BYU Game II: Electric Boogaloo

Having procured tickets from an old mission companion (thanks Jake), we went to the BYU v. New Mexico game. The game time weather was a balmy 43 degrees, so we clothed Elliot in his winter coat (with his cougar outfit on underneath, of course).

Living in New Mexico brings a whole new meaning to this game, and thankfully we pasted them 21-3.

Everyone loved Elliot's coat. We had five or six who thought it was a cougar coat. (It looks more like a bear coat, with the ears and all, but you know, people see what they want to see). Anyway, we had a great time.

BYU v. Wyoming (a.k.a., Elliot's First BYU Game)

So Rise and Shout, the Cougars are out.
We're on a trail to fame and glory.

Rise and shout, our cheers will ring out

As we unfold our vict'ry story.

On we go to vanquish the foe

For Alma Mater's sons and daughters.

As we join in song,

In praise of you, our faith is strong.

We'll raise our colors high in the blue

And cheer our Cougars of BYU.

Thus is the last half of the BYU fight song, which we heard seven times this Saturday, as BYU routed the Cowboys 44-0. More important than the score, however, is it was Elliot's first game. More on that later.

Denis and Lisa graciously allowed us to stay at their apartment. They even went on a hike with us before the game in Rock Canyon.

Dem and I loved Rock Canyon when we were in college. It's just gorgeous.

After the hike, but still before the game, we ate lunch with some friends at Cafe Rio (we had a pork salad, like always). This was Elliot's first time meeting Matt and Evige Warner's adoptive son, Jorgen.

We even got to see the elusive, and now high-powered attorney, John Anderson.

Not disparaging our wonderful friends, but nothing was better than the game, which we attended with another friend who drove nine hours from Montana, Josh Campbell. (We were bummed not to see Naomi, but not all our wishes can come true at once.)

Elliot took a nap through the second quarter and part of half time, but after that, he enjoyed himself.

Having witnessed a blowout, and having bought some books at the BYU bookstore (Huevos Verdes con Jamon, a couple Italian boardbooks, and Glimpses of Lehi's Jerusalem), we ate at the Bombay House. The chicken coconut kurma and the lamb saag and the saag shorba were drop dead awesome. In my hierarchy of world cuisines, Italian is on top, but Indian food runs a very close second.

Finally, pooped out of our minds, we went to bed.

La Matonella

When Dem and I were in Italy a couple years ago, we found this little ceramics shop called "La Galleria" in Montelupo Fiorentino. Betty, the genial proprietress, supplied us with wonderful ceramic show plate that now hangs on our kitchen wall.

Well, I went back to Italy in May to unwind from law school, and decided to drop by La Galleria and buy Dem something. While I was picking up a beautiful, large ceramic bowl, I notice something called a "matonella." I was a ceramic tile with a scene hand painted on it. This particular matonella had a baby scene, complete with baby in bed, a scale showing baby's birth weight, a clock indicating baby's birth time, calendar with baby's birth date, and a little portion for the colors of the parents' favorite soccer team (it is Italy, after all). Betty informed me they recently begun selling these, and I told her I would order one when we had our first child.

Needless to say, when Elliot came into our life, I up and ordered the prized matonella. But, instead of soccer colors, I sent Betty a BYU football logo and asked the artist place it in the scene. He kindly obliged. And here, finally, is a photo of possibly the coolest possession we own.

My BYU Stud

I have to admit, I'm exceedingly stoked have a son. One of the reasons for this stokedness is I can dress him up in BYU apparel, and he looks dang good. Here's an example.



































And that's just the hat. Here are a couple pictures of Elliot in his cougar onesie.

Note the BYU logo right on his bottom.



He even looks good when he sleeps: amazing.

Café Rio Pork Recipe

When we went to BYU, Dem and I (along with 98% of Provoans) ate at Café Rio. My favorite meal was the pork salad, which is a beautiful amalgam of sweet shreeded pork, cilantro-lime rice, black beans, lettuce, salsa, etc. Anyway, in the years intervening graduation and now, we've longed for pork salad many times. Well, in order to assuage these longings, I've developed a, I might say, a pretty dang good Café Rio pork salad recipe. I'll post the entire recipe in later (it's somewhat long), but I'll post the sweet pork recipe below.

Sweet Pork Ingredients
• 3.5 lbs pork shoulder (a.k.a. pork butt) — boneless is easiest
• 10 oz. can red enchilada sauce
• 8 oz. Dr. Pepper
• 1 ½ cups light brown sugar
• 1 can chopped green chiles
• 2 teaspoons salt

Cooking Instructions

Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Place pork in crock pot bowl. Add brown sugar and green chiles. Pour in enchilada sauce and Dr. Pepper. Put aluminum foil over bowl and cut 8–10 slits. Place in oven and cook for 5–6 hours. (I prefer this to the crockpot method because the meat cooks more evenly.)

Take bowl from oven. Remove pork to a cutting board under which you’ve placed two layers of paper towels. Place liquid into sauce pot, turn burner on high, and let boil while you pull the pork. Now, take two forks and pull the pork apart. Pull until the entire butt is reduced to a big pile of stringy goodness. Remove unnecessary fat globs.

Place pork in liquid. Reduce until mixture is not runny. The pork is runny if you pull some out with a tong and you see a string of liquid coming dripping off. A few drops is okay, but no liquid strings.

Place pork in container and set aside.

* You can make the pork ahead. Pork placed in an air tight container will keep for 5–7 days in the fridge. If you do make ahead, remove pork and reheat it in a sauce pot before using.

Other Café Rio Recipe Links

1. Kalyn’s Kitchen
2. Tried & Trues
3. Grandmas Syrup
4. Pimp My Dinner
5. Hot out of the Oven
6. Recipe(tried)
7. Where Cooks Collide
8. Lauren Black
9. Menu Planning 101
10. Griffin Family