“The best chiles en nogada are at Bugambilla in Centro, but Bugambilla is no Antigua Villa Santa Monica—as I said—I’m here for the ambiance. The courtyard. The columns. The flowers.”

Lunch at Antigua Villa Santa Monica

We walk toward Parque Juarez.  “I thought you said this restaurant is not open.”

“If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t be going there; I honestly don’t care about the food. It’s the building I care about.”

Imagining the thoughts exploding in the head of my patient longtime companion and spouse, I comfort myself with the fact that it is my week to choose, and he loves me. That settled, we continue walking toward Antigua Villa Santa Monica, the place I celebrated my first retirement anniversary with Michael, Patsy & Joyce (friends visiting from San Antonio) ten and a half years ago. The place we had Easter brunch with Wendy and Hans (friends we met from Canada).

Arriving, it is just as I remember.  If I had three or four million dollars—maybe more—just laying around, I’d buy it.  This is the villa that spurred our house hunt in the country years before we finally moved.

Only open for breakfast and lunch, Michael tells me he feels out of place.  Only three other tables have patrons, and they are all women.  He gets over it—I knew he would— and orders dos vino tintos. I order chiles in nogada, while he orders chiles relleno.  This place is beyond peaceful. Beyond beautiful. “If ever we come back and stay in a hotel,” I say, “this is the hotel I would choose.”

Chiles en Nogada is a cold dish consisting of poblano chiles filled with picadillo (a mixture usually containing shredded meat, aromatics, fruits, and spices) topped with a walnut-based cream sauce and pomegranate seeds. Its ties are to the independence of Mexico, containing the colors of the country’s flag: green chile, white sauce, and red pomegranate.

A Post Lunch Stroll

Tomorrow is the day we want to go to Guanajuato. Today is the day we must head to the Biblioteca to purchase tickets.  We meander through the streets toward the Jardin, climbing a hill toward Recreo and the house with the window I painted so many years ago at Sam’s.  Now, ten years later, bougainvillea almost hides the window. Painting these bars today would be no problem at all.

Meeting other pedestrians coming toward us, we hop on and off the narrow sidewalk. We pass a school and walk past the bright red double doors that lead to the town bullring. We pass shops that I want to walk into and houses with old wooden doors that I can only guess what lies on the other side. Sazon, the store where Michael took cooking lessons while I painted with Sam, beckons me inside.  I used to love their stuff. We turn right, then left, and pass a building with many curious ninos looking as if they are trying to escape their nursery school prison—I think—monkey bars!

We reach the town library and pay 1,700 pesos for tomorrow’s tour.  The driver will pick us up in front of our casa at exactly 9 a.m.

In preparation for tomorrow’s adventure, we stay home munching on leftover pizza from Mexico and drinking wine from Spain. We watch reruns of popular sitcoms on TV.

 It doesn’t rain today.