OF FOOD AND FAMILY

We spent ten days in Tucson, which gave us an opportunity to visit with our son, Jay, his daughter, Melanie and son, Jay, Jr.  We also enjoyed visiting with Jay's girlfriend, Nora, and meeting all her kids, her granddaughter and her mother, Estella.  Jay works at a mine almost 2 hours north of Tucson and Nora works at a dental office in Tucson, but they both managed to squeeze in visits after work and when Jay was able to get a couple of extra days off work.  Akin to most families, much of our visit was around and about food.

During our visit in Tucson, we met with old friends from our days in Italy, Des and Sherman Maultsby, who picked us up for dinner at a Mexican restaurant.  It was a fun time with good food and lots of laughs.  We also helped Jay, Jr. celebrate his 18th birthday at a Tucson eatery on December 18th.  On another day, we found a nondescript place near our RV park that served the BEST-EVER Indian tacos!  The cafe is called "Indian Tacos- Manna from Heaven", although the sign is hard to see from the street.  In the event you're near downtown Tucson, the place is at the corner of St. Mary's and Grande Avenue (1118 W. St Mary) - it's worth the visit!  We were too busy eating our tacos to take a photo of them!

I was so pleased to join Nora and her mother, Estella in their Christmas tradition of making tamales.   Estella, who on the surface appears to be a very pleasant and funny 78 year old woman, was actually a slave-driver!  Last Saturday, I helped make about a million tamales and they threatened not to let me go home.  I was exhausted after several hours of tamale production.  Nora and her mother didn't stop their efforts when I went home to our RV - they continued that night and early the next morning.  Estella reported they made 24 or so dozen ( which in my book = millions!).... It was a very fun time and the tamales, filled with Estella's amazing red chili with beef - and a stuffed olive - are excellent.  Estella and Nora were excellent teachers of this craft.  We enjoyed the fruits of our labor and also got recipes for the chili and Nora's fantastic beans and salsa.  I really scored on this visit!  If we're back this way next Christmas season, I'll sign on to help again.

Another highlight of our visit with Jay and family, was a ride up to Mt. Lemmon.  It's an 8000 foot mountain with a ski area at the top.  The ride up goes through a saguaro forest, then century plants (more cacti) and finally into pines, then to the snow.  The drive was lovely and we had an OK lunch at the top.

On our last day in Tucson, Jay made posole, a Mexican soup, which was excellent.  Combined with some of Nora and Estella's tamales, beans, tortillas and salsa, we enjoyed yet another great meal and good company.  We thoroughly enjoyed our visit with family, friends -- and the food.