Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Mama is doin' the HAPPY DANCE!

I loves me some Mexican food. My first husband (Have I mentioned that there was a The Hubs, version 1? Trust me - we were infants!) was from southen California and his family really got me hooked on homemade Mexican food. We cooked a Mexican meal for dinner a couple of times a week, and tacos once a week. We even fried our own tortillas.

At that time, it was hard to find many of our favorite brands or spices, so when the grandparents of The Hubs vs. 1 came to visit us in Oregon, they brought us care packages of our favorite sauces, and even brought us tortillas as they were hard to find in Oregon. It was a great day in our household when we finally started finding our favorite products on the store shelves in Oregon. (That was the late 70's, early 80's. Now, it's very common place.)

In 1993 I moved to New England to marry The Hubs vs. 2. (yes, there was a divorce in between husbands. And four years of dating a very sexy Navy guy! Pardon me, I need to take a little mind vacation.) .................. (ok...I'm back)

Where was I...yes...1993, moved to New England...and guess what? No Mexican products on store shelves. Not even any Mexican restaurants! Cuban, yes. Puerto Rican, definitely. Brazillian, affirmative. But Mexican? The only Mexican restaurant I could find was in another state! (Fortunately the states are small back here) I would make The Hubs vs. 2 drive me from our home in Massachusetts to this restaurant in New Hampshire. Sometimes we'd get there and it would be closed. Or it wouldn't open for another two hours. Or the owners had gone to Florida for January.

When I went home to Oregon for visits I would buy my favorite taco sauce, carefully wrap it up, and bring it back in my suitcase. Any visitors from out west were required to do the same - bring me my sauce! (This was obviously before every item in suitcases had to be picked up and inspected by Security).

In 1997, when we got the internet at home, I started ordering my favorite sauce online and had it shipped to me. Which was a pain. Until fairly recently, the shipping costs were as much as the product (heavy glass bottles needing special packing). I did this right up through July of this year.

One time I was actually able to find my taco sauce in a grocery store, but it was a fluke. They never carried it again. My daughter looked at my face when I realized it wasn't on the grocery shelf the next time I shopped, and said, "Mom, you look like you're gonna CRY!"

Perhaps you underestand my jubilation when last week, while shopping at a major New England grocery chain I was able to find my favorite taco sauce on the shelf! I feel I must give a big shout-out to SHAW'S Supermarkets for making me one happy mama! Shaw's, you have made a new and loyal customer in me!

And here is my Holy Grail. .. La Victoria Taco Sauce.




And when I finally begin seeing THIS in the local grocery stores...

I will think I've died and gone to heaven.

4 comments:

RiverPoet said...

Kathy, I grew up in Houston, so yeah, I feel your pain! There are a couple of "Mexican restaurants" here in central MD that the locals rave about. I can't even taste the spices! Compared to that food, my chili will take the paint off the walls!

:-)

Good luck finding all of your comfort foods in your neck of the woods...Peace - D

Anonymous said...

Sorry, but I just don't feel your pain. Mexican is not a favorite for us. We are kinda cornbread and pintos people. That sounds kind of Mexican, doesn't it? Now if I moved away from here and didn't have a Chick-fil-A, that would be another story.

Anonymous said...

oooooooooooooooooooh... that's my favorite too!!!! I love the green enchalada sauce with my chicken enchalada's.. yummy!!! Think I'll make them for dinner this weekend!! I feel your pain.. when we lived in Illinois a long time ago, we could never find any good Mexican food.
Gotta love the plug for the Sexy Navy Guys!!!

Anonymous said...

Kathy,

That's Adrians' favorite too!!! Me, not much for mexican.

P.S. They come in plastic bottles now too! A larger version.

Wow, bringin' back some old memories of THE HUBS vs 1. We just had our 25th last week!!