kind enough to give us a tour of their state of the art facility, Manoa Chocolate, an artisanal chocolatier, specializing in Hawaiian grown cacao.

       My favorite was a Hawai’i Macadamia nut coated with dark Hawaiian chocolate

We ended up in the sales shop where all their chocolates were available to taste. We bought eight bars of Hawaiian dark and milk chocolate as gifts.

It was 2:30 when we drove back to the hotel. 

We napped until 5:00 when we grabbed our half bottle of Trapiche Malbec and drove to the long beachfront park near the hotel where we watched the sunset until 6:00 

We then drove to Istanbul Hawai’i, another restaurant recommended by the evening bar tender. Istanbul served Turkish family recipes. We tried to keep it simple. We ordered a Mediterranean Salad, lettuce, cherry tomatoes, cucumber slices, a few black kalamata olives dusted with feta dust and dressed with a light vinaigrette.

Then I ordered a 1/2 pita with a bowl of tzatziki that was warm and delicious when dipped in the tzatziki.

Then our entrees arrived, a grilled boned Branzino served with Rice pilaf and a thick leek sauce that was strongly flavored.

The other entree was a whole baked eggplant split open and stuffed with a tomato filling served with a bowl of tzatziki in a bowl filled with rice pilaf.

We drank water.

After dinner we filled the tank with gas and drove back to the Equus Hotel. We packed and I ate the complimentary gingerbread cookie with a cup of Ear Grey tea.

Suzette went to bed shortly after 9:00, but I stayed up to blog this entry.

The natural beauty of Hawai’i is impressive. We have driven north, south, and east on Oahu and loved the scenery everywhere. I can see why folks like to retire here.

I walked 5200 steps today which is back to a reasonable level including two beaches.

Bon Appetit