Pepe the Penguin

Last year, during one of our trips home, my brother Chris gifted me a big fluffy penguin stuffed animal.

Little did I know that a) this was actually called a ZooPurrPet, one of the many knock-offs of Pillow Pets a phenomenon that has apparently taken kids by storm, or b) what a staple this little guy was going to have in our lives in the year(s) to come.

I began my relationship with this penguin on the plane ride back to Buenos Aires, where he rode in my lap, with my baby daughter, because a pillow takes up quite a bit of valuable smuggling space in a suitcase.  Once we got Gretchen to sleep, I proceeded to use the penguin to have one of the best night's sleep on an airplane that I've ever had without the assistance of sleepy-time pills.  He's so soft.  He's so plush.  He's a pretty great plane-companion.

After this flight, we started calling him Pepe.  I have no idea why, but it stuck.  Now he is our little buddy Pepe, and he's a constant fixture in our living room.

You may remember Pepe from such milestone moments as Gretchen's first tooth:

Gretchen lovin' on Pepe

He was present at her 7-month photo shoot.  Here she is using him for support as she sits up.  Also, I found it hilarious that in this particular photo, Pepe is the one in focus, whereas Gretchen is a bit in the background.

He also attended her 1st birthday party, right in the middle of all of the action:

He has serves as a nursing pillow, a sleeping pillow, a teething ring and a comfort object.  When Gretchen falls or gets hurt, we don't run to the pacifier, we run to Pepe.  When she's tired, she throws him on the floor and lays across his belly.  We have a couple of late-night flight trips coming up and you can be sure that if there is space, Pepe will be along for the ride.

Great gift!  When Gretchen's older we hope that she will associate this penguin with her south-pole-faring Uncle Chris - but until then, Pepe is a key member of Gretchen's preferred toy collection.

Mendoza the Return Visit: Day 2

On our second day in Mendoza started off at our favorite bodega from our trip two years ago, Domaine St. Diego (mlauritamza@hotmail.com (0261)155395148, Laura speaks English and Spanish). On this trip we reconnected with the same tour guide, Angel Mendoza's daughter, Laura, who was just as pleasant as the last time we saw her.  It was a beautiful and serene place to be first thing in the morning. I love the number of olive trees they have on the property, even though it reduces the number of vines they can plant.  This bodega is family owned and operated, and they go to great lengths to use the small amount of land that they have in a number of very interesting ways.

As mentioned before, the olive trees are interspersed between the vines, or more accurately, the vines were planted among the trees.  The grapes that grow directly below the trees don't get enough sunlight to grow to use for the wines they were originally intended for, so they use these grapes to make other wines.  When we visited before, they made a dessert wine called Oportuno that was delicious.  They have discontinued that wine and started making an outstanding sparkling rosé called Elea, after their first granddaughter.

They also grow certain vines at two different heights, to allow double the grapes to be planted in the same amount of space.  They manipulate the vines so that some grow taller than others and then maintain them at different heights.  The root structures for these types of plants are relatively deep, also making them a good match for the shallow-rooted olive trees.  Very cool.

The last piece of horticultural knowledge that I will share from this visit is the way that the winery creates new vines.  So, the plants that they currently use to make wine are somewhere in the range of 70 - 80 years old.  I don't remember the exact numbers, but somewhere around this range, the plants start to get tired and produce less quality fruit.  If they continue to naturally let the plant go, it will eventually die - literally from old age.  Instead, they naturally clone a new plant.  At the end of the season, when they prune all of the plants, the older, more tired vines are left with an off-shoot.

Grape vine "cloning"

This longer branch continues to grow, and then is guided down into the ground.  The plant will naturally grow down, then turn up toward the surface again and re-emerge as a new, sapling vine.  This vine (which is still attached to the mother plant by an "umbilical" cord) eventually grows it's own root structure and is able to live on it's own as an independent plant.  The branch is then cut, the new plant relocated - but not before the new plant feeds nutrients and energy back into the mother plant, rejuvenating it's fruit production for another period of years.  This will allow the plants to produce fruit from 30-40 years longer than usual, and has the added benefit of keeping the same DNA in all of the grapes.  Amazing!

 Domaine St. Diego has a beautiful look-out point that is great for photos, and is the weekend meeting point for the entire wine-making family.  What a great tradition to have, drink the wine you all helped to make while sitting atop a hill on your family's beautiful land.



The last stopping point on our tour was the olive centrifuge, which is the new technology for the olive press.  More simply, we stopped to watch them make olive oil.  They use this machine to create their own olive oil, which is outstanding on it's own or in the grapefruit and rosemary infused variety, and to generate profit by pressing other farm's harvest of olives.

After this we enjoyed the tasting of Pura Sangre, Paradigma and the sparkling Elea.  We also tasted, and proceeded to purchase, their olive oil, both versions, and got the contact information to purchase wine for delivery in Buenos Aires.  This is the last point to make about this winery, they only sell from the winery - no distributers or wholesalers, so if you want it, you buy from them.  Not a bad deal considering that all of their wines are a mere AR$60.

The next bodega on our tour was Carinae, a winery started by a French couple that used the stars as their theme.  Carinae is the name of the constellation that appears directly above the vineyard during harvest time - making it an appropriate name for the star-loving wine-enthusiast.  The Carinae wines are made from vines planted in Maipu, the place that we visited, but also in Salta (to make Torrontés) and Lujan de Cuyo (an area a few hours outside of Mendoza city).  Their most prized wine is called Prestige, which is aged for 18 months in new French oak barrels, and is a blend of Malbec, Cabernet Sauvignon and Syrah.

Jon admiring the aging process

Their wines were good, though my personal favoriet was a Malbec Rosé.  I particularly like the foils surrounding the corks of these wines, they are classy, colorful and contain their namesake constellation.  

We spent another amazing, large lunch at Ruca Malen, another purposeful repeat from our last trip.  It was delicious, and pared with great wines - most notably the Yauquen Bonarda, a varietal that I have never heard of before this trip.  Keep your eyes open for Bonarda, it is very good, and rumored to be the next big thing after Argentine Malbec.

We ended our day at the Alta Vista winery, a beautiful building and grounds that is a photographer's dream.  Unfortunately for me, this was the fourth winery of the day, so my photos were not as impressive as they probably could have been (at least that's my excuse).  You be the judge. 

And here is the only photo I took of our guide, Javier.  The best wine guide in Mendoza!

To finish off the day, we returned to the hotel for some cards and relaxing before dinner.  This night, we made reservations at Azafran, the same restaurant we visited back in 2010 and still an outstanding choice for dinner. We were sad to learn that Philip, the gentleman that gave us the stargazing tour back in 2010 is no longer offering these tours.  And I was confounded to learn that he was actually one of two star-loving, wine-making Philips in the small town of Mendoza (the other being one of the owners of Carinae, who I was CERTAIN was the same Philip as before... who knew??).

Argentina is great about allowing carry-on wine on the plane, so we were able to purchase a few bottles to bring home with us.  I am obviously quite pleased with our purchases - and it was a great, fun weekend.

No doubt, we were anxious to get back to this little princess, who is now saying "night-night", "bye-bye", "bath-bath" and some singular words like "stop", "hi", "meh" (for milk) and most heart-warmingly "ma-ma" and "da-da" to refer to Jon and I.  She's so cute it's painful!

Mendoza, Keeps You Coming Back!

Last weekend we took our first repeat trip in Argentina, and which location was great enough to return to?
Mendoza. It's calm. It's relaxed. It's a great location to enjoy for an adult weekend of eating well, having fun with friends and visiting bodegas.

We returned to Mendoza a little over two years since our first trip, this time we arrived with our friends Chris and Mary.  Our friend and tour guide, Javier Inzaurraga (info@plazaitalia.net) arranged all of our bodega tours and graciously drove us around for two days.  Last time, we stayed at the B&B Plaza Italia, which is how we met Javier, but this time we opted for a more standard hotel accommodation, which worked out great for a quiet weekend away from the kids.

Thats right.  The kids stayed at home.  I have to say though, I think Gretchen thoroughly enjoyed her weekend with our beloved nanny, Candy.

Back to Mendoza.
We asked Javier to choose some of his favorite boutique wineries, along with a few requests from our last visit to Mendoza.  The first place we visited was Vistalba, a beautiful bodega with plenty of unique touches.  Vistalba wines are, perhaps, not as well known as the winemaker's brother's wines, which are produced under the name "Pulenta".  We are particular fans of Pulenta wines, they are affordable and of great quality.  The Vistalba wines have three lines, which they refer to as A, B and C if they are produced from the grapes from the Vistalba vineyards, or Tomero Gran Reserva, Tomero Reserva or Tomero if they are produced from the grapes grown in Uca Valley, an area of Mendoza provence approximately 2 hours from the city.

A few months before our visit, someone in the Altavista family had a wedding inside the bodega. As part of the wedding decorations, they covered all of the hanging lights with a wreath of dried grape clusters, making one of the coolest chandeliers I have ever seen. The light given off by these decorations was dimmed and shadowed which made for a very cool effect in the wine cellar.

In the tasting room there was also an exposed wall of earth to demonstrate where the vines are planted and how the soil remains so cool. This was a great place for a photo shoot.
The winery was impressive, though we were not floored by the wines provided during the tasting. It was disappointing that the tasting was exclusively from the "C" level wines.

Very picturesque indeed

Our second stop on day one was Mendel, another winery where we had no previous experience with the facility or the wines. This bodega had an interesting back story, the original vineyard was owned by a Spanish family that came to Argentina in the early 1900s and planted the vines.  Somewhere along the way, the winery was abandoned and left empty for over 20 years, until the current owners purchased the land and made it functional again.

The current owners have kept the original vines and building, which makes for a great looking bodega.  I love the old-world feel, and the fact that the vines are almost 100 years old.  It was a fun winery to tour, and Mariela, our host, was incredibly nice and knowledgable.

After the tour, our tasting started with a "vertical" tasting.  This is an interesting way to taste wines because instead of comparing varietals, it compares one wine through two or more vintages. For us, this was the Mendel Malbec 2010 compared to the 2011. The unanimous opinion was that the 2010 was the superior wine.

Our next stop was lunch, which involved a 5-course pairing at Melipal (the word Melipal is a South American Indian term for the star constellation the Southern Cross, which is a constellation I am quite fond of).  The lunch was quite good, and we enjoyed the wines, especially the Malbec Rosé.  We were told that the chef is the same at Ruca Malen (which we visited the next day for lunch) though we still felt that the lunch there was a bit better.

Our last stop of the day was Achaval Ferrer, a repeat from our trip in 2010.  This winery is beautiful and the day was warm enough to enjoy the tasting outside.  We still really liked the wines, though the prices still seemed a bit steep compared to the rest of the bodegas we visited.  That being said, we purchased their Dolce, a dessert wine that is sweet, but not overly so, and reasonably priced.

This was a nice way to end day one.  We returned to the hotel and the girls headed to the spa while the boys lost some dinero in the casino.

For dinner, we took Javier's recommendation and ate at Florentino (Montevideo 675, Mendoza City) which was casual, fun and delicious.  I specifically enjoyed the mushroom appetizer, though everything we had was delicious.  We also were able to order one of the Mendel wines that was left off of our tasting, one called the Lunta, which was probably our favorite of everything the offered.  It, ironically, was also the cheapest.

So, Mendoza didn't disappoint.  We had a full first day, and though there was plenty of indulgence, we had a great night's sleep and were bright-eyed and bushy-tailed for the following day.

Cheers!

Dada Bistrot

Dada (San Martin 941: 4314-4787, Retiro) is old school in more ways than one. This little "bistro" has only a dozen tables, a handful of bar stools, no host and instead of reservations they give you a window of time - which they may or may not adhere to. Despite, or rather because of this, the super-casual atmosphere was exactly what we were looking for last Saturday night after seeing El Hombre Araña (better known as Spiderman). Once again, Time Out was instrumental in guiding us to this restaurant, because even though Dada has been recommended to us by multiple people, we never seem to remember it when we're thinking of a new place to go. We certainly weren't the only ones that relied on the magazine for a Dada recommendation, here the bartender is actually posing with a copy of Time Out for another patron's photo.

This is one of the first real bars we've been to since moving here. The bartenders are quick, ready to refill your drink and actually interact with the people sitting at their bar. Our "reservation" was at 11:00pm, and though we waited for awhile after that time came and went, we were well tended to and were even asked if we wanted to order at the bar instead of waiting for a table. This is second nature to most places in the US, but rarely, if ever happens at restaurants in BsAs. I ordered a caipiroska (which was delicious) and Jon had a beer, which was served to him in a wine glass - we are still missing out on draft beer. The only draft they offered was Quilmes, which is like asking for an agua con gas. 

Since we had some time to get hungry while we waited, it was nice that menu features and specials were written out on chalkboards around the restaurant. The bar features Ruca Malen wines, which is a great quality choice, though somehow not what I was expecting for this more rustic-style place. Dada continued to surprise me with the best hummus and pita chips appetizer I've had in Argentina (I should note that I've only had this dish a handful of times, not a popular offering in local restaurants) - such a strange collection of items, but somehow it works.

I ordered a steak salad as my main dish, while Jon had the lomo. Both dishes were delicious, and we had devoured them before I had a chance to take any photos. The food was far more elegant than you would originally expect when looking at the bar, but it's one of the many surprises we had at Dada.

I will say that as the night went on, service got more and more scarce. We asked for our check two or three times before finally receiving it at 1:30am (!!). Considering the food, wine, drinks and bar service were all great, something had to give.

All in all, a great spot that we will return to for future casual nights out.

Happy 4th of July Turkey Fry to You!

Last year we celebrated the birth of America by frying a turkey and having a traditional Thanksgiving Dinner with friends.  The presence of a turkey fryer was, perhaps, the best mistake that movers have ever made - as our friends requested that their turkey fryer be sent to storage and it was accidentally added to their household goods.  Through this mistake was born a tradition that we thoroughly enjoy, it includes frying a turkey for the 4th of July, and then playing Rock Band for the rest of the night.  It is now my preferred method for wishing the USA a Happy Birthday.

In addition to the amazing food that everyone contributed to the event, I made use of my Bakerella Cake Pops cook book and made some little Toms of my own. (Quick note: Calling a turkey Tom, is this an American thing? I asked around the table and no one else had every heard of the generic turkey name Tom.  Maybe I made it up...) Thank you to the numerous people who served as candy-sherpas for me and brought most of the cake pop supplies from the US. Another reason why our country is great.

Here is the event, in photos:

The delicious pavita prepared for the fryer.  This year's turkey was 10 pounds, the largest I could find in the city. Luckily, our gracious hosts supplemented the dinner with a delicious lomo, which is a huge perk for hosting a 4th of July Thanksgiving-style event in Argentina.  Fried turkey + beef tenderloin = Best. Dinner. Ever.

Jeff the Chef

Jon graciously volunteered to keep Jeff company as the oil heated up.  These two Canadians were trying to push the Canada Day initiative with their Canadian aprons.  

The oil is ready to go.  Notice the amazing engineering feat taking place in the background of this photo.  You see, an American turkey fryer doesn't necessarily work with an Argentine propane tank.  Nothing a little tin foil won't fix...

Milena's beautifully set table:

My little homemade centerpieces:

Have you ever seen more adorable turkeys??

Our little troublemakers. Don't they just have that mischievous look in their eyes??

Last year's troublemakers.  Back in the days when Gretchen would still wear a bow.  It is hard to believe how much these two have grown!

This year's newest member of the Turkey Fry tradition, baby Preston!  Trey was taking special care of his brother during our attempts to get a picture of the kids on the couch.  How sweet are they?!

This year's best picture of all of the little ones:

Last year's best picture of the kids:

Last year's real best picture of the kids:

 And for posterity's sake, here is Gretchen on her first 4th of July:

And the lone photo I was able to take of her a this year's 4th of July.  She looks like such a little girl!  If only we had video of her instead of a photo, you would see that she's telling us "Hot! Hot!" because the  under-counter oven was on.  Last year, we celebrated Gretchen smiling, clasping her hands together and laughed at her obsession with sticking out her cute little tongue.  This year, she tells us "Hot!", "Stop!" and loves her "Bath! Bath!".

 Thank you to our friend's movers for making the best mistaken turkey fryer delivery ever, and to all of our friends for helping us celebrate a very American holiday far from our American homes.