Taco night....

Trying to continue with the "food" theme this trip, Lorrie and I had tacos at the house tonight. Ah, but not just any old taco, no that would not do on Vieques. I'm trying to prove that you can come down here and buy what's on island and in the process create some darn good food right in your rental house.

Tonight was great. No actually it was fantastic and it would be a real shame if other people didn't give one a try. These were the best darn tacos ever, even better than what I had at Cayo Blanco this past June.

Originally it was going to be chicken and lobster tacos. We still had one lobster tail left from the big cookout over at Bill and Joys. Problem is, I ate it this this morning, well mid-morning. So no lobster, well at least that's what it was looking like.  Today was a rainy day. One of those "no beach" days and really we where ready for one. For us it was a pina colada "no beach" day.  In the process we managed to drink all the rum we had, plus went through all the pineapple juice.

Grrrrr...yeah life's a bitch right?

So off to Isabel to get more rum and I was thinking we could maybe try to recreate the Coqui Fire margaritas we had last night. Right as we were getting ready to leave I decided to try and get a Medalla out of the cooler in the Jeep. Only thing was the damn back hatch door hasn't been working right and it had finally given up the ghost.

Grrrr...life's a bitch when you can't get to your Medallas in the back of the Jeep.

Now it was onto to Maritzas. I'd had it with this non functioning back door on the Jeep, especially  with paying premium price. When we got to Maritzas they had no jeeps and the mechanic wasn't there. They said come back tomorrow and they could get it fixed. Why did I know they were going to tell me that before we arrived?

Swing and a miss, we were off to Morales for pineapple juice, rum and Triple sec.  Got the rum and pineapple juice, but couldn't read the labels on the liqueur to see if any were triple sec. I kept seeing "tres". So I was thinking one of them surely was triple sec. We finally  had to commandeer a lady shopping to help us out. Her Spanish was "muy bien" , her English was not. So no triple sec.   Left Morales and headed to El Sombreo Veijo. I knew Kathy would have Triple sec.

When we parked I noticed that right across the street was a health food store. Only in Vieques that right across from the liquor store you would find the health food store.

One last leg of this mission was to hook up with Bill. I needed to get the lid of the lobster pot I left the night before, the other reason  was to return a book I had borrowed from Bill this past November. 

We met up with Bill, Joy and company at Cookies Paradise. They had our lid ready and waiting. They also had, to our surprise, what was left of the lobster we had cooked the night before. They insisted that we take it. Fantastic, we now had regained  lobster for the tacos. 

 A little word about these tacos. Lorrie made two types of toppings for the tacos plus some brown rice. First was a green pepper corn and black bean salsa. The ingredients are:

Olive oil

Cilantro

red wine vinegar

chili powder

pepper

cherry tomatoes

can of corn

can of black beans

green pepper

I'm telling ya this stuff is wicked good.

The chicken that went with the above was marinated in fresh lime juice and olive oil for 30 minutes. It was then seasoned with black pepper, chili powder, cumin, dried oregano and was pan fried in olive oil. Cooled and then diced.

The lobster was topped with the mango salsa we had made for Bill and Joys. It had mango, red onion, red pepper, cantaloupe, two limes, capers, a jalapeno, salt and pepper. This salsa pairs great with the lobster. 

We had two Coqui Fire sauces to use, but ended up using the #3 Pina Star. As a matter of fact we used almost the whole jar. It's the one on the right below. 

I was wanting to have margaritas with the tacos, but I forgot to get limes. We ended up making Pina Coladas. 

Absolutely great meal and one I would love to share with other folks. 

:-)

The Fish Market.....

In all the trips to Vieques, Lorrie and I had never been to the fish market or any "fish market" for that matter. Is was near 10:30 a.m. when we arrived.

There's not a lot of room to park down close to the dock, something to remember. It would probably be better to park out nearer the road and walk into it because once you pull in your probably going to have to back out of the place like I did when we left.

The market is like a little oasis tucked away just steps from the ferry dock and if you've ever drove by the ferry when it's unloading you know what I'm talking about. On our first trip to Vieques it was a baptism by fire,  because on our very first  day I managed to get in the middle of that snarl of traffic. I was in my shiny new jeep from Maritzas and having to squeeze within inches of other cars and people going in every direction, except what seems proper,  put me in a white knuckled state. I remembered telling Lorrie and Jessica "we've got to get the hell out of this."  I've since seasoned to the point that it doesn't really faze me, it is just part of Vieques. A place where every nuance and minutia of traffic etiquette has not been  pre-determined, marked with signs and traffic lights.

As I got close to the market I was taken back by just how tranquil and picturesque it  is with all the blue colors. The building has a beautiful mural painted on it's exterior in  a monotone palette. 

Blue is the color of the mind and is essentially soothing; it affects us mentally, rather than the physical reaction we have to red. Strong blues will stimulate clear thought and lighter, soft blues will calm the mind and aid concentration. Consequently it is serene and mentally calming. It is the color of clear communication.  Time and again in research, blue is the world's favorite color.

The atmosphere reminded me of many scenes from the Movie "Big Blue", specifically  Jean Marc Barr swimming with the dolphins, not to mentioned the eye candy that Rosanna Arquette provides. It's one of my old time favorite movies, for reasons I can't really quantify.

As I approached the market there was a scene before me that made me think of what Daniel Klein wrote about in Travels with Epicurus, a book worth reading, especially if your over 50 years. It's an old tale supposedly told by Aegean islanders, mostly rural.

As the story goes, there's an affluent Greek American out on a walk. He comes upon an old Greek man, sitting on a rock, sipping ouzo, lazily starring out into the ocean watching the sunset. The American notices there are olive trees growing on the hills behind the old man but they are unintended, with olives here and there dropping onto the ground. He asks the old man who the trees belong to?

"They're mine," the Greek replies.

"Don't you gather the olives," the American asks?

"I just pick one when I want one," the old man says.

"But don't you realize that if you pruned the trees and picked the olives at their prime, you could sell them? In America people are crazy about olive oil, and they pay a damned good price for it. Why you could build a big house and hire servants to do everything for you."

"What would I do with the money?" the old man asks.

"You could do anything you want!"

"You mean like sip ouzo and watch the sunset?

And that's what I was thinking about as I came upon these three old gentlemen, and the sleeping dog. Just starring out into the ocean, swapping stories, waiting for the fishing boats to come in.

We took up residence and enjoyed the morning, waiting for the boats to come in.

From right to left  - myself, Bill, Teresa, and Carol. Linus and Brad were out near the dock edge.

Wasn't too long before they showed up. We were waiting on the lobster. That's Bill helping one of the fishermen with a large tub full of Lobsters.

Not going to get much more fresher than that.

Linus was first to claim his "langosta perfecto."

Bill was developing an affinity for this fellow.

I ended up buying three lobsters. Price was $8 per pound. We paid $44 dollars for ours. Bill, Brad and Linus bought Yellowtail and Grouper, plus lobsters. This was going to make for a great meal.

We gave Bill and Joy our lobsters since we were all meeting up later that night for the big cookout.

Lorrie and I headed out to Playa Chiva for the rest of the day.

Forecast was calling for a 30% chance of rain. Looks about right, maybe a touch too many clouds for 30%. 

Met Matt and Jennifer while on Chiva. These two are newlyweds and hail from Michigan. Jennifer's first trip to Vieques, Matt has been here a number of times.  Great people, had a lot of fun hanging out with them.

Matt was really wanting to snorkel and tried a couple times, but the surf has been up too much the last couple of days. Playa Chiva was nearly void of people. We were only one of 3 couples at turnout 10. I could only see one or two other couples looking back west. Did some beach clean up towards the east. Got one bag of mostly plastic liter bottles.  We found a couple of old T-posts sticking up almost right at the waters edge. I would guess this are left from when that part of Chiva was closed for beach clean up.  They were broke off with about 3 inches or jagged metal sticking out of the sand. I could see this really doing some harm to a person's foot.  We stuck a big Styrofoam buoy we found over the top of them, only a temporary solution to a potentially dangerous hazard.

I have to interrupt this post to point out how darn quiet it is here at Beso Del Caribe. Super quiet, this is the place to come to if you want to only hear the waves, which I can while I sit here typing. 

Anyway......

Left the beach about 5 pm, changed and headed over to "Cookies Paradise," where Bill and Joy are staying.

That's Brad preparing the fish for the grill.

Joy was, as always, the best host ever. Such great people and we had so much fun. Everyone was busy in the kitchen.

We were fortunate enough to have a very large lobster pot at Beso, which we brought with us. 

Couple of the lobsters ready for the table which Linus was already preparing with salads for the crew.

After a great meal we spent the evening out on the veranda, joking, laughing, singing and just having a great time.

Thank you  Bill and Joy. To our new friends Linus, Carol, Brad and Teresa with hope we can all do this again sometime soon.

:-)

Provisions and Mojo chicken......

Spent the day on La Plata, the full day. First order of business set up the cabana. We  had replaced one of the poles. Somehow I managed to lose one of the Teflon thing-a-ma-jigs that's inside and helps the telescoping lock, lock. Other than that it's the same old ropes and everything else.

The wind was strong and constant but the cabana held up just fine. A familiar site on the beaches is a people showing up with a beach umbrella. They unfold the thing before the pole is even set in the sand then  it flips wrong side out. This also happens a lot even when the pole is set/screwed into the sand. The below video is why we ended up building the cabanas we use on Vieques:

This young guy, obviously frustrated, told me he must have gotten the worst beach umbrella made. We offered our cabana if they got too hot or too much sun.

La Plata was just as gorgeous as ever. Not much had changed and we're thankful for that, because there's a lot that has changed driving into Chiva and La Plata. There's been enormous habitat destruction along Chiva and on the road into La Plata. That sort of jungle feel, especially on the drive into La Plata is gone. It feels more like a savanna now.  They widened the road going into La Plata. I'll have to get video of it this week.

Like I said, La Plata beach itself hasn't changed much.

The gallery is up and ready for business. I, of course, jumped right in on my curating duties.

Above is my new piece for this trip. There were lots of pieces that have been balanced for 3 years now. I remember digging this next one out of the water at least 3 years ago. It's one of Andre's favorites:

Counted 24 people on La Plata at the high point, about average for peak season. We ended up leaving earlier than we normally would (we feel obligated to close it down whenever we can).

So I guess it was about 4:30 when we said goodbye to our favorite beach. Our mission was provisions, our destination, wherever we could find what we needed and that could end up being as many as 7 or 8 stops.

 First stop was the vegetable museum (VM). The VM is at the intersection of 997 and 200. When you drive by you'll swear it's a tire shop, which it is, but they also sell fresh, ahem,  vegetables.  Tires and vegetables, almost like bread and butter, or fish and chips, well at least that's the way it works on Vieques. The fruits and veggies are stored in these refrigerated semi trailers that are permanently set up, sorta like a  walk in freezer/refrigerated. There are a lot of vegetables/herbs/fruits/melons inside these trucks, in varying degrees of freshness (hence the vegetable museum). 

We bought 3 mangoes,  4 avocados, 3 pears, 2 limes,  4 lemons, 2 oranges, 2 grapefruit,  package of carrots, one pineapple, 3 red onions, 2 yellow onions, 3 eggplants,  3 sweet potatoes, 1 green pepper, 1 red pepper, 1 yellow pepper,  one package of cherry tomatoes (that looked GREAT btw),  package of grapes. They've expanded the VM to an area outside the trucks that has a decent offering of can goods, spices, beer (where are you not going to find beer for sale on Vieques?) and a few other items. We picked up some cumin and chili powder and capers. Final bill was $56.

Next it was off to Morales on 200. I had remembered that they had a much better selection of asian/indian spices, plus they seem to have more meat. We found the red curry but not the green.  We even found organic honey at this store. We almost didn't find the honey. It was over near the candy bars. Honey, sweet, candy bars, sweet.  Total bill was $195. We bought too many items to list, but a few of note werer: ground beef, chicken breasts, shrimp, grouper fillets, balsamic vinegar,  red wine vinegar, oyster sauce, dijohn mustard and a bottle of Pinot Gricio.

Still on mission,  it was off to the Morales in Isabell because we still hadn't found in turmeric (it's for a tea we make each morning), plus we needed fresh cilantro.  Didn't find the turmeric (I'm thinking there's no tumeric on island) but did get 2 bunches of cilantro. Also picked up some fresh cantaloupe. We found dried black beans, which weren't at the Morales on 200. Thing is we had already bought canned Goya black beans so we didn't pick them up.  I bought 2 quarts of Hag and Dais ice cream and some more coconut water. There were a few other items but I can't remember. Total for that stop was $44.

So you want to see what $300 of provisions looks like on Vieques?

We did buy some sunscreen, salsa and corn chips, they just didn't make the pictures. With provisions secured in just three stops (there was still the Mambo, Buen Provecho and the Vieques Emporium for those really hard to find items) it was off to Beso's to get cooking.

Menu for tonight, once we finally got all the groceries put away was Mojo chicken over brown rice with a spinach avacado salad on the side. We had a Pinot Gricio for wine. 

The chicken breast we bought at Morales where huge. They were boneless and so big we only had to use one. The cost for the package was $14 but since was just used 1/4 of it, the chicken for this meal cost $3.50.

We were going to cook it on the grill but it was getting so late she just cooked it in a skillet on the stove. It had cumin, pepper and was grilled in olive oil.

While she was doing that I was cutting up one mango and the one pineapple we bought.. I absolutely love fresh mango:

She took  this and put it into a med sized pot that had olive oil, red onion, minced garlic. Once this sauteed for 10 minutes she added red wine vinegar, pineapple juice, one squeezed orange and 1/4 cup of white rum (you know, the gift we got when we arrived at Beso).  Difficult for me to say how much the mango salsa cost. It wasn't much though.  I'll be generous and say $4.

Now the salad. It was  spinach, avocado, red onion,  and sliced almond. The dressing was fresh squeezed lemon, olive oil, honey (organic), and ground pepper. 

The spinach we used cost $2 per bag and we only used 1/4 of the bag. So 50 cents for the spinach. We used 1/4 of one avocados. I think the avocado was under $2 a piece.  So maybe another 50 cents. We used maybe a dimes worth of onion. The almonds were $2 and once again we only used 1/4 of it. So another 50 cents. What is that now.....$1.50  We used 35 cents worth of honey and maybe 15 cents worth of apple cider vinegar. The olive oil we used was maybe 35 cents. Grand total on the salad $2.35 for two salads. 

The meal is up to $9.85

The rice was $1.79

The wine was $11

Total cost for our Mojo chicken /spinach salad dinner was $22.64 of which the wine was half so if you drank water you talking less that $7 per person. Not bad at all and there's left overs. 

Eating this great meal, and it was blow your socks off good, in the Caribbean with coqui frogs and ocean waves in the background......just doesn't get much better.

Who can put  a price on that?

:-)