Blog Post 11 – Another Unexpected Adventure….The Original Margarita

08/30/15

31:51.8 N  116:39.72 W

Yesterday we had another amazing and unexpected adventure. Earlier in the week while driving by in a cab we had seen a little falafel restaurant. We decided to go and seek it out.  It was small with only 3 tables outside on the sidewalk and only 3 things on the menu. There were falafels, hummus, and sneitzel. Jirig and I ordered falafel and Nico had the sneitzel.

 
While we were waiting for our food I got up to explore the other shops in the little strip mall. I walked into one and struck up a conversation with the proprietor. There was not much merchandise in the store so I was about to walk out when he asked me if I would like a margarita? I thought that was odd but I said yes anyway just to check it out. He proceeded to bring our drinks. We took one sip and were in heaven. We have become somewhat of margarita connoisseurs of late and these margaritas were the best we had ever tasted. They were not too sweet, with just the right amount of twang and were very strong, but delicious. The gentlemen spoke perfect English and proceeded to tell us about the recipe.

The Original Margarita Recipe:

1 oz. freshly squeezed lime juice (about 5-6 Key Limes, the little ones or regular limes) 

1 oz. Heradura white tequila

1 oz. Gran Marnier

Shake all of the above ingredients over ice and serve in a salted rim glass. He used a seasoned salt that had a chile and lime kick to it. It was perfection. 

He then proceeded to tell us the story of the Original Margarita. He said that it had been first served in a bar across the street called the Andaluz. It is inside of the "Centro Social, Civico y Culture de Ensenada or Cultural Center. He said that he had gotten the recipe from the bartender. As the story goes......."A pretty girl walked into a bar on a hot day and sat down. When the bartender asked her what she wanted she said surprise me. He proceeded to make the above cocktail. When she asked him what it was called, he said, 'what is your name?' and she said, 'Margarita'. And so the Margarita was born. Many have claimed title to it including the famous Hussong's, an Ensenada bar that has been an institution since 1897 and is a required stop for all tourists to the city. He told us that just recently a Mexican TV station sought to determine who really created the first Margarita and they determined that it was the Andaluz Bar across the street. OK that was all we needed to pique our sense of adventure and we decided to go over there and check it out.

Our falafel and sneitzel were served and Oh what a treat. There were piping hot spicy chick pea balls that were deep fried to perfection. There was an assortment of what the girl called 'salad' to put on as you wished that included, fried eggplant, fresh peppers and spicy onions and pickles and of course the requisite tahini sauce and all that was enclosed in a freshly baked pita. It was amazing! It had just the right amount of crunch, tartness and kick to it. We wolfed them down.  

We thanked everyone and walked across the street to the Cultural Center to try to find the Andaluz bar. The cultural center had been on my radar for a while. I am always looking for cultural things to check out and expose Nico to. The building is magnificent, and is the cultural and architectural center piece of Ensenada. We found the bar and ordered our margaritas. Then we started wandering around the building. It appeared to be closed but was wide open and unsupervised there was not a soul in sight. 

The first exhibit we saw was a huge map of Baja California showing all the Spanish missions. The Spanish started building missions in Baja long before they did in California. The first one was built in 1557. They proceeded to build 27 others up and down both coasts and in the interior. As Jirig and Nico lingered there I started to wander around. I found myself in what appeared to be the former casino and I saw the biggest chandelier I had ever seen. As I continued walking I found myself in a bar and I could just picture this place in its heyday with all the pretty people hanging around and gambling. I got spooked being in there by myself and went to find Jirig and  Nico to bring them back there and explore with some company. It is rumored that Al Capone once ran the casino and many other nefarious characters were associated with the building and hotel. But for all the rumors and stories aside the building was magnificent and it truly is a gem or architecture and culture in Ensenada and is what many say put Ensenada on the map. We had free reign of the place. We were respectful, as always but we opened doors, walked down passages and took pictures everywhere. At this point we were practically floating as we had had 2 strong margaritas in less than an hour. Thank god we had eaten or we probably would have been crawling! It was so much fun. What an adventure......only in Mexico could this happen!