A great week and more to come

Chefs and Champagne, 3 hours with Ratso Sloman and sharing a ride with Lenny Lopate and his lovely lady Melanie, taping a segment of “The Best Thing I Ever Made” with my son Food Network star Aaron Sanchez, fulfilling my lifelong dream of making a “record” and seeing lots of my friends and nieces and  nephews from a far at the restaurant.  Weekend will be spent with dear friends upstate.

It would’ve perfect if the air conditioner in my office were not lying in pieces in my garden and  the  vent for the extractor  weren’t broken and that’s all I can say about it. And if the plumber had not had to cut through  the old beautiful tile in my bathroom.  Well, maybe it isn’t beautiful but it suits an 1866 house. To boot my lovely intern for the summer Lucinda is going back home to England! What a joy it was to have around and , better still, she accomplished a lot.  But I still have sweet, gorgeous Jen who is working on a very valuable project:  putting my archive together.

Chefs and Champagne:  I wasn’t planning on going.  The heat was miserable, I did not have a ticket. Ratso  and and his wife journalist Christy had suggested I come out for the event but they were going on to a Russell Simmons party and I was not invited.     But the chance to spend some time with Ratso –story teller extraordinaire, author of six or so New York Times best sellers, loyal friend and the hippest guy around made me change my mind.

The event was beautifully executed, the food was delicious, the rose wine (I still haven’t managed to learn how to add an accent) perfect for the suffocating heat  and the bathrooms were air conditioned.  At one time or more I felt like repeating Debra Winger’s  line  in Urban Cowboy “My legs are sweating, Momma.”

Martha Stewart was the honoree and she made her rounds, looking fabulous as always,  graciously posing with all the participating chefs.  She  gave me a big hello.  I’ve known her since before I moved here and she did my first cover on the NY Times Entertaining Issue when she was the editor there. Maybe inspired by her presence, Delta had a stand for hand massages though no one knows why or what they hoped to accomplish.

Marcus Samuelson and me

But what is this fascination with tacos? Okay, Julian Medina is Mexican and has several Latin-inspired restaurants and  his tacos are authentic but Marcus Samuelson serving tacos and not one of his brilliant creations  Then the NY Times reporting about Korean tacos caused me to seriously  worry. Is Mexican food back to being tacos?  It’s a shame–we had gained a lot of ground in creating awareness of all kinds of regional cooking.

Those who listen to his show on WNYC know that Lenny Lopate is a fascinating, learned man who listens well and does fabulous interviews.  I’m going to be on his show next Wednesday, August 4th,  from 1:00-1:20. and one of the subjects we will talk on is traditional Mexican food.  Customers want it and many understand it. Very few of my customers say “I want t he chocolate sauce” when asking for mole!  They will say:  “What is the mole of  the day or the tamal special? So listen in if you can,  otherwise, you can download it as a pod cast.

Sometimes, I might go to a Party and I’ll meet a nice couple and ask them to join me at home for a drink.  That is how I met David Garland, star of WNYC’s Spinning on Air and Evening Music on WNYC-FM 93.9 and Anne, his lovely wife, an accomplished illustrator, and we sat around and talked for hours in my backyard.  As I am wont to do, I usually start singing and I almost fell off my chair, when he said he wanted to record me.  ME!!!  This was a a long held dream of mine that I never thought I would accomplish and here he was giving me this tremendous gift!  We recorded with Silvio Solis a marvelous harpist and Pancho Espinola, who played  at the restaurant for years.  They were all pleased with it. I don’t know how it will sound once it’s mixed (I am not a professional singer by any means) but you can decide for yourself on September 12 at 8:00PM when it will air.  The recording was made in honor of the Bicentennial of Mexican Independence and the hundred anniversary of the Mexican revolution.  It was one of the greatest thrills of my life and I thank David for making this dream come true.