DISH | a goodbye + beef carnitas

You know that person who with but a smile could turn your day around. The one with a laugh so contagious the entire room could do nothing but laugh in unison. That was him. Though a cantankerous old man at times, he was as genuine as they come.  He touched everyone he came in contact with and I am grateful to have been called a friend.

I can vividly remember the first moment we met. It was the season Brent had gone tree planting without me. I had come to visit for the last few days of the contract and, though I had long since given up planting for cooking (best decision ever), I put on the bags one more time. And there he was. Frantically planting in no discernible pattern or rhythm, sweating so profusely I thought for a moment I had missed the rain. Barely looking up to say hi, he meant business. Nothing was going to stop him from planting those trees. 

Now a million trees later, he outlasted many of us.  A lifer to the very end. No doubt he would have continued, travelling in the off season, only to return ‘home’ to the woods each Spring. I think it was there he found himself like so many of us did. 

But his last tree is planted, his life stolen decades too soon.  

A true lover of Mexican, he’d never be without a jar of his trusty Herdez salsa verde, sometimes eating it with nothing but a spoon. Here I am years later, more obsessed than perhaps even he would believe. Though not traditional, this is all the flavour of marinated carne asada meets the tenderness of braised carnitas. I like to think he’d be proud of this one. With a sadness too deep for words, it’s the only way I can think to say good bye. 

Faraz, this one’s for you.