While we ate out a couple times on our Rocky Point Weekend, with access to a house and full kitchen it is less expensive (and more fun!) to go out shopping and cook your own meals. That especially true when you happen to have a former professional chef staying with you!
So we went to the local "Super Ley" supermarket, which is a lot like a major grocery in the States, with a few minor changes. The first was the parking lot guard carrying the machine gun! Anyone who reads the newspapers knows about drug-related killings in border towns, and while Rocky Point in particular has not had any issues, we certainly saw lots of security carrying weaponry. Once in the store, things looked more familiar. The fruit and veggie section was huge, with usual standard stuff, but with a Mexican flair -like fresh coconuts and a big chili section. Here Margie checks out some huge papaya. Note prices seem high, but remember, they are marked in pesos (currently about 12/dollar), and also would be weighed out in Kilos, so divide again by 2.2 to get to pounds. So the $16.75 peso/kg works out to 63 cents/lb. The large seafood section contains unusual (for us) items like fresh manta ray, conch meat and squid. And we also chose not to get any chicken feet, which I've never seen for sale... But they also had a large bakery that sold fresh, warm tortillas and a variety of other fresh-baked goods.
We were in search of seafood, but wanted the ultimate in freshness, so headed down to the old port area of town where the fishing boats unloaded that morning. Here Rick oversaw the shopping with a menu in mind, and got a couple kilo of the biggest shrimp I'd seen in while. They also had clams fresh enough to squirt you, oysters, scallops, pretty much any sort of shellfish or fish you could want, right off the boat and on ice. They even cleaned the shrimp for us while we waited for a couple minutes.
We had the shrimp for our Easter dinner - grilled with veggies over noodles and garlic sauce. Rick again did all the work, and we helped as best we could - set the table with paper plates and made sure everyone had the alcohol of their choice. It was fun and instructive to see and listen to the chef at work. His secret seemed to be - more butter! But there were no complaints from the customers - the leftovers consisted of a lone linguine noodle!
There is more coming, but it will have to wait till next time!
...seriously dude, what happened to the "smile" detection on your digital cam during that joyous holiday meal?
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