Sangria Hosts Baseball and Benefit for Father's Day

This Father's Day was unique for me. My wife and I are expecting our first born in August. While we discussed planning and parenthood, Hermosa Beach families gathered at Sangria to watch baseball and participate in a prostrate cancer awareness fundraiser on Sunday.

Five percent of Sangria's sales revenue during the afternoon event, along with proceeds from a signed baseball raffle and home run challenge, went to the Prostate Cancer Foundation in Santa Monica. 

I watched the fathers in the room, young and old. That's when it hit me that I, too, will soon be playing baseball with my son or daughter, or helping wipe his or her mouth at the dinner table. And, as it turns out, both Sangria and I are preparing for something new this summer.

The restaurant launched new items on its lunch menu at the fundraiser. The dishes were headed by chef Juan Basini, previously the sous chef under Oscar Rosales, who passed away six months ago.  A large photo of Chef Oscar proudly hangs near the kitchen.

"He designed all our sauces from scratch," said restaurant manager Lexi Balner.

New dishes on the menu include zacatecan street tacos, Puerto Nuevo enchiladas filled with sautéed lobster, and via Loma chilaquiles, which looked particularly good with beef chorizo added on top.

Sangria will be also changing its patio area, adding awnings and new seat arrangements. Other recent changes include additional flatscreen TVs and a new surround sound system for sports games.

Sunday's fathers were some of the first customers to experience these new additions, along with receiving free light blue wristbands embroidered with "DAD," raffling tickets to win signed baseballs from Torii Hunter of the Angels and Nomar Garciaparra, previously of the Oakland Athletics, and placing bids on the home run challenge.

The challenge is a partnership with Major League Baseball teams in which donors give a certain amount of money to the cancer foundation for each home run hit in 60-selected baseball games during the June schedule. All of the games played on Father's Day counted in this program.

The foundation has raised $37 million in pledges from the Home Run Challenge since its inception in 1997, said prostate cancer foundation representative Courtney Chai. She added that it's important to raise money for the foundation because, when compared to women, men are less willing to regularly screen for cancer.

"Women talk a lot more about breast cancer," Chai said. "So more women get regular screenings, which leads to better prevention and treatment. Men need to do the same for prostate cancer."

More than $300 was raised for the cancer foundation on Sunday. With thoughts of fatherhood and the prostate cancer foundation both swirling around in my head, I picked up the telephone as soon as I got home and made a call. "Hello?" my Dad answered.