Saturday, 2/20 -- back to the stove!

Another lovely morning -- throw the windows open before breakfast and enjoy the zephyrs until the dinner hour.  Linda and Claudette re-acquainted themselves with the lazy river while I plied the needle upon the cross-stitch piece.

proper pepper protection!

By afternoon, it was time to get back to proper culinary pursuits.  While red rice had not been in the original planning, we were to enjoy chicken with pumpkin-seed sauce and green rice would be redundant.  So dried anchos were gutted and reconstituted, and the resulting paste used to flavor the rice.  Lots left to liven up another day.



Next up was our starter, a well-tested favorite salad featuring jicama.  Cucumbers, radishes and tangerine slices (remember, Walmart had NO oranges for us...) round out the crunch, and the dressing is a simple mix of ancho powder, lime juice and cilantro.  Try it some time!



The main dish was the poached chicken breasts, sauced with salsa verde (remember, Walmart had NO tomatillos for us...) jazzed up with toasted pepitas and roasted garlic, among other additions.  With steamed chayote and Mexican zucchini (cooked right away, as Walmart had the most PALTRY of offerings...), and flanked with the red rice, we thought we looked pretty spiffy.




Some black beans (well-laced with onions & garlic) rounded out the plate, and we enjoyed the remainder of the strawberries and yogurt as parfaits again for a healthy, light dessert.


Meanwhile, we have been working on organizing our (admittedly modest) discards.  There was a small plastic trash bin in some kind of holder under the sink, which fell into our hands the first day and declined to go back.  We're using it to hold "wet" discards (vegetable peelings and such) and moved a larger trash container from another room for "dry" trash.  Then we noticed that the housekeepers' carts have a big bag that holds recyclables, though there's no recycle bin in the room.  So another container from another room now holds recyclables.  Makes for a busy kitchen counter area, but we hope we're helpful to the hard-working staff that spruces up the room twice a day.

While the kitchen was busy, Linda was engaged in researching our favorite restaurant here, El Arrayan.  We were thrilled to see that they're now offering cooking lessons!  Calling locally from our U.S.-based phone was complicated, but with the help of the concierge desk, we were finally able to connect and make reservations for a program on Monday.  It's  been years (perhaps forever) since any of us have attended a proper class, we are definitely excited for this enhanced dining experience (we'll be cooking our own lunch).