V Day Sushi Adventures

Sushi made with the help of Nobu Now cookbook Rachel found in the donation pile at the library!

From left to right: avocado, home made picked carrots, masago, blanched baby bok choy, sautéed baby bok choy leaves, cucumber, seaweed salad, home made crab salad, asian pear, and panko. 

Roll 1: White fish, pickled carrots, seaweed salad, asian pear, panko, and home made spicy mayo.

Roll 2: Shrimp tempura, sautéed baby bok choy, crab salad, pickled carrots, cream cheese, cucumber, avocado, masago, and sweet soy with sesame seeds.

This was sooo much fun! I see why people go out for sushi though because it's not that it is too difficult to execute but MAN what a process! My favorite part was making the rice. I read the recipe and just at first glance for some reason I didn't think it would work but I decided to follow it to a T. I was soo happy with the end result and even more thrilled because I had to cook it on an electric stove. 

Sushi in a Bowl

OK so I realize that some Sushi Master is rolling over in their grave right now because of course the AMERICANS always find ways to bastardize things but this was created out of laziness/necessity. I unfortunately cannot take credit for being the 1st to make this atrocity. The next day I had to work a PM shift and Rachel wanted sushi again for lunch and so did I. I didn't have time to orchestrate rolling more sushi but I did have time to sear some tuna and then put all the ingredients I had from the night before in a BOWL! It was amazing and we ate sushi this way two times after that (I over prepped go figure) : ). 

AND FOR THE BONUS! 

Mock Turtle Soup is called "Mock" Turtle Soup because it usually doesn't have any turtle in it at all! Turtle is too expensive probably because they are hard to clean, yield very little meat for the effort, and because Rachel said you would have to pay her a lot of money because she loves them too much. It was created by the English in the 18th century as a substitute for Green Turtle Soup. It was usually made with the brains and organ meats of calves or even their hooves! The joke made in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is that the soup is made from Mock Turtle as if it was an actual species of turtle. P.S. Ask D to show you what Rachel made for me on V Day! Miss YOU!

F.O.P.R.

Fisherman's Ocean progress report, part 2.

On page 183, I have encountered the first real, non-theoretical fishing tip in the book.  It concerns using different sorts of lures on the same line.  The suggestion was to use a fly (the tiny, weightless lures used by the obsessive-compulsive psychopath philosophers known as fly fishermen) as a 'teaser,' tied only a line a few feet up from the main rig.

The article's main point was that fish feeding habits are variable, and very hard to observe, so giving them options is one way to beat them.

I here present my fishing goals for the 2013 season.

1) Attempt to get a sheepshead off the Cooper Pier at least 5 times.
2) Attempt to get a flounder of the bottom of Breach Inlet at least 5 times.
3) Go to the Folly Pier as often as possible, and every time I go, try at least 1 alternative bait set up on top of my normal shrimp/cut bait double-drop bottom rig.
4) Get the Trolley Line up and running.

This book is getting good.  Part 1 is all environmental theory, part 2 is all descriptions of types of fish, and part 3, which I will arrive at today, is all practical advice.

Miss you, sweets, we should try to talk soon.

Mardi Gras

So we can't really have a Mardi Gras party this year, cause D is still kinda broken, so instead we are having a small (well, smaller) scale dinner-and-drinks thing.  We are calling it the Krewe of Legba Founder's Dinner, Shrimp Boil, and Hammertime Shit Show.  I wish you both were here.

The menu this evening:

Carolina Calico Bay Scallops Raw on Nabisco Club Crackers with Sel Gris

Mock Turtle Soup

Shrimp and Andouille Boil (featuring Slap Ya Mama devil dust)

Chanda's Meat Pie (which we have formally re-named the Myocardial Infarction Pop Tart)

And my signature cocktail, the Cooter Brown (It's Rebel Yell Bourbon and Steen's Cane Syrup on the rocks with club soda).

And, I have an idea that homemade kahlua will be thrown down sooner or later.....


You give that Mardi-Gras hater Rachel a big hug and tell her I said she's a grouch, and if she was here, she'd be having a blast.  Tu es pas tu-ay WOOOO!


PS Bonus points if you can tell me what the meat is in Mock Turtle Soup, and what that has to do with Alice in Wonderland...

Fisherman's Ocean Progress Report

So I finished part 1 (of 3) of The Fisherman's Ocean.  It was a complete discussion of the marine environment, talking about tides, waves, currents, and salinity.  There was surprisingly little discussion of fish, and I started to get frustrated, but then I checked out the table of contents.

As it happens, the three parts cover different topics.  Part 1 is strictly on the environment, part 2 covers the fish themselves, and only in Part 3 does he actually get into functional tips on how to properly kick the fish's asses.  

So I started in on part 2, and it was immediately informative.  Not just on how fish work biologically, but how they think, too.  Its really starting to get good.  Here is a disturbing fun-fin-fact.  Fish look for eyes, because they are the least camouflage-able feature of a fish.  So a majority of fish-on-fish strikes are on the EYES.  Fish are weird.  That's why lures always have eyes.

In other fish-ass-kicking-related news, I bought a 12 foot surf rod.  It was actually pretty cheap, like 30 bucks.  I plan on using it to throw the anchor for the trolley line, but it will also be good for beach fishing, because it is so damn long it will be able to throw the bait a mile.

So that's what's up.  7 new dishes on this week at the restaurant.  There is 1 i am especially proud of, I'll post about it later this week.

(In other news, cool moment at the Moose the o