Football and Feasts

Oh there's no place like...

These are my favorite kind of blog entries to write, and it's primarily because they place me back in The Commonwealth and surrounded by the people I care about most.

And these fantastic people called familly, they score me tickets to my first ever Patriots game!

I heard a joke on the radio today about how 2011 was the year of the bandwagon fan. This comment was made with respect to the Bruins, and the ad even played a sound clip of a self-professed true fan who was "bad with names" when asked to name the team's head coach. Nice.

So with that said, I got to go to a Patriots game, but I cannot pretend to know a heck of a lot about the team. Sure, I really enjoy watching football, but I could never hope to call myself a true fan. By the way, the head coach of the Pats is Bill Belichick.

Here we are, Christmas eve at Foxboro! I think that there were about 2,500 Santas in attendance.

Did I mention that we all layered up in ridiculous excess for this outdoor December activity? My sister was kind enough to supply boot and hand warmers, my brother-in-law wore ski pants, and our friend Mike was nice enough to lend me a Brady jersey so I could blend in better with the drunk jolly hahd-core fans in front of us. 

I'll tell you right now that this video is not worth watching. I really didn't pay much attention to what I was filming- but we did have great seats!

If anyone followed this game, then they know that the first half was kind of uninspiring for the home team. At halftime I opted to get up and use the restroom- along with the rest of the females at Foxboro. I waited in line for what must have been 20 minutes before I got to the actual bathroom.

Maybe I was a bit out of my mind from the cold, but this sign greets you at the bathroom door. I don't know about you, but I interpreted it to mean "Don't drink the toilet water". 

I don't know why my gloves are off. I'm probably trying to see what else I can do to make my charcoal hand warmers more warming. My fur-lined gloves and fancy scarf were clearly not doing the job.

You will note how I am a hockey fan when I summarize this game by simply telling you that our team woke up in the second half and we started scoring touchdowns. Like this one. Hooray for jumping around and celebrating. It keeps you warm.

The end of the game saw the playing of our favorite hated contemporary Christmas songs- chiefly among them was Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas". I still have a fantastic image of my sister giving up and embracing this song's vapidity as she danced around free as a bird in a brave attempt to warm herself up in the fading sunlight.

So the good guys won, and we made our way back to the city. I had a great time at the Pats game- but for us our evening was only just beginning. Part two of Christmas eve was about to begin...

If you remember this statue from last year, then  you know what's coming up next in this blog entry.


Oh yes, time to break bread (or fish, as the case happens to be) with the excellent family of my Italian-American brother-in-law.


Here is said brother-in-law and my fantastic sister. You will see a similar photo if you look at last year's entry.

I don't know what  more to say about this Christmas eve meal except that the food is always as good as the company. The three of us hadn't eaten since before the Patriots game, so we did well in showing up to the house with empty stomachs. I started in with the fennel, olive and orange salad, as well as some smelts and then fried cod with tomato sauce. In so many ways, scoring a seat at this Feast of the Seven Fishes is way better than getting into Foxboro.

This primo piatto that cruised past my plate was this excellent garlic, clam and pasta number. Knowing that this meal is a marathon rather than a Super Size Me sprint, I only took a little bit of this offering. Now that I'm reviewing all of my photography from the evening, I am quite sad that I didn't take more of this dish. The garlic flavor was really fantastic.


Pasta Puttanesca. As you can see, nobody liked it. Horribly good!


Here we've got three types of fish preparation. Salmon, cod, and...I'm not sure. I've already started drinking wine and am excited about my triumphant rediscovery of buttered breadcrumbs. Oh yes, there was shrimp as well...with those breadcrumbs. Laurie knows how to cook.


Rory and I mention to our excellent host Dom that we love garlic. In one of those "ask and ye shall receive" moments, he suddenly sends a dish our way that we are sure to enjoy. I guess you would call them fish meatballs with garlic and amazing tomato sauce. Extra servings of this stuff made me happy that I scorned the obscenely overpriced $7.50 Papa Gino's mini pizza pucks served at the football game.


Here we've got a squid salad- or is it octopus? I can't keep them straight. In any case, it was also awesome: it was a cold salad that served as a nice contrast to all of the hot seafood flowing on a steady loop around the dinner table.

I should probably pause here and say that for two years in a row I have done a lousy blogging job of capturing the guests seated with me at the table. Sure you probably don't know any of these people by name, but I have to mention that every year they have welcomed me to their family table like I was one of their own. In coming to the house, I hardly qualify as family. Indeed, I originally showed up just as a person who was dying to learn what it was like to be an Italian-American at Christmastime. I don't know how many years it has been since I first started coming over, but these people are really wonderful. So with that said, much thanks to Dom, Laurie, Danielle, Franco and everyone else I am forgetting at the moment!

After dinner, one of the desserts was created on the spot. Zeppole was fried in the kitchen as cleanup commenced.

 
Here is Frank skillfully manning the zeppole station. I got served a plate of these beauties that was accompanied with a hit of nutella. I won't lie- the fried doughy goodness combined with hazelnut made me and my brother-in-law pretty happy campers.

So that's a snapshot of my Christmas eve. Despite all of my travels abroad, these memories are the ones that I love most. In the short span of time since I have been back at home, I've probably laughed more than I have in months, and I've also been served a furnished with a great deal of good food and Boston sports. Don't get me wrong-  Megan's 2011 as a whole can be described as quite superlative- but enjoying the chance to be back here will always come out as tops in my book. 

I can't wait till next year, and I hope that the Italians will have me back. I just may have offered to give a speech of thanks in Italian if I do indeed return, but I think that was the wine talking. Just in case, I have a terrific back-up plan that involves me speaking in really quick French. Maybe just maybe it will come out sounding the same if I do it while chowing down on more zeppole.  Grazie mille!