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What’s New

New Event Registration Software

Event Report: 7th Annual March Madness Stag

Best of the Cockle Bur compiled & edited by Harry B. Otis, 3rd President 1973-1974 “Tell me how a people uses its leisure and I will tell you the quality of its civilization”

Maeterlinck

The May event at Salted Edge was the first time for using a new event registration system. The goal is to make registration easier and give you more flexibility to manage your reservations.

1. Invitations will now come from: jmatthews@supportworkstech.com. Add this address to your safe sender or whitelist now so the invitation doesn’t end up in your spam folder.

2. Registration is much like before, and payments are still handled through Stripe, so that part should look familiar.

3. You can tell who signed up.

4. You can now manage your guests yourself. One of the biggest improvements is that after registering, you’ll receive a link that lets you add guests, change guest names, or request cancellations.

5. We now have a waitlist feature If an event fills up, you can join the waitlist, and you’ll be automatically notified if a spot opens up.

Please take a quick look at the attached PDF guide for a visual walkthrough of how everything works.

Many Thanks to John Matthews, who, with his programming expertise, allowed us to eliminate the Constant Contact limitations with event registration, such as being unable to see who is coming to an event and adding guests.

Event Report: 7th Annual March Madness Stag

Story by Tom Murnan Photos by Ron Policky & Tom Murnan

Wow, I can’t believe this was the seventh iteration of a winning event. Host Goldstein has won the gold medal on this idea. Many of us love March Madness basketball. He has devised a casual afternoon drinking great wine, watching basketball on TV, and starring the popular make-your-own Mac & Cheese station. Not as many wore their favorite team’s jersey this year, but some did. The series started out with Tailgate Cuisine, but in the past few years we have been exploring Mexican menus.

Quaffing found us with the usual great end-of-bin wines left in the cellar: not enough for an event but great to start hors d’oeuvres with. Of the appetizers I especially liked the Italian Sausage Stuffed Mushrooms. We should consider them for the December Holiday event. The Charcuterie Plate also offered numerous choices. Next was the HHC Mac & Cheese Station, with choices of toppings ranging from lobster bites, shrimp, bacon, blackened chicken, etc., all potentially smothered in a smoked Gouda white sauce. It was great as always, with the added benefit of being able to talk to your fellow queue partners while you waited to build your masterpiece. With this course, a Stag’s Leap Chardonnay 2023 was served, which went quite well with the smoked gouda white sauce.

Moving onto the Mexican portion of the menu, we started with Pupusas Two Ways: Chicken & Beef, then Mexican Coleslaw, Sour Cream, Salsa and Avocado. A pupusa is a traditional Salvadoran dish consisting of a thick, hand-made pocket of corn or rice flour tortilla stuffed with savory fillings like cheese, beans,

and chicharrón (pork). Pupusas are filled before being cooked on a flat, hot griddle known as a comal. There was one of chicken, and one beef, which laid one atop the other, with coleslaw atop these two round tortillas. I found them quite heavy and very filling. Joe told us he used Ask André, the IWFS AI wine pairing program, to help in selecting the wines. Those were Seghesio Rockville Zinfandel 2013 and Bergström Cumberland Reserve Pinot Noir 2018. Both did a decent job with this unusual dish.

Our main course was HHC Cubano Slow Roasted Pork Shoulder, Ham, Pickle, Provolone Cheese, Spicy Mustard, and Steak Fries. Cubano, or Cuban style, means a fork-tender dish made by marinating pork butt/shoulder in a citrus-garlic mojo sauce (orange, lime, garlic, cumin, oregano) for 12–24 hours. My pork was far from fork tender, certainly not shredable, again, a rather heavy sandwiched between two grilled crusts of bread. Along with the heavy steak fries, it was all somewhat dry. So, my impression of both these Mexican dishes was too dry, too heavy, too much food. Not one of our better HHC Mexican meals. The Chappellet Signature Cabernet Sauvignon 2013 and Freemark Abbey Sycamore 2016 were both good matches.

We finished with Black Magic Guiness Cake paired with a Warre Vintage Port 2011, a great match. Many thanks to Joe Goldstein our host and Chef Bobby Mekiney, and the attentive wait staff, for an enjoyable afternoon lunch.