I had been wanting to make a Mexican dish and a one pan dish with some make ahead potential seemed perfect. But before the Mexican meal, we had the required chips and salsa as a pre card game appetizer.
Real Mexican For Lunch
I didn’t ask why, but Bev has decided she wants to make some tamales which required buying the needed ingredients. The closest real deal Hispanic store that we know of is La Lupita Mexican Store And Restaurant in Maryville. I’d been thinking about eating there so after shopping for a new riding lawn mower, we headed to La Lupita for lunch and supplies – masa, lard, corn husks.
My old Kubota mini tractor was having too many issues so I bought this mower.
Since I’ve made this recipe before, I normally wouldn’t post it again but I wanted to show off my new pan. We have two 12” skillets and a 12” saute pan but I occasionally wish I had a larger one so I bought a 15” cast iron pan. I normally don’t like to use cast iron pans on the cooktop as they heat unevenly but I decided to get it anyway and for this meal, I gave it plenty of time to preheat to help with this issue. I increased the recipe amounts by 50% for the six pieces of good looking swordfish that came frozen from Food City.
I’d mentioned in an earlier post that Bev, Pat and I were all celebrating BD’s with our trip to Townsend and Cindy's friend, Ernie, also had a Sep BD so Cindy wanted to make a special meal for all of us when we got home from our short trip.
Cades Cove Loop Road
One of our desires for the Townsend trip was to drive around the Loop Road in Cades Cove and hopefully see some wildlife but since the girls didn’t want to get up early, we got there a little after 10am rather than my hoped for little after 8am – when the animals are more likely to be out and about. When I first moved to TN, we could go around the loop and see 100 deer grazing among the cattle but the park no longer leases the bottom land to farmers for that purpose and the green pastures have been allowed to grow up into original habitat.
When I first moved to Tennessee, we made regular evening drives around the Cades Cove Loop Road in the Smokies to see the wildlife (mostly deer) but I haven’t been in many, many years. For low crowds and good wildlife viewing, early morning is the best time to go but we have to leave home earlier than Bev wants to get up, but staying in Townsend saves an hour.
When Bev had her BD in April, she said she wanted to go to
the Appalachian Bistro at Dancing Bear Lodge for
her BD dinner but we had yet to make it.
So, when Pat (SIL) and I both had Sep BD’s a plan was born – let’s
combine the events. We made a
reservation at the Bistro for Sunday night and reserved a two BR cabin on the
river for two nights so we could hit the loop road Monday morning. Then we could do anything else we wanted in
the park and take in the sites/shopping in Townsend the remainder of Mon,
before spending a second night and coming home on Tue morning.
We made the hour drive up (up river) to Townsend in time to
check in, drop our stuff at the cabin, and make our 5:30 dinner
reservation.
Originally, dancing bear contained cabins, and a lodge with the restaurant and Bev, Rhett and I had eaten there a long time ago but the lodge/ restaurant building burned to the ground in 2013 and new owners (Oldham Hospitality) took over in 2014. Rather than rebuild the lodge with rooms, they added to the number of cabins and built the bistro and an event center. Everything is located on a 37acre wooded area up on a hill except the three riverside cabins which are just over a mile away.
The two-bedroom cabin was very nice and seemed to have
everything we needed and a balcony that hung over the
river.
