1. This morning's basketball game between Michigan and Ohio State might have been an even better game than I had hoped for. These are two of the top three teams in the Big Ten Conference. Michigan is ranked #3 in the nation and Ohio State is rated #4. Michigan and Ohio State are two versatile, deep, teams that are adept at playing at a variety of styles and tempos.
Thanks to some blistering shooting from behind the three-point line (10-13) in the first half, Michigan held a slim 45-43 lead at the intermission. Their long range shooting cooled off (1-10) in the second half, but -- and I said they were versatile! -- they got superb play out of their mammoth 7-1 freshman center, Hunter Dickinson, who scored 22 points for the game, and was a force near the basket. Ohio State's E. J. Lindell and Duane Washington, Jr. scored 23 and 30 points and gave the Michigan defense fits throughout the tilt. In the end, Ohio State committed a couple of head scratching turnovers late in the game, just couldn't contain Dickinson, and Michigan held off Ohio State's furious late game efforts to draw even and won 92-87.
Watching these two teams today and having watched several of the top teams across the country play this season, I'm thinking this year's NCAA national tournament could be a real donnybrook. I might be in the minority, but off the top of my head, I can imagine Michigan, Ohio State, Illinois, Baylor, possibly Iowa, Gonzaga, Florida State, and possibly others as capable of winning the national tournament. I've been wrong many times before, and I might be now, but I do not subscribe to the idea that Gonzaga and Baylor are playing at a level superior to the rest of the nation and are clearcut favorites to play in the championship game. To me, it's much more wide open than that -- and, there are teams like Oregon and Kansas and others who seem to be improving with each game late in the season and could cause some of the premier teams a lot of problems.
2. Once the game ended, I shifted into high gear in the kitchen.
First of all, this morning, Ed brought me by a bag full of crab shells. The Elks Crab Feed was a carry out event this year and, on Saturday night, Ed, Nancy, Jake, and Carol Lee had crab dinner together and, I deeply appreciate this, saved their shells for me.
Before Ed arrived, I had cut up an onion, some celery, celery greens, green onion, and cilantro and put it in the crock pot. After I secured the shells, I poured them in the crock pot, covered the shells and other ingredients with water, and seasoned everything. I'll let it bubble away for a couple or three days now.
Second, I took the chicken party wings that had been marinating in tequila, lime juice, garlic, and cilantro out of the refrigerator and also took out the mole sauce I made last night.
The mole sauce seemed tamer today, but, I decided to bake about 7-8 chicken pieces without the sauce. Not only did I want anyone sensitive to spicy hot things to have an option, I was also curious how the marinated chicken would taste without the sauce.
So, I set some pieces aside and I took all the other pieces out of the zip lock bag one by one and put them in a bowl with half of the mole sauce I made and coated the pieces with sauce. I arranged them in a baking pan. I arranged the naked pieces in a smaller pan. I baked them for 30 minutes at 400 degrees, took them out, turned each of them over, and baked them for about 20 more minutes. I removed the chicken from the oven. After about fifteen minutes of cooling off, I put the pieces of chicken in the remaining mole sauce for a second coating and returned them to the baking dish. Later, I would warm up all that chicken for a while when I arrived at Carol and Paul's.
Third, I also wanted to make an appetizer and originally planned to melt cheese in-between two toasted corn tortillas and cut the tortillas (quesadillas?) in quarters.
I changed my mind. I would still make quesadillas (are they?), but instead of just having shredded cheese inside, I decided to make a batch of refried pinto beans, melt the cheese in the beans, and line the bottom corn tortilla with cream cheese. So, I fixed and served what I called refried pinto beans and cheese with cream cheese quesadillas cut into wedges. Carol provided salsa and cream cheese for the appetizer.
3. I got myself organized and headed over to Carol and Paul's for family dinner. I put my stuff in Carol and Paul's lower oven to warm up and then sat down to enjoy tonight's cocktail. Carol mixed each of us a Gold Rush. It's similar to a Whiskey Sour, but instead of simple syrup, the Gold Rush includes honey syrup. Carol also had read that this cocktail would be enhanced by including grapefruit peel. I agree. I thought the grapefruit added a zip to this drink that I enjoyed a lot.
So, we had our appetizers. I also put out celery sticks to eat whenever anyone wanted them.
Then I brought out the chicken wings and Carol put out the macaroni and cheese I asked her to make. My thought had been that if the mole sauce was kind of spicy hot that the macaroni and cheese would balance out the heat (along with the celery sticks). Well, to be honest, I also just liked the idea of having macaroni and cheese and chicken wings together.
The wings turned out to be mild. I was grateful that that was the case.
My sense was that everyone enjoyed this dinner -- it was the first time we'd had chicken wings for family dinner and definitely the first time we'd had anything with mole sauce. I'm going to keep experimenting with mole sauce at home. There's a balance between heat and chocolate that I imagine, but that I haven't quite achieved yet.
We ended the night with a delicious Mexican Chocolate Tart, a really tasty dessert that Christy made.
If I were to do this dinner again, I'm not sure I would coat the chicken a second time with mole sauce as directed in the recipe. I'll have to think about it, but I think I like wings better when they are less saucy than these wings turned out to be.
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