I am a huge fan of margaritas ... especially on the rocks. I have a go-to margarita recipe that I make a couple of times a week. But, variety is the spice of life, so I tested a new margarita recipe this week. This margarita comes from Cooking Light, but I'm not sure what's light about it. These sweet Blackberry Margaritas are every bit as delicious as they look. And, don't take a short cut by skipping the rims on the glasses. The salty sweet rims elevate these margaritas from tasty to terrific.
Blackberry Margaritas
Margarita Ingredients:
1 cup simple syrup
1 cup silver tequila
3/4 cup triple sec
2/3 cup lime juice
12 oz fresh blackberries
Margarita Directions:
Combine all the drink ingredients in a blender. Process until smooth. Strain the mixture through a cheese cloth lined sieve and into a pitcher.
Salt and Sugar Rim Ingredients:
1 Tbs kosher salt
1 Tbs sugar
1 lime
Rimming Directions:
Combine the sugar and salt and place on a small plate. The sugar-salt mixture should be distributed in a ring about the same circumference as the glasses you will use. Set the plate aside. Slice the lime into wedges. Use one wedge per glass (can be traditional margarita glasses or a tumblers). Cut a slice in the the meat of each lime wedge. Insert the lime wedge onto the rim of the glass.
Assembly Directions:
Rub the rim of each glass with a lime wedge. Squeeze a little to make sure the juice is getting on the rim. Rotate the juicy rims of the glasses in the sugar and salt mixture until you have a nice even rim all around. Fill the sugar and salt rimmed glasses with ice. Carefully pour the drink contents from the pitcher into the glasses. Enjoy!
Okay guys, this is my birthday weekend. To celebrate, I'm going to give you all a gift. Unlike a lot of recipes that I post on this site, I can really claim this recipe as my own. I adapted it after about a year of trial and error with different guacamole recipes. This is probably my most coveted recipe ever. I've been making this guacamole for a while, but I've been reluctant to share it because I'm honestly a little afraid that no one will visit my Banshee Lair in the future if they know how to make this elixir at their own house.
Ingredients:
4 ripe
avocados
2 Tbs lemon
juice
1 Tbs lime
juice
4 dashes
Tabasco
½ red onion
1 Tbs
minced garlic
2 tsp
kosher salt
1 tsp black
pepper
2 tsp olive
oil
2 roma
tomatoes (seeded and diced)
1 jalapeno
pepper (stemmed, seeded and diced)
1 cup
cilantro
Directions:
Combine
garlic, jalapeno, olive oil, salt and pepper in a pestle and mash with the
mortar. Add lemon and lime juice to the mash and set aside. (If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, this
can be done with the back of a sturdy spoon in a shallow bowl).
Chop
cilantro and set aside. Dice the tomato
and onion and set aside. Dice the avocados. Place the avocados in a medium sized
bowl. Mash avocados with hand potato
masher. Add tomatoes and onions and
mix. Add four dashes of Tabasco, the
cilantro and the juice/jalapeno mixture from the pestle to the bowl. Mix it all together.
Cover
tightly with plastic wrap and pressed right against the guacamole and chill for
at least 30 minutes before serving.
If you keep
this guacamole sealed like this with plastic wrap in a Tupperware container
then it can last and stay bright green for up to a week.
If you read my bio, the NBA doesn't even get a mention on the list of sports topics I'm passionate about. But, the 2013 NBA playoffs are worth the attention of any sports fan. What is it that makes sports great? Up and comers vs. veterans. Dazzling skill vs. dogged determination. Pedigree vs. desire. Some of those elements are always present in the early rounds of any playoffs. But those things are all still present as the NBA advances to the Conference Finals. Early on in the playoffs, I wrote a post about why each of the remaining playoffs teams were worthy of casual bandwagon allegiance. Well, now the NBA is down to four teams. And the lines remain just as compelling.
(Anthony Gruppuso/USA Today)
In the Eastern Conference, the Indiana Pacers will take on the Miami Heat. It would be easy to say this is a contrast of styles. The blue collar nature of the Pacers vs. the South Beach glamour of the Heat. It's true that the Pacers have a workman-like persona. And they deserve that persona. In the second round, the Pacers eliminated the high-flying Knicks by stifling their offense and getting effective post play from their big men. And for those of us who do not live in a gigantic coastal city, it was nice to see a town from the heartland oust a team from the Big Apple. But the thing is, the Heat actually deserve a blue collar persona, too. Yeah, I remember The Decision and the Not-1-Not-2-Not-27 celebration in the arena that followed. But, since that time, the Miami Heat have actually been a team built on defense and unselfish offense. The Eastern Conference Finals will finally get started on Wednesday night.
(AP)
In the Western Conference Finals, the Memphis Grizzlies are facing the San Antonio Spurs. That series got underway this weekend. And, honestly, it was the Spurs' performance in Game 1 that prompted me to write this column. I didn't portray the Spurs in a flattering way in my last post about the NBA. But, this series can be summed up in a phrase my Dad often repeats: "Puppy for the path. Old dog for the woods." If you don't know what that means, then you should have watched Game 1 on Sunday. The Memphis Grizzlies are physically talented and play very hard. The Spurs are aged, but they are wiley and experienced. The Spurs won Game 1 in convincing fashion with fantastic movement of the ball and players. Game 2 was a much closer affair, but once again, the precision of the Spurs offense was a beautiful thing to watch and was enough to propel the Spurs to a 2-0 lead. Game 3 will take place in Memphis on Saturday.
This is the first installment of the Fan's Voice series of guest posts on Banshee Sports. It's a series that allows dedicated NFL fans to share their thoughts about the team they love. This debut installment is written by Eric Harrison.
Two of the best events of my life are births that took place
on November 30. My son was born November
30, 2010, and that day is probably the happiest day of my life. Having a child involves unconditional love,
pride, joy, frustration and sometimes sadness.
So does loving a football team.
Seventeen years before my son was born, on November 30,
1993, the Jacksonville Jaguars were born.
I was in middle school, and that day became the happiest day of my young
life when I heard the announcement. I am
a Jacksonville Jaguars fan and I exist.
As a 12 year-old the process of getting awarded the 30th
NFL franchise was rather abstract. I
knew we had a one in four chance of getting a team (with Charlotte having been
awarded the 29th franchise a month earlier). For years our city had tried to lure a
football team to town. The Colts, Saints
and Oilers, all flirted with us and then left us hanging. Ironically, Jacksonville was the 1980’s
answer to Los Angeles today. Owners
would demand concessions from their city and threaten to move to Jacksonville,
but they never came.
A lawsuit by the Jaguar car company caused
Jacksonville to change their logo before they
ever played a game.
Jacksonville’s bid seemed a long shot. We had to sell 10,000 premium tickets in 10
days at one point just to stay in the game.
We did. Still, our opponents
included two former NFL cities, St. Louis and Baltimore. Two cities that were much bigger than
Jacksonville. Two cities most people
thought “deserved” a team.
I think a lot of people have harbored resentment about that
announcement ever since. Jacksonville
didn’t deserve a team. Jacksonville? During the bid process Charlotte’s mayor
scoffed and said that the only thing Jacksonville had to offer the NFL was
cockroaches.
1996 was our second season of play. After going 4-12 in our inaugural season we
began 1996 with a 3-6 record. Then the
Jaguars caught magic in a bottle and earned a playoff birth with a 9-7
record. In our first ever playoff game
we shocked the Buffalo Bills 30-27 in Orchard Park, ending Jim Kelly’s career
and setting up a game in Denver the following week against the Number 1 seed in
the AFC.
ESPN regular Woody Paige was a columnist for the Denver Post
in 1996. In a lame attempt at humor Mr.
Paige gratuitously bashed the City of Jacksonville and the “Jagwads” in advance
of the game:
“How do you get worked up to play somebody called Jacksonville with a
bunch of nobodies? Jacksonville?
Is that a semi-pro team or a theme park? Isn't Jacksonville the only Florida
city without a beach? (Note: I am from Jacksonville Beach, Florida)
Who do these upstart Jaguars think they are,
anyway…?
Can we get a legitimate NFL team in here
next Sunday?”
As the largest underdogs in NFL Playoff history the Jaguars
defeated the Denver Broncos 30-27. No
football team, legitimate or semi-pro, went to Mile High the following week.
The City of Jacksonville erupted with the victory. That night 40,000 people went to the stadium
downtown. 40,000! At 1:30 AM the team’s charter flight took a
detour so that it could fly over the stadium and see the thousands of delirious
folks who had gathered to celebrate their win.
Once they landed, the team hurried to the stadium to celebrate with
their fans.
Fast forward to February, 2005 and there’s Super Bowl fever
in Jacksonville because the big game itself is being held in town. Jacksonville is a wonderful place with nice
hotels, nice restaurants and fun bars.
But they’re not all located in one district. Jacksonville’s downtown is pretty quiet after
5PM. Jacksonville is not New
Orleans. It is not Miami. It is not Atlanta or even Tampa. To make quota on hotel rooms, cruise ships had
to be docked along the riverfront downtown.
It’s a novel concept that went off fairly well. It also was a stark reminder that Jacksonville
in 2005 just wasn’t a Super Bowl kind of town.
To make matters worse, a February Nor’easter was in effect for most all
of Super Bowl week. It was Jacksonville in
February. Sometimes it’s 70 and
fantastic. Sometimes it’s 50 degrees
with a 30 mph wind. That week it was
the latter.
It was the most panned Super Bowl experience ever by the
media. All in all the week went
fine. The game went off without a hitch
and the lights even stayed on the entire time. But the criticism made some sense. Jacksonville wasn’t ready to host a Super
Bowl.
For those who always felt Jacksonville an undeserving NFL
city, that week made the city an even bigger target.
The Jaguars have not won a division title since 1999. We have been to the playoffs only twice since
then. It’s been a bad run. For years the team ran a boring system under
Jack Del Rio which focused on defense and playing a ball control running game
on offense. When you are losing year in and year out and playing a boring brand
of football, it’s not terribly fun. Then
the economy crashes and you have scenes like the one in this photo.
It was bad. I drove
to Jacksonville in 2009 to watch them play the Rams. There were 38,000 people there. If that. Yes, fan support was lagging in
2009. There were blackouts. There should have been more but the team
intervened to stave off several. Here
was proof Jacksonville was the illegitimate NFL city some people had convinced
themselves it was. Too small. Too Southern.
Too redneck. Too podunk. Not sexy.
Jacksonville? So the chorus began across the nation. Move the Jaguars. Move them to a real city like Los Angeles. Move them to somewhere me and my media
brethren think is worthy of a team.
Jacksonville ranked 30th of 32 teams in
attendance that year. The Jaguars drew a
measly 49,651 a game in 2009. But, Detroit and Oakland drew even fewer
fans. Jacksonville has never once had
the lowest attendance in a season. The
impression the national media gives is that we do every year.
In 2010 the Jaguars missed the playoffs again and were the
constant focus of jokes and speculation about the team moving. Everywhere you turned there was a joke about
the L.A. Jaguars. That season the
Jaguars had no blackouts and sold 63,032 tickets a game, ranking 24th
in the league. They sold more tickets
than the Arizona Cardinals, Chicago Bears, Minnesota Vikings, Cincinnati
Bengals, Detroit Lions, St. Louis Rams, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Oakland
Raiders.
Jacksonville is the 2nd smallest market in the
NFL. Jacksonville has at least 500,000 fewer
citizens in its metropolitan area than every other town on that list. That’s not to make excuses. If we want to play in the big leagues we have
to play on the same footing. But
Jacksonville, pop 1,500,000, sold more tickets in 2010 than Chicago, pop
9,500,000. Could Chicago sell more
tickets with a bigger stadium?
Sure. But have you ever heard
these figures? What impression was made
by ESPN, Yahoo!, etc. about the Jaguars?
That they had the lowest attendance in the league. That they have no fans.
In 2011 the Jaguars were a putrid 5-11 but we still sold
62,331 tickets a game, good for 25th in the league. Again there were no blackouts. Again Jacksonville sold more tickets than
Chicago, Miami, Arizona, Oakland, Tampa, St. Louis and Cincinnati. Yet the perception continued. The Jaguars need to move. Jacksonville is not a legitimate NFL city.
Last year the Jaguars were mind-numbingly bad. They finished 2-14, the worst record in
franchise history. At the start of the
2012 season it had been 5 years since our last playoff appearance and 13 years
since we last won a division title or hosted a playoff game. We were blown out by a combined score of
95-20 in our first 3 home games last season.
Yet we sold an average of 64,984 tickets per game. That was good for 20th in the
league. To repeat: 20th in
the league for a 2-14 team that hasn’t made the playoffs in a half a decade and
hadn’t won a division in over a decade.
Last season, suffering through the worst season in franchise
history and after a decade of misery Jacksonville trounced places like Tampa, Miami and Minnesota in attendance. Minnesota made the playoffs, yet the Jaguars
drew a higher % of capacity and 4,000 more fans per game than did the Vikings
and removed the tarps from some sections for 3 of the 8 home games.
Of course the tarps are Exhibit A for those who claim
Jacksonville can’t support the Jaguars.
They’re the visceral representation to the uninformed that the Jaguars
just can’t sell tickets.
Why the tarps? They
are there so that our stadium is actually a reasonable NFL size. With the tarps on the capacity of Ever
Bank Field is 67,000+. That makes it
bigger than 11 other stadiums in the league.
Bigger than Chicago’s stadium. Bigger
than Pittsburgh’s. Without tarps the 2nd smallest market would have the
4th largest stadium in the league.
The stadium was intentionally built too large for the NFL because of hosting
the annual Florida –Georgia game. They
could sell 100,000+ for that game. Were
it not for Florida-Georgia, our stadium would have been built smaller from the
outset and there would be no tarps.
Sold out Alltel Stadium. Common in 1990's
When the team was winning, Jacksonville would routinely sell out a tarpless 73,000 seat stadium.
During the 90s? No tarps.
Not a seat in the house to be had.
In 1997 Jacksonville hosted a Monday Night game against Pittsburgh that
drew 73,000 fans. The Jaguars won when
they blocked a game winning Steelers field goal attempt and ran it back for a
touchdown. Al Michaels, no stranger to
the Earth moving during a broadcast, said that the stadium was literally
shaking during the touchdown return and aftermath.
We are Jacksonville Jaguars fans. We exist.
Why bother writing this?
I don’t know. Like your children,
your hometown sports team fills you with pride and unconditional love. It is a particular and special point of pride
when that team is from a town like Jacksonville. In the past when I’d tell someone I’m from
Jacksonville there would often be a pause for the look of confusion on the
other person’s face and then I’d have to say “Florida”. They’d nod in a way suggesting vague
familiarity. Now I don’t have to say
“Florida”. They know about Jacksonville. That’s because of the Jaguars.
Hearing your team and town relentlessly bashed over and over
again with false information gets a little tiresome. Hearing that your city is unworthy and
illegitimate can hurt because by extension, that means you are unworthy and
illegitimate, too. It’s nice to have an
opportunity to set the record straight. Do
we sell out every game? No. But that’s true throughout the league. Nobody
cares about Jacksonville, so it’s easy to make fun of us. It’s easy to form a quick opinion and move
on. Illegitimate. No fans.
Get rid of ‘em.
I’m a 32 year-old man now.
On December 1, 1993 twelve year-old Eric ran round Fletcher Middle
School in Jacksonville Beach high-fiving a bunch of other 12 and 13 year-olds. We got a team. We’re all in our 30’s now. A lot of us have kids. We love the Jaguars and we are
multiplying. We are here to stay. We belong in the NFL.
We are Jaguars fans.
We exist.
Eric Harrison was born and raised in Jacksonville Beach, FL. He's now an attorney, husband and father in Lynchburg, VA. Knowledgeable on many sports and politics, Eric is well-worth a follow on Twitter. If you'd like to be the next contributor to the Fan's Voice series, please contact Wild Banshee via Twitter or email.
