Check Out Time at the Ritz

Even This Ain't Far Enough South Apparently

2 Nights ago the low here at Camp Bee in Marshall, TX was 26ª - as in 6º below TOO COLD for us.  So, we are pressing on farther south.  We are leaving here in the morning to head to McAllen, TX which is right on the Rio Grande River between the US and Mexico.  We've actually had this trip on our calendar for about 5 weeks.  We will be visiting an RV development.  Here's the website:

Bentsen Palm Village RV Resort

We continue to consider having a "base of operations" from which to do our sojourns.  A key criteria is that the state we live in doesn't freeze.  This is the reason we became Florida Residents at the end of last year and we are certain we will be there next winter.  But we've about concluded that Florida may be MANY things ("God's Waiting Room" for instance) but being "Centrally Located" isn't one of them!  So, we are considering Texas also.

The Rio Grande Valley is where "Winter Texans" seem to congregate.  It's as far south as you can go without becoming an Illegal Alien in Mexico which means its the best chance at having moderate temperatures in the winter (which is the time when we will want them).  In the summer when it is sweltering hot down there we will be visiting our kids and doing sojourns farther north.

Every Thursday night the sojourners that are staying at Camp Bee get together to have a pitch-in dinner.  So, yesterday I spent the day making Beef Curry and Roti.  Roti is an Indian fried bread.

To make enough for 20 people, I had to go "institutional" in my food prep.  The kitchen in the Lodge here is amazing!  It has 4 ovens and 2 stoves.  It has a 5 foot x 10 foot 100% stainless steel "island" in the center of it.  There are more pots and pans and measuring cups and spatulas and anything else that a cook could want than you can shake a whole faggot (used in its PROPER CONTEXT and with its PROPER MEANING) of sticks at!  Still, making good curry from scratch is a time consuming venture.  Since there isn't a crock pot big enough to hold enough curry for 20 people, I had to make it in a large stainless steel pot on the stove.  That's problematic because until the pot is hot enough to cook, you have to have the pot hot enough that it might burn the contents of the pot on the bottom of the pot.  That means that you have to stir it every 10-15 minutes for the first 2 hours.  Once the pot gets up to the proper temperature, you can back the pot down to the LOWEST of the LOWS and let it simmer.  But good curry made this way takes 8 hours, so I had to be at the kitchen by 9:30 to have it cooked by the 5:30 dinner time.

Once it was cooking I could turn my attention to the Roti.  I use a recipe given to me by Viola Manuel in Cape Town, South Africa. Here it is:

Roti Recipe

3 cups flour
1 Tsp salt
3 Tbl oil
Enough water to form a soft dough
1 cup soft butter or margarine
Oil for frying

1. Mix the flour and salt in a large mixing bowl and add the oil.

2. Rub in until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

3. Add water and mix to a fairly soft dough. Roll out on a floured surface and roll to the size of a 23 x 32cm rectangle.

4. Spread the dough with softened butter and roll it up like a Swiss roll.

5. Cover with a tea towel and leave for 30 minutes.

6. Break off pieces of dough and form into balls the size of tennis balls.

7. Roll out each ball into a disc the size of a dinner plate.

8. Fry in hot oil for 2 minutes on each side.

Since I could only cook ONE at a time and each one of the 20 that I cooked takes 4 minutes, that means that it took over one hour just to cook them all.  It made me appreciate why it takes so long to get any kind of "special order" bread (aloo kulcha, aloo paratha, etc) that I order at an Indian Restaurant.  Everyone seemed to like the meal, so the time spent was worth it all.  Irene who's had the "real stuff" in South Africa even said it was great.  I did make it fit for foreigners, not for native Indians.  It was almost dark brown, not nuclear orange - RIGHT, JOSHUA!!

Good Night.