My LONG Mardi Gras Story - Take Two! (with FunTimes)

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1 hour ago, pcvtmom said:

My daughter and her Hokie husband did the same entrance, with all of us jumping!  (Not a small feat, in heels 😁!)

Oh dear.......LOL

 

1 hour ago, erstreet2017 said:

Michelle just doesn’t “get” it but she knows that if I’m grumpy, there’s a really solid chance the Hokies have made me mad! Aaron and I actually had a big Hokie colored wedding 7 years ago. Walked into the reception to Enter Sandman! 

I'm not a sports fan and, as Sherri of "Bob and Sherri" says, "Sports confuse me."

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22 minutes ago, TrqoisWtrs said:

Love your reviews!  Have a New Moon for me at my favorite, Fortune Teller.😊

Thanks so much for your kind words and for reading along!  Fortune Teller is a neat area...I like the entire French Quarter theme.  I'll have a Diet Pepsi and raise a glass to your New Moon...although I'm not entirely certain what that actually is!  LOL  A couple of our group got whatever drink it was where the blew the bubble on top.  That was pretty neat!

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Sept. 15th – Sea Day

 

There’s nothing like waking up, walking up on deck and seeing water in every direction.  That really “gets” me every time.  I can’t fully express how the vastness of the ocean makes me feel.  I love it!

 

Fun Times for today

 

Fun Times

 

We woke up a little after 8am and were anxious to start the day.  First order of business was to grab a bite to eat on the Lido deck.  Ron and I are not big breakfast eaters, so a nice, big breakfast is typically wasted on us.  Some of our friends went to the Sea Day Brunch since they do enjoy breakfast.

 

Emory provided a picture from Sea Day Brunch

 

 

After we ate, we found a deck chair and settled in to read for a little while.  I didn’t read as much on this cruise but that is one of the really relaxing things that I typically enjoy a lot. On this cruise, I found so many other things to do that I just didn’t want to read as much.   Still, it was a really nice way to start our first Sea Day.

 

Perfect view!

 

There's relaxed and then there's "cruise relaxed"

 

Everyone in our group was scheduled for the Carnival Kitchen pasta class later that morning.  Ron and I had done a couple of Carnival Kitchen

classes and had really enjoyed them.  We were anxious to do it again!

 

 

As we passed Grand Central they were setting up for Celestial Strings

 

 

We all met outside the door and were checked in.  Everyone went inside and found a seat.  It was a full class.  Sometimes, if the class is not full, each person will have their own station.  When the class IS full, you must share stations.  Since everyone in the class was there with another person, it was much more comfortable that if you were sharing a station with a stranger.

 

Waiting for class to start

 

We were assigned stations and then sent to wash hands

 

Pasta cutter and tablet

 

Ingredients

 

Looking out into the kitchen

 

 

 

The chef teaching the class was Steph.  She was fantastic!  Definitely the best teacher we’ve had in a class yet!  She introduced herself and her assistants, gave us a brief overview of what we were going to do and then sent everyone to wash their hands and go to their various stations. The room is arranged in sort of a “U” shape with Steph in the middle.   Ron and I were on one end.  Kim and Bobby were beside us, Liz and Aaron were beside them.  Emory and Cami were on the side facing Steph and Sarah and Steven were on the side facing Liz and Aaron.  All the ingredients were pre-measured and laid out on the station.  There was a tablet with a close up view of Steph’s station and what she was doing so you could follow along.

 

Chef Steph

 

She began the class with an explanation of how to use the stove top controls and the various kitchen tools we’d be using.  She then immediately started into the class.

 

First step was to mix the pasta.  It was a pretty simple recipe without a lot of ingredients.  Perfect for me!   The first thing was flour.  You put the flour in a bowl and make sort of a “hole” in the middle.  Then we put in the eggs in the hole and started mixing the dough.  At first it was very sticky and would stick to your hands.  Over time it gradually stopped sticking to hands and the dough that was on our hands became part of the dough ball.  You could tell when it was correctly kneaded because the dough was no longer on your hands and there was very little residue in the bowl.  When it was the correct consistency, she told us to form a ball and set aside, under a damp cloth, to rest.

 

Steph had a station in the center of the room and taught from there.  She also made the dish as the class progressed.

 

Looking across the kitchen.  Ron and I were station 1.

 

 

Ron starts mixing the dough

 

It's starting to come together

 

Liz and Aaron

 

 

 She then instructed us to take out a skillet and told us which setting to use on the stove.  She showed us through the specific ingredients to add in the specific order.  As each ingredient was used, we put the dirty dish in a pan.  The assistants were constantly circling the room checking on us and picking up dirty dishes.

 

Liz and Aaron

 

Kim and Bobby

 

Ron and I

 

Emory and Cami

 

 

 

Who knew Bobby was a cook?!?!

 

Steven seems to be letting Sarah do most of the work!

 

 

Steven and Sarah

 

Look at the people in the window behind us.  It was like that anytime a class was in session.

 

Proof that Liz DOES cook.....occasionally.....

 

Emory...feeling sassy!

 

 

After the sauce was mixed, it sat on the stove to cook down and we again turned our attention to the pasta.  Each of us started a pan of salted water on the stovetop so it would reach a boil when the pasta was ready to cook.  Each station had a manual pasta maker attached.   We divided the dough into smaller balls and patted into a “rectangle” that would fit through the pasta maker.  The pasta maker has a knob on the side.  When you start running the pasta through the machine, you start on a wider setting.  Then you gradually reduce the width until the pasta is a usable width for cutting.  Finally, when it was the right width, we ran it through the linguini cutter setting.  The pasta was immediately put into the water, which was boiling by that point.  It is surprising to me how quickly the fresh pasta cooks in comparison to boxed pasta.  It only took a couple of minutes!

 

When the pasta was finished, we mixed the pasta and the sauce, placed it in the provided bowls and sat down to eat.  It was delicious!  Each of us was presented with our own Carnival Kitchen spatula.  Steph assured us she would be sending the recipes later.  It was a very enjoyable class, and I would highly recommend the class to anyone.

 

Lunch is served

 

It was delicious

 

Lis and Aaron enjoyed the class so much they bought the picture!

 

 

Ron was immediately making plans for Derrick and Lucinda to come to our house to make pasta and have dinner.

[LatinaInTexas]

Great review/story, appreciate all the details and pics.

And here I thought I was the only one crazy enough to fly Frontier lol.

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10 minutes ago, LatinaInTexas said:

Great review/story, appreciate all the details and pics.

And here I thought I was the only one crazy enough to fly Frontier lol.

lol. That’s funny!  I’m a total cheapskate when it comes to flying.  Given the recent problems with so many planes, that’s probably a very bad thing!

 

Thanks for reading!