Kumayaka for the last ladies lunch of the season.

I"m a little late with this blog but in my defense we are getting ready to leave on April 22nd so there is lots to do and...it slipped my mind!  

When we had lunch at Aruba a couple of weeks ago I noticed Kumayaka at the other end of the building.  Good reviews and very new like Aruba and they are both in the Wyndham hotel commercial space next to the Hospital Medica de la Ciudad Mazatlan.  

I guess you could get plastic surgery downstairs after lunch. 😁

There are stairs, escaltors that aren't operating and an elevator.  We chose the elevator. Pat, Mar, Ruth and I.

Kumajaka opens at 1pm and the sign said " cerrado" or closed...no problem they just forgot to flip the sign.  

We started out by sitting close to the window which overlooks the parking lot and east.  

Once again we were the only customers at this time of day and we wonder how many of these beautiful new restaurants will fail.  Huge amounts of money has been spent on decor so someone has deep pockets.  

Kumajaka means bear paw in Japanese and not the pastry kind.  Hopefully that delicacy becomes a thing of the past.  

This is a predominately Asian menu but there is something for everyone.  

As we were having a look at the menu we remarked that it was too warm in the restaurant.  It is a huge space with no customers but us, so the A/C was not on.  The waiter then asked if we'd like to go to the private room and he'd turn on the A/C...sounded good to us.  

Holy cow look at the liquor cabinet...there is some really expensive booze in there.  

The extremely bright light makes taking pictures a little tricky. 

Ruth with her favorite Negroni. 

Pat had sangria...and it's so pretty. 

I decided to celebrate the last lunch with " Sex on the beach" which I didn't think was that great but since I've never had any kind of sex on the beach it was just fine. 🤣

Who's that drinking white wine?

Mar!

It's a lovely room and the table holds 12 chairs but as it's all hard surfaced it would be incredibly noisy if everyone was talking.  It was bad enough with us four!

Pat, Ruth and I each ordered and then we shared.  This is my Kumayaka roll.  Very good and you can see the ingredients on the bottom left corner of one of the menu pictures. 

Mar ordered a noodle stir fry and it was HUGE!  She managed to eat half and said it was very good.  Half went home for another meal.  

Ruth ordered mixed tempura and it included all sorts of vegetables, shrimp and fish.  Another huge portion.  It was a bit smaller at Zasshi but also half the price there.  Sorry, I caught Ruth with her mouth full.😉

Nice light batter and not too greasy with all the appropriate dips. 

Pat's mango, mango roll with you guessed it mango!

A very large portion and both Ruth and Pat split up the leftovers. 

That is a huge plate of food.  Definitely the largest portions of any of the lunches. 

"Objet's de Art" as well as liquor. 

Good food, good friends, excellent service and another pleasant experience.  Definitely a restaurant to bring the rest of the group to next season.  

I must say that my favorite of the many excellent restaurants we visited this season was " Zasshi" located almost across from the Fresh Market Tres Islas Mall.  I'm sure everyone had a favorite but that one was mine.  

So a good time was had by all four of us and we will reconvene next November!

Torres for Ladies lunch

 Yesterday was a little ladies lunch at Torres.  Torres is one of the oldest vacation rental complexes in the north end of Mazatlan.  Built in 1980 and last renovated in 2012..  It is a low rise complex at 6 stories high.  Well run, immaculately kept and always reasonably full.  It has a lovely restaurant called La Palapa and that is where we went yesterday.  All of us have eaten there at one time or another but never as a group.   It's located a short walk from where most of us are staying for the winter.  

Always immaculate.  

Coming through the buildings you can see the pool, beach and the palapa restaurant up ahead. 

I took a photo of our little group and...

....one of the older waiters offered to take one with me in it.  Some of the waiters have been working here since they were 17 so it must be a good place to be employed.  As this is a time share complex families come year after year and now it would be the children of the original time share travelers vacationing.   

Happy hour is from 12 to 2 and 4 to 6 so we just arrived when happy hour started.  They ring a gong to let all the people sunning themselves know that it's time to drink. 😁 It took a little time for our drinks to arrive as everyone was waiting for " happy hour!'

I was a little lax with photos yesterday and I must admit I've just about had enough of this season's lunch blogs! This is my taco salad but I thought it was more like a chicken salad with a few taco chips in it.  I expected the taco bowl filled with the salad.  The salad itself was good but the dressing was a little flat.  Could have used a little "zip!" 

Mar had the seafood soup on Pat's recommendation.  Not very large but tasty. 

Pat's seafood soup.  

Ruth had the tuna filet salad and it was huge.  Very good but she ate the other half of it for dinner last night. 

Ruth's neighbor Yolande joined us for lunch and she had a Cobb salad...enough for two!

Lots of greens in that salad. 

Marion looks unhappy....she was not!  She had a goodbye pina colada as she is heading home on Saturday.  She ordered cheese sticks which was small so she'd had room for key lime pie.  Sorry I forgot to take a picture of the pie.  

Torres is right on the beach so it's a beautiful place to relax and have lunch. We chatted and discussed this and that and just had a really nice time.  Bingo is played in the palapa every afternoon starting at 2pm so Pat, Mar and Marion stayed to play.  Pat, who won big at Friends bingo a couple of weeks ago continued her winning streak and won 2600 pesos on the Super bingo at the end.  Lucky duck😇

A good time was had by all and we might even do one more small lunch next week.  

 

Helene has a birthday and we celebrate at Ladies Lunch!

 Yesterday was ladies lunch at El Parmar which is located right outside the gate of the Las Jaibas RV park where many of us spent numerous happy winters together.  

8

On Monday it was our good friend Helene's birthday.  This is a photo I picked off her birthday post...

" The Lady in Red!" 

Ruth is our " party planner" and she was prepared with a special birthday hat for Helene.  It didn't want to stay on her head so she put a pointy one underneath but she still had to balance it on her head.  I think she looks like Queen Nefertiti!

Lots of us are readers and Helene had a favorite book with her..."Braiding Sweetgrass".  Pretty soon we were all sharing favorite reads.  Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese was my favorite this season.

Our happy birthday girl.  We don't get to see as much of Helene as we used to when she and Hal were in the RV park.   They now rent down in centro for the winter.  She loves it there but...she misses us too!

We are down to 6 as so many of the ladies have left for home.  Pat, Ruth, Marion, Helene and Mar.  

The waitress thought I should be in the picture too.  It was quiet in the restaurant as it was lunch time so we pretty much had the place to ourselves.  It is a favorite as the sushi is very good here.  

Now that's a Nefertiti pose!  Hal and Helene are heading back to their home which is a Yurt in New Mexico.  Helene and I both chatted about how we missed our gardens and that it was time to get planting.  Marion joined in and we started discussing vegetables.

One of the vegetables I suggested was New Zealand spinach.  Not really a spinach but lovely, tasty green leaved plant and the it produces from spring until fall and .....it doesn't bolt in the hot weather!!  Marion was interested because her garden is in Saskatchewan and it gets hot there in the summer.   

Ruth and I shared three different kinds of rolls.  As she ordered two of them the leftovers went home with her.  They were all a combination of seafood...salmon, tuna, eel etc.  

Marion opted for a mixed teriyaki stir fry and it had lovely fresh vegetables that smelled delicious. 

Pat had a sushi roll too!

Mixed Teriakyi for Mar.

My salmon roll. 

My plate with all three rolls.  The one on the left is wrapped in tuna and I liked it the best. 

Ruth's tuna roll..😋 delicious!

Artfully presented.

Helene ordered the chicken teriyaki and it was very good.  

Me and the " birthday girl" trying to hold her hat on!

When the restaurant staff figured out it was Helene's birthday they presented her with a shot of Tequila and a chocolate dessert with her name on it and....they played happy birthday on their music system.  Helene was very touched by the whole birthday lunch and said it was the best birthday she'd ever had.  Isn't that nice!!

The birthday candle was lit and Helene made a wish and ....no she didn't tell us.😁  She is a very spiritual person so I'm sure it was something close to her heart.

Isn't that sweet!  Helene said it was very tasty but she was so full from lunch she had to take it home with her. She also took her special party hat with her too.  We all spent our time together discussing all sorts of things and reminisced about our happy times in the RV park together.  We all agreed that we were all very lucky to have met so many nice people and that we have  remained friends over the years. Only Pat is still in the RV park now but we all remain in the Mazatlan area and stay close through our weekly lunches, cards and bingo over the winter season.  

A really lovely lunch experience with good friends and really good food!

Thanks to Ruth for planning the birthday with party hats and especially the home made on for Helene.  😊