THE JAVELINAS

- Debbie Fisher, Contributing Writer

The Javelinas are a group of 7 dedicated, loving friends who get together monthly (if not more often) to cook, eat, laugh and bond. Recipes are assigned by the hostess (we take turns), so occasionally someone is asked to prepare a dish that falls outside her comfort zone. This happened to Debbie when Jackie assigned her Alice Waters' Classic Roast Chicken from her new book, "The Art of Simple Food."  Read on ...

A Testimony
Or, what I will do for the Javelinas
I was a vegetarian from college until my mid-thirties.  Mostly it was an ethical decision, but I never really enjoyed meat so it wasn’t a difficult thing to do.  At 34-ish, I added seafood back into my diet and became a self-titled "Oceanarian."  My second pregnancy changed everything when all I could think about was waking up and dining on filet mignon. It still bewildered me that anyone would want to eat a bird, but with restrictions lifted, I began to sample a Thanksgiving turkey here and a roasted chicken (a la Richard Weintraub) there.  The Cornish game hens with the cranberry sauce Ana made for one of our Javelina dinners was one of the most delicious things I have tasted, so I have been eager to take on the cook-a-bird challenge.  Which brings me to today ...

Before prepping my dish for tomorrow's Jevelina dinner, I spent the day going from horse ranch to horse ranch looking for the perfect trainer to start my filly, Roxy, under saddle.  I think I may have found one and my decision is all based on the vibrational feeling I got watching this person work with a challenging horse.  I feel we all love our animals because they are expressions of pure love and connect us to God.  When I am with my horses, it’s like being in a moving meditation and I hit highs on some indescribable spiritual level.  Anyway, I’m in this heightened Zen-with-animal-place, and I come home to season a couple of chickens for tomorrow’s dinner.  I unwrapped ... and panicked.  Alice Waters tells me to stuff herbs between the skin and the meat.  Oy!  Thank goodness I read "The Omnivore’s Dilemma" and had my Bristol Farms, raised-in-the-best-way-possible birds. I knew to give reverence to the poor chickens.  My intention was to have perfectly-placed, under-skin herbs like a Martha Stewart photograph.  What you are getting is something entirely different, but the good news is there was definitely no over-handling of the merchandise.  After the breaking-in period (eek!), it wasn’t too bad.  I'm not sure I will be doing it again, but if by some miracle it tastes o.k., maybe.