'Tis the Season for Parties

so, i've been thinking about this a lot lately, and i really want to have my tapas party SOON (i've wanted to throw a tapas party ever since i got back from spain in septemeber). for new year's, perhaps? i don't know if that will work since all my peeps are out of town until next week, and i won't see them until next friday. and we haven't really discussed new year's plans. but anyway... i've already started planning the menu in my head. i'd like to try my hand at making a small paella (though i do not have the traditional paella pan), veggie paella i think. also, i really want to make russian salad (i ate SO MUCH russian salad in spain, and it was delicious). i bought a cookbook called 'the best 100 tapas' at the airport in madrid, and it has some great recipes in it. i also want to make croquetas (fried balls of spanish goodness!), which i tried out shortly after returning to the states, and they turned out pretty tasty. and churros! so yummy. oh, and i can't forget tortilla española. i’ll probably make some other stuff, too, but i’ll have to pore through my cookbook for more ideas.

some of the recipes in that book sound absolutely disgusting. like baby eel tartlets. gross! but most sound delicious.

since it’s a party, i’ll also need some drinks. sangria sounds perfect. and mojitos! jose luis made us paella and mojitos in spain. i was deathly sick at the time, and when he handed me a mojito, jose luis was like, “some vitamins for you. it will make you feel better.”

i’ll also have the bottle of wine that chad got to bring home from the ice pilots’ christmas party (we said we wouldn’t drink it without you, nessa).

on the topic of alcoholic beverages, i recently procured a delightful book of alcoholism-in-the-making, the complete bartender. it has recipes for sangria and mojitos, and any drink you could possibly dream of. including pensacolas and scooby snacks! and they both sound delicious! maybe i could also serve pensacolas at my tapas party. they aren’t spanish, but pensacola was the first north american city to be colonized by the spanish, so that counts for something, right? they sound delicious. here’s what’s in a pensacola:

1.5 oz rum
0.5 oz guava nectar
0.5 oz orange juice
0.5 oz lemon juice

you blend it up with ice.

and, just for fun, here’s the recipe for scooby snacks:

0.75 oz vodka
0.75 oz Midori melon liqueur
0.75 oz Malibu
1 oz pineapple juice
0.5 oz cream

you blend that one up with ice, too.

i think i’ll share more festively named drink recipes with you when i don’t really have anything else to charm you with. we’ll all be raging alcoholics yet.