Gifts from Paris

Stephane, my friend from work, went to Paris and other parts of Europe during the Christmas holiday. He was nice enough to bring me back some gifts (food gifts, my favorite!):

Stroopwafels are waffles with a light caramel in the center:

They’re crispy and sweet but not too sweet. Good to pair with a light green tea.

The poilane biscuits had beautiful origami-like packaging:

The box was filled with shortbread-like cookies:

Also great with green tea:

Stephane is a very generous friend and was very nice to bring back chocolates and biscuits for me and Ken. He said we should share the stroopwafel and the poilane biscuits but we should keep the chocolates to ourselves! There are only two of each flavor so you have one to sample and one to really enjoy:

The passion fruit was my favorite – they are all filled with a little extra sweetness or crunch and were all delicious. I shared with my mom when she came to visit, but no one else!

Thank you, Stephane, for being a wonderful friend!

Daiquiri Dick’s

On Thursday night, we went back to the city and walked the boardwalk again for another dinner with the family. We decided to eat at Daiquiri Dick’s because Paul read some positive reviews of the restaurant on chowhound. We actually passed the restaurant when we went to La Palapa but thought it was a touristy place so we passed on it.

The food was surprisingly good – Ken started with the tortilla soup:

And I had the cuban black bean soup:

We sat right by the beach and watched the sun set (this isn’t a great shot because there’s a big palm tree in the middle, but it was very breathtaking, I promise):

For my entree, I ordered the whole red snapper with Mexican rice:

The red snapper was very fresh and the meat was very tender – we squeezed a ton of lime juice onto the snapper and happily ate it with the Mexican rice and jicama salad.

The chef was actually an Asian woman that originally came from the United States (before that, she lived in Thailand). She said she was one of the first Asian chefs to go to Mexico and back then (30 years ago), it was really difficult to get Asian-inspired food in Mexico, but now it’s available everywhere!

The daiquiris were very good because they used fresh fruit and not syrup, like the resort, and we had another great meal in Puerto Vallarta.

Puerto Vallarta Yacht Club: Whale Watching and Fishing

On Wednesday of our trip, Paul decided to charter a boat so we could go fishing and whale watching. Charley was super excited about the trip because we were going deep sea fishing for marlins and the pamphlet we found at the hotel had photos of people holding huge fish after very successful trips to the ocean. We went to the Puerto Vallarta Yacht club to meet up with our captain and board the boat:

Charley, studying the pamphlet:

Our boat, the Nicole, was large (but not too large). I usually don’t do well on boats, or any moving vehicles, but decided to tag along because I figured the waters couldn’t be that choppy. Me, before I realized I had made a huge mistake:

We headed out to sea and I was already feeling a little queasy but I couldn’t really ask to turn the boat around (that would’ve been too embarrassing, right?) The last time I was on a boat was for work and we did a cruise around lower Manhattan. I really didn’t want to go but it was a team event so I boarded the boat and sat in the exact same spot looking at the horizon until they allowed us to get off the boat an hour later.

We were having a good time on the boat and I even went and sat by the captain so I could see exactly where he was going (sometimes it helps when I sit shotgun so I can see exactly where we’re going in cabs so I figured it would be the same for a boat). When I went downstairs to sit with Ken, I immediately knew that I couldn’t handle sitting on the boat anymore (but there was absolutely no where to go since we were about an hour away from shore). I usually feel nauseous but nothing happens, but I couldn’t handle the seas that day and ended up throwing up off the side of the boat. Ken said I threw up a lot of papaya (that’s what happens when there’s unlimited papaya at the resort) and lots of pico de gallo (there was pico de gallo right outside our door that was sooooo good going down, not so good coming back up).

After clearing my stomach, I felt a little better but couldn’t get the energy to fish. Luckily, the captain sighted a lot of whales that day and we did a two for one – whale watching and fishing!

We saw at least 12 whales that day – lots of whale tails like this one:

But I did see one whale jump on its belly (I couldn’t even focus my camera that day so most of the shots are of whale tails!)

The experience is pretty surreal – I thought we were getting super close to the whale (of course we were a safe distance away so we weren’t disturbing them but it still seemed dangerously close):

Speaking of dangerously close, there was a whale boat that we were going to ride the next day so we could do a full day of whale watching; basically it’s an inflatable life boat that takes you super close to the whales because a helicopter looks for whales while communicating with the boat captain. Here it is:

The entire boat was screaming when they saw the whale because it was SO close — we decided seeing the whales from a safe distance was good enough for us and didn’t end up going on the second whale tour!

Charley ended up catching two fish that day, but nothing that was large enough for us to take back to the resort to have the chef cook for the family for dinner. Instead, we had a great dinner on the resort with the entire family. It was a really fun day!

La Palapa

Since we had such a fun time at Tacos El Gordo, we decided to venture outside of the resort for another dinner. The entire family didn’t come (Sammy was too tired to join) but we went to the downtown area and ended up finding a great restaurant, La Palapa, right on the beach. The downtown area is quite fun and lively and has a lot of little vendors selling Mexican street corn and little desserts (actually, it looked like they purchased cakes from a Sam’s Club, sliced it, and sold it by the slice). We walked for a long time before finding La Palapa but Ken insisted on going there because he read good reviews beforehand.

Charley, me and Ken after finding the restaurant:

We were all pretty hungry by the time we found the restaurant and were very eager to order. The restaurant is located in the romantic zone of the boardwalk and it was dimly lit so my photos aren’t the best (but use your imagination!)

For an appetizer, we ordered mussels in a red pepper cream sauce:

The mussels were gigantic and really delicious – I usually make mussels with a lemon butter and wine reduction but this was a really decadent preparation.

Ken and I shared the tortilla soup:

We really fell in love with tortilla soup while we were down in Mexico and ended up ordering it at every restaurant that served it. This preparation was my favorite because it had the crunchy texture of the tortilla chips.

We all shared taquitos with jicama salad:

We also shared duck soft tacos smothered in a cream sauce:

For my main entree, I ordered the sea bass covered in macadamia nut:

And Ken ordered the braised short ribs:

Service was a little slow but there was live jazz music to keep us entertained as we waited for our food to arrive. The portions were very large and we ended up ordering way too much (especially since we were eating so much at the resort that we were accustomed to ordering multiple courses for a meal).

After dinner, we walked along the boardwalk and Ken realized he misplaced his blackberry (and had to run back to the restaurant where the waiter had luckily picked it up). We had a fun time at the restaurant and really enjoyed our meal and our evening in the city.

Tacos El Gordo

After a couple of days at the resort, we were getting a little stir crazy (although we did make a trip to Wal-Mart to pick up some necessities like sand toys for the kids!) We decided to venture out to dinner before we were sick of the food options in the hotel (personally, I could have eaten at their fruit bar for the rest of my life since it had a never ending supply of papaya). We asked a cab driver where locals eat because we wanted real Mexican food and he suggested Tacos El Gordo:

We requested a driver take us there and when we arrived, it was literally on the side of the highway (and very close to the Wal-Mart we had visited earlier). The taco stand is all outdoors and it was a true family operation; the women made the corn tortillas while the men cut the meat and grilled it and the children prepared the salsa/condiment platters for guests. Here are the women preparing the fresh corn tortillas:

A little boy (around 7-8) brought a tray of different condiments to place on the tacos – we didn’t know the spice level of any of them so we had to taste them all. Some of them were deceptively hot – the green one on the right hand side, for instance, was blazing hot!

The taco stand’s grill was right by the highway – perfect to entice people as they’re heading onto the highway:

The boy brought by some chips so we could dip them into the salsas – the avocado cream helped balance out some of the hotter sauces (although the green one I mentioned before was so hot that nothing really helped when you ate that one!)

Everything is stored outside – the sauces were right next to the grill:

Charley ordered a plain beef taco:

And I ordered a beef taco (front) and a pork taco (back):

And a tripe taco for good measure:

The tacos were probably the best I’ve EVER had – the best anyone had ever had! We were a little nervous when we arrived because it looked a little…run down, but we actually ended up running into the cab driver that recommended the place! He must’ve gotten a craving for it after he told us how good it was.

My favorite was the pork (it was also Ken’s favorite!) and Paul liked the tripe the best (I think he actually had four tacos because he liked them so much!) The meat was very lean, surprisingly, and flavored with lots of fragrant cumin. The sauces were a great touch and the tacos were all really fresh and light. Charley was accidentally served some of the extremely hot green sauce and his lips turned bright red for our group photo:

But he said the tacos were really good and managed to survive after gulping down a large bottle of orange Fanta.

After we got home from our taco adventure, we ordered more chicken tacos from room service and ate some more (with some dessert, too) and couldn’t stop talking about the deliciousness of El Gordo. We wanted to go back before we left Puerto Vallarta but we ended up going to another Dreams resort on the other side of town so we were too far to go back. Next time!