Ribs and date shakes

I wrote recently about our experiment in preparing ribs using the Instant Pot (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/03/cooking-and-celebrating.html). 

We had purchased the ribs at Costco, so we had 3 full racks. We had frozen two of the racks, but decided we had better go ahead and cook them, because we finished them on the grill, and we're not planning to take the grill with us when we leave Mesa (it is pretty rusted out and takes up a lot of space in the basement of Gracie). 

So, Wednesday night, before going to Organ Stop Pizza, we made the rub and put it on the two racks. We sealed them up in plastic wrap and left the rub to sink in for about a day. On Thursday afternoon, we put the two racks into the Instant Pot and cooked them, and then put the barbeque sauce on and Carl carmelized the sauce on the grill.

Ribs with sauce on them ready to go to the grill

On the grill -- they smelled wonderful!

It is funny when we are out biking around Venture Out, we'll smell other people's grilling and it always smells so good. Maybe we caused some other folks' stomachs to growl with our grilling!

The ribs tasted as good as they smell while cooking - yum!

We had also gotten dates a couple of days ago at Agritopia, and we had ice cream in the freezer taking up space, so we decided to make date shakes too.

Preparing to pit the dates

Carl pitted the dates (he said they were the freshest dates he has ever worked with!), then put them in water for about 20 minutes to soften them up even more. He then blended the dates, vanilla ice cream, and milk together.

Yum! They were very good!

Just a few of our culinary adventures!

Another visit to Organ Stop Pizza

We met up with Dwayne's brother, Keith, and wife, Holly, at Organ Stop Pizza on Wednesday evening.

We had visited Organ Stop twice in December as Christmas get-togethers were held there for a couple of different Ham radio groups (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/12/hamfest-and-organ-stop-pizza.html, https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2020/12/another-trip-to-organ-stop-pizza.html). 

The restaurant is open for groups for lunch service with a pizza buffet. During the lunch gatherings, the organist gives a presentation about the instrument and provides information about all the different peripheral musical devices that the restaurant has installed. Evenings are open for normal business, and the organist performs, but doesn't share as much information.

Lew Williams was the organist playing

Keith and Holly met us at the restaurant. It may not be obvious, but there is a plexiglass barrier between us and the next folks at the table.

To the other side of Holly (not visible in the picture), a single woman was seated at a table that had a great view of the performance. She was all by herself and seemed to just be spending time there, not really eating. At one point, when the organist took a break, I saw him come by and speak to her. As we were preparing to leave, I asked her if she was related to Lew, and she confirmed that she was his wife of 47 years!

We had good seats, could see Lew well and see most of the instruments as they were played during the concert.

In December, a lot of the music was Christmas carols. It was nice to get to hear a more "normal" show -- lots of variety in the music, from "Phantom of the Opera" to the "United States Armed Forces Medley" to "Stairway to Heaven" to theme songs from "Mission Impossible", "Star Wars", and "Star Trek" and many others -- a number of songs that you wouldn't think of as being organ music, but, of course, the console at Organ Stop Pizza plays a lot more instruments than just organ pipes!

More information about Organ Stop Pizza can be found here: https://organstoppizza.com/ 

It was great to see family again... we're thinking that we're going to be leaving the area "soon", so trying to get last visits in. We are still hoping that we'll get the awning installed before totally leaving Arizona, but, we may be leaving the lot in Mesa as early as this weekend.

Agritopia

On Tuesday, I needed to get a lab test done down in Gilbert, so we decided to go visit a community that I had read about called Agritopia that was relatively close to the medical lab.

We initially went into "Barnone" that I thought was a facility with little shops. There were a couple of small eating places in there, but it appeared that they might just be opening so we didn't find anything too exciting in there.

We walked through Barnone and out the other side, where we found the Farm Store. At first we didn't think it was open either, there was no one in there, but it turned out that the door was unlocked and we could purchase on the honor system.

There were some tea towels with cute comments on them...

Information about the farm/community

Sign board on the wall -- cash payments would go into the box, and there was an iPad for making charge payments.

Another tea towel with an interesting comment printed on it! (I'm not a coffee fan, so it wasn't as interesting to me...)

In the refrigerator there were fresh vegetables and other items -- including eggs in cartons similar to the ones that I remember Mrs Binns had when I was growing up (except hers were grey, I think).

I don't think Mrs Binns' prices were quite this high, but that was many many years ago!

A tee-shirt in the farm shop

They also had Medjool Dates for sale.

Outside of the Farm Store

There were community garden plots near where we had parked.

We decided to eat at the grill...

Arriving at Joe's Farm Grill

Inside Joe's Farm Grill

We decided to eat outside

There were nice picnic tables

We both got scrambled eggs and biscuits and gravy -- Carl got fries and I had fruit. The eggs were delicious!

After the folks at the next table left, the "cleanup crew" arrived.

There were trees around the outside eating area -- this one was huge and had supports under some of the branches (you may be able to see the white support in the middle of the picture).

Warning sign not to climb the trees. The concern about scorpions would keep me off of them!

Agritopia is a unique community built around a farm. As the farm family saw suburbia coming out to surround them, it seems that this was the way that they determined to preserve some of the farm while allowing for a residential community to build up too. It definitely is a pretty community, and we enjoyed our visit and our lunch.

More information:  https://agritopia.com/

A trip to Tortilla Flat

On Monday, we decided to take a drive to Tortilla Flat.

Carl had planned the trip:

We would get to Tortilla Flat in time for an early lunch, and then proceed the long way around past Roosevelt Lake and through Globe on our way back home (Google Maps Link to route).

When we went on a hike with the Venture Out Hiking Club a couple of weeks ago, we saw Canyon Lake from our hike (https://journeyinamazinggrace.blogspot.com/2021/02/another-hike-this-time-with-hiking-club.html). The drive to Tortilla Flat took us right past the lake and across a couple of one lane bridges.

Carl at Canyon Lake

There were a number of folks at the pullout that we selected -- including a couple getting wedding pictures taken (they were in the white van behind me).

It was pretty much impossible to get a picture without power lines... but it was a very pretty lake.

Not far past the lake we came to Tortilla Flat

We came to eat at the Superstition Saloon. Bob, a neighbor at Venture Out, had suggested that we arrive by 11am to avoid a long wait.

Before going inside, we saw a sign that gave us a little concern...

hmmm.... that would not get us to Roosevelt Lake... oh well, we might as well eat!

The restaurant has interesting wallpaper...

Thousands and thousands of dollar bills

Most of them have writing on them by the person(s) who donated them.

They are even on the ceiling.

I think I overheard our waiter telling the customers at another table that there are $350,000-$400,000 of "wallpaper" on the walls!

The drink menu on the table told us the population of Tortilla Flat, Arizona is 6, and that the town was established in 1904.

Some of the views outside...

The road toward Roosevelt Lake -- and we asked our waiter - he confirmed that it is closed 9 miles ahead -- about 5 miles paved and 4 miles unpaved. He said that a landslide had closed the road back in 2019, and, originally that it was going to be re-opened, but, more recently, it is sounding more like it may not ever be repaired.

Quite a number of folks come to enjoy lunch -- and there was also live music on the patio.

We drove a few miles further toward Roosevelt Lake (not even getting to the dirt road section) before choosing to turn around and head back home. It was beautiful, though the power line was visible a lot of the time (though not in this picture -- that's a sign next to the road, I think).

I had heard that Tortilla Flat was a stagecoach stop, though I didn't really see any information about that while we were visiting the "town". Wikipedia indicates:

Based on available records Tortilla Flat got its start because of the road construction to Roosevelt Dam in 1904. There was a need for a stagecoach stop for freight haulers on their way to the construction site at Roosevelt Dam and Tortilla Flat served that purpose. Shortly following the construction of the road, Roosevelt Dam became a big tourist attraction. At that point Tortilla Flat was a stage stop for tourists and mail carriers through the 1930s. Wikipedia link

Information about the road closure: https://azdot.gov/projects/southeast-district-projects/state-route-88-apache-trail -- it sounds like a fire initially closed the road in July, 2019, after which the road reopened until a huge rain in September, 2019, did major damage to the road, when it closed.

It was a pretty drive and Tortilla Flat is an interesting place to visit. I think I might be just as happy that the road was closed as it looks like it was pretty curvy and gravel for a large part...

Out with neighbors

Last evening (Sunday), we were on our patio enjoying the cool breeze (it had gotten up in the high 70s in the afternoon and inside the rig was quite warm), one of our neighbors drove by in their golf card and stopped to let us know that there was an impromptu concert starting on a neighboring street. We decided to carry our chairs over and join in with neighbors...

Due to the COVID restrictions, they don't have official gatherings, but this band has members that live in the park and so they "practice" and allow folks to come hear their practice (the band is the group on the right side -- guy in the pinkish shirt was the lead singer, the "concert" was at the home of the drummer). We had to be sure to keep the street clear for traffic (there isn't *that* much traffic, just one or two cars and a couple of golf carts and bikes came through). We enjoyed joining with our neighbors for a little bit of fun time!

We had a Walmart pizza for dinner -- we supplement it a little -- I slice up Roma tomatoes and put some basil on it (fresh if we have it, the stuff we squeeze out of a tube was all we had last night), and Carl shreds extra Mozzarella cheese to go on top.

We get the Medium Ultimate Meat pizza -- medium because that's as large as will fit into our microwave/convection oven. It is $5 at Walmart and although it isn't Chicago-style pizza, we like it, and it is a good price-performer! We generally get two meals out of it -- so that's a bargain!

Whenever we find savings somewhere, if the savings is at least $5, Carl judges it as worthwhile because "it'll buy a pizza!"

The value of safety cables

A few years ago, Dwayne and I experienced the value of safety cables when our Jeep came loose from Miss Doozie: https://trekincartwrights.blogspot.com/2015/11/excitement-for-day.html 

Today, I read about another family experiencing the value of safety cables -- this is a pretty terrifying story:  https://www.rvtravel.com/edge-safety-chains-saved-day/

I cannot imagine being in the cab of that truck -- what a blessing that no one was seriously hurt!

Flowers around the park

In the past few months while we've been here at Venture Out, we've done most of our trips around the park on bicycles, but, Carl is not able to bike right now, so this morning, we walked all the way around the park on Douglas (the street that we live on, and just one street in from the outermost ring). Some of the yards have such pretty flowers so I got some pictures as we walked (it is harder to take pictures on the bikes!).

A few patches of flowers

Pretty flowers at the side of this this one -- if there had been a car in the neighbor's driveway, I wouldn't have noticed them, but could see them well across the neighboring drive.

This is right on the corner down from us -- these are wildflowers that naturally seed. They are so pretty now. The blooms close up at night. In a few weeks, when the blooming is finished, they will probably just look like weeds, but right now they sure produce a show! We've talked with the fellow who lives here -- he has owned at the park for many years, I think he told us he was in his 90s.

This house has a beautiful display with pots of geraniums and other flowers. We've spoken with the fellow at this house too -- when we commented on how pretty the flowers were, he said it was really a pain to water them and suggested that we could come back and help!