Cinco de Mayo (Spanish for "fifth of May") is a celebration held on May 5. It is celebrated in the United States and regionally in Mexico, primarily in the state of Puebla, where the holiday is called El Día de la Batalla de Puebla (English: The Day of the Battle of Puebla). It originated with Mexican-American communities in the American West as a way to commemorate the cause of freedom and democracy during the first years of the American Civil War, and today the date is observed in the United States as a celebration of Mexican heritage and pride. In the state of Puebla, the date is observed to commemorate the Mexican army's unlikely victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, under the leadership of General Ignacio Zaragoza Seguín. Cinco de Mayo is not Mexico's Independence Day—the most important national patriotic holiday in Mexico—which is celebrated on September 16.
The Seventh of April Club was formed for the purpose of providing "for the discreet and refined enjoyment of uncommon wine and victuals and the companionship accruing thereto".
Excepting some peculiarities of our chairmen, our Club has been surprisingly successful and a fairly constant group, and it may be that we are frivolous as well. We do not enrich or endow or do good for anything or anyone but ourselves. We have no aspiration, as a Club, worthier than our own epicurean pleasure.
So The Seventh of April Club must be something of a modest and occasional oasis in so vexed a world as it has come to be a part of. So be it.
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Members have sought to combine with moderation of scale brilliant freshness in the fare and the atmosphere it engendered. As members have become critics, and sometimes fussbudgets, the dinners came more and more into focus, sharpened and heightened, as did each member and many of the places where The Club dined. Yet the excellence of food and wine, an admirable goal, must in such a group always cohere with Michel de Montaigne's words: "For I say with Epicurus that one should not so much consider what one eats as with whom one eats it...There is no dish so sweet to me, and no sauce so appetizing, as those derived from the company."
originally posted by Peter Creasey:
Domaine du Pegau Cuvee Reservee Chateauneuf-du-Pape '04 -- Dark red, blackberries, spice/garrique, earth, nice balance, herbs, tar, rather thick texture, fine now and still improving. [E]
The Seventh of April Club (from Club Charter)...
We do not enrich or endow or do good for anything or anyone but ourselves.