Authentic Guacamole and Tableside Presentation Starts with a Peeled Avocado

Authentic Guacamole! I feel a bit presumptuous stating this, but I have a little history with authentic guacamole.

A visit to Puerto Vallarta before I knew Mr. ST. with someone else I refer to as the surfer heel, if I can use a very old fashioned word, led me to a near death experience and an authentic lunch in the middle of nowhere, Mexico.

First, the near death experience.

Our hotel had a secluded beach and a riptide someone forgot to tell me about. The surfer heel insisted we venture further out into the water from the shore and as usual he went ahead not looking back. He never noticed that I got caught in an undertow only a few feet from shore. The good looking outdoor bartender came to my rescue, got me out of the water and somehow my top, that came off in the rough waters, got back on. I was too frightened to care about that at the time and am grateful there were no cell phone cameras back then to embarrass me.

The guests were stunned. Not because of my wardrobe malfunction nor my near drowning, but that surfer heel didn’t even look back or take notice. Finally, he realized I wasn’t there and he came back to find himself at odds with all the guests. They shook their heads with disgust and wondered what a nice girl like me was doing with someone like him. This was the vacation that led to the demise of this relationship and that wasn’t the worst of it.

Second, the dirty beach in the middle of Nowhere, Mexico.

The next day, he insisted we rent a car and drive from the semi-safe tourist part of town to a smaller town where odd looking stray dogs run wild and tourists are no where to be found. While he was surfing, I had the pleasure of sitting on a dirty beach, scared to death that something worse than an undertow was going to come along. It was time to end this relationship and wait for a real man who put me first.

Third, Mexican Lunch in the Middle of the Nowhere, Mexico.

The food was surprisingly good and that’s when I tasted my first real guacamole, assembled from chunks of avocado with simple ingredients. The next time I tasted anything as good was at Boudro’s Texas Bistro in San Antonio. I had dinner there with Mr. ST one Valentine’s week about 8 years ago, comforted in the realization that I had waited for the right man.  They took a picture of us on the patio wrapped in blankets which Boudro’s provides its guests.  Romantic that he is, he framed the picture and has it on his desk.

He became just as smitten with the their famous tableside guacamole and recreated the recipe as soon as we got back home, adapting it to his own taste. He left out the serrano pepper but you could always add that back in.

His guacamole is legendary, and there is none better anywhere here in Nashville. He’s very particular about it, and I enjoy watching him do his table side magic especially because it always takes us back to that night in San Antonio, serving as a reminder to me how different my life could have been with the wrong person. (Although I’m not sure about those sunglasses. I think they are long gone, but he thought he looked like Bono. I laughed too).

Tableside Presentation

Tableside guacamole is something you can do when your guests arrive, but give them a drink first. The entire assembly takes about five minutes, but do make sure your avocados are ripe enough, but not too ripe. There is a little brown stem (button) on the tip of an avocado. If you flick it off, you will see either a brown spot (too ripe) or a green spot (ripe enough).

The key to a beautiful presentation is to have everything ready to chop freshly on the spot peel the avocados. This is much easier than you may think and I did a post on it.  Peeling the avocado makes it easier to cut into attractive slices for some dishes or nice chunks for this one. It might be a good idea to have your onion pre-cut, but dice the tomato fresh.

So tell me, did you wait for Mr. or Mrs. Right? Did it take you as many dogs as it took me?