I've always been thankful that I'm not allergic to anything. I breathe a sigh of relief every time I get to say "not that I know of" when the doctor asks if I'm allergic to anything. At the same time, I've always felt really bad for people who do suffer from food allergies. Lactose intolerance? You poor thing! What? You can't eat wheat/bread? I just don't think I could make it.
I realize that if you are one of the people who can't eat certain foods you get used to it and take it in stride. And of course, food labels are enormously useful in helping people avoid those dangerous foods. Even though there are more, manufacturers are required to list the top eight, which are responsible for 90% of allergic reactions. I'm sure all of these look familiar to any careful label reader!
1. wheat 2. soy 3. peanuts 4. tree nuts (almonds, walnuts, etc) 5, milk 6. eggs 7. fish 8. shellfish
After disliking scallops through most of my childhood, I found them on my birthday dinner plate a few years ago. My friend had whipped up a warm scallop salad for my big day, and it was insanely delicious. Now, of course, I love the things. They're very tasty, pretty versatile, and are ridiculously simple to prepare.
Over the last few weeks, I wanted to use up the last of the big scallops hanging out in my freezer. First, I made the above -- a warm salad to get back to the roots of my scallop love. The key is to have a creamy sauce/dressing, and vegetables that are warm and almost limp (but still holding some firmness). This one had tomatoes, peppers, green beans, basil, and feta.
There is a whole slew of cooking shows on the web that showcase newbie cooks that can show off a good meal, but can't necessarily give you some great background information that a chef can. Above you can watch Dallas' Master Chef David McMillan prepare halibut and clams with chorizo and black bean sauce -- and he not only discusses the dish, but the particulars of what is going into the meal. For example, he explains the different flavors that can be coaxed out of garlic, and the differences between curly and flat-leaf parsley.
It's the debut show, so I imagine there will be lots of great cooking info to come in the future. Enjoy!
The other day, I was itching for a great meal -- as gourmet as possible without breaking the bank. So my friend and I walked around the corner to this small fusion bistro, and while the over-done steak left something to be desired, I almost melted over the seafood chowder. There's nothing quite like the texture of seafood so soft that it melts in your mouth, exploding with flavor. Still dreaming about that great bowl of sea goodness, I have to share a similarly awesome-looking recipe from Leite's Culinaria -- Rhode Island Clear-Broth Quahog Chowder.
Doesn't the above look absolutely amazing? It's also accompanied by a great story -- one that taps into my day dreams about living near the ocean and having a sea full of great food as my back yard. I don't have quahogs readily available, so I'm hoping one of you Slashfood readers can take on this recipe for me and tell me if it tastes as good as it looks. I have a feeling that it does...
I never thought anything could beat the combination of garlic, butter, and shrimp in scampi. But really, that's more because garlic and butter make most things taste great, rather than the trio being the perfect flavor combination. When my tongue got a taste of ginger shrimp, however, I discovered a true pairing. The crisp, spicy-yet-light ginger flavor is just meant to go with shrimp, and together, they're unstoppable. Put it in a stir-fry, pasta, pizza, or a wrap like above.
Seeing that I still have some homemade mayonnaise, I decided to whip together a quick shrimp salad. Some frozen shrimp was quickly sauteed with ginger, cooled, and then mixed with mayo, onions, orange peppers, and a little salt and pepper. Spooned into a wrap with some diced Swedish vodka currant cheddar, and you've got a great twist on the usual seafood salad.
For another twist -- add the ginger shrimp to some egg salad.
After many years abiding to the rule that I would never eat what I couldn't look at in its real form, I succumbed to temptation and had a delicious bowl of Conch Chowder at the Nicola Seafood Restaurant at the Hyatt in Key West (a dish that is, sadly, no longer on the menu). While the conch might look all gooey out of the shell, it's ridiculously delicious and a must-eat when heading south.
And if you're lucky enough to live down south, or find yourself in a kitchen somewhere that conch is available, you've got to check out the quick video above. Bahama Breeze Chef Vern Thomas whips up a really easy Conch Chowder recipe. It's got all the basics -- onions, carrots, potatoes, plus a great tip about putting whole Scotch bonnet peppers into the mix -- to give the chowder flavor without the tear-inducing heat. If you want to learn more about conch as well, they've got a how-to here.
I always thought that a muscle car was a hot rod from the late 60's- early 70's until I was driving around my old haunts of Rockland, Maine yesterday researching and shooting an article and saw this impressive Mussel Car.
That looks like it was the remains of a tasty lobster, clam, and mussel bake. Or maybe it washed up on the beach after a Nor'easter. Either way that's one heck of a vehicle. I wonder how many shellfish power it is? Does it get dive bombed by hungry gulls? Does it belongs to the offspring of Neptune's many affairs with mortals? If I follow, will it lead to a huge vat of steaming Mussel's Provence? Inquiring minds want to know.
It's easy to pull out a few crackers, chips, or veggies to munch on, but I'm a big fan of fancy no-muss, no-mess snacks that are even tastier. One of my favorite quickies is shrimp cocktail, like the one above.
I keep a bag of cooked shrimp in the freezer, and when I'm feeling peckish, I pull out a handful, and then quickly thaw them in warm water* in a measuring cup. Pull out the shrimp, quickly rinse the cup, pour in a little cocktail sauce, and viola! It's shrimp cocktail with only one thing dirtied in the process, maybe two if you need to spoon out your cocktail sauce.
*Edit: Warning: As Chris pointed out below, warm water can increase bacteria attached to the shrimp after cooking, another reason why cold water baths are usually used. Using cold water, if you choose, shouldn't take much longer for a small amount of shrimp.
The old story was that expectant mothers should eat fish to help their growing babies' brains. Then we heard that eating fish was dangerous to the health of the baby. If you're pregnant, no fish!
Obviously, fish was never really bad for expectant mothers; it was simply that some certain types of fish that had high levels of mercury. All the news about "fish," "mercury," and "pregnancy" must have been confusing. The most recent research doesn't seem to sound like anything new, just a reminder that fish is, in fact, good for the brain, as "Preschoolers whose mothers regularly ate low-mercury fish during pregnancy may have sharper minds than their peers...Researchers found that among 341 3-year-olds, those whose mothers ate more than two servings of fish per week during pregnancy generally performed better on tests of verbal, visual and motor development."
Just remember that it's fish with low levels of mercury, so make sure you do your homework.
A few days ago I told you about the 2008 Boston International Seafood Show that is going on from 2/24-26, 2008. I went down to the show yesterday and spent six hours tasting my way around the exhibits. I don't think I have ever eaten so much raw fish before in one day, no make that one month, as I did yesterday. If I don't see fish again for awhile it will suit me just fine, although I always have a hankering for shrimp, lobster, scallops, and clams.
Here's just a quick glimpse of the 2008 Boston International Seafood Show in twenty photos.
Gallery: Photos from the 2008 Boston International Seafood Show
The Boston International Seafood Show is being held starting tomorrow, Sunday Feb. 24 and going through Tues. 26, 2008. The event is located at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center from 10am-5pm on the 24 & 25th, 10am-3pm on the 26th. This is the largest seafood show in North America. If you love seafood and are within a few hours drive of Boston then this is where you should be over the next few days. You will see every type of fish and shellfish there is on display. Experience all the new seafood based products, try samples of value added goods like smoked fish, chowders, pate's, dips, gourmet items, you name it.
I have heard about the show for several years and just haven't been able to schedule it in. This year I gave it top priority and I am going to be joining one of Maine's top, multiple award winning chefs, Carl Johnson, owner of what is one of the best smokehouses on the East Coast, Grindstone Neck of Maine and The Fishermans Inn & Restaurant, both located in Winter Harbor, ME. Carl has been written up in several magazines and newspapers. Last year his incredible smoked crab claws were near the top of the list of Saveur Magazines Top 100 2007. Over the past few months I have been chatting with him as he develops new products. Late last fall he told me about his foray into cold smoked uni. he had made a batch and thought it was really good, but didn't see much of a local market. For New Years I asked him to make me a batch and he graciously did. I coordinated a special event at a local Sushi restaurant where we served this paired with a sweet potato shochu, an elegant Japanese spirit, to huge success. Now I will be delivering some of this incredible product to several restaurants in NYC so they can try it, as well as the test kitchen of one of the best food magazines in the country. Expect to hear more about Grindstone Neck of Maine's cold smoked uni.
I look forward to exploring what is happening in the world of seafood with Carl. I couldn't ask for a more knowledgeable guide. Half chef / half molecular gastronomist, he is sure to have valuable insight into the show. See you there!
Talk about your specific food holidays. First of all, I had no idea that people even stuffed their flounder with crab. Is this some sort of regional delicacy that I'm not aware of? As someone who isn't a fan of seafood, this isn't a day that I would celebrate anyway, but I thought I would have at least heard of this day in my web travels, but it's a new one on me.
Though I am personally not a big fan of seafood in general and shrimp in particular, I know that I am in the minority on this one. Most of the world's population loves shrimp. This fact plays out in a bad way in Jamaica.
For years, people in the mountains of Jamaica were able to catch giant shrimp in the rivers there. They would catch them in the old fashioned way, which was, of course, slow and difficult. And, just like throwing dynamite into the ocean to catch fish in Asia, someone came up with a quick new way to catch a lot of shrimp quickly for some fast cash. They dump some kind of poison into the river, instantly killing the shrimp (and everything else), which then float to the top. They're easy to catch that way.
The good news is that a lot of local people have joined a movement to stop this crime. They're taking steps to catch perpetrators, educate local judges (so offenders won't be simply released), and stop the poachers from selling their ill gotten gains at the market. Hopefully they'll be able to put a stop to this before the shrimp is gone for good or the environment is permanently damaged or both.
It's no secret that what was once inexplicable about the seductive power of chocolate can now be explained with science. In fact, there are a lot of foods we call "aphrodisiacs" that have a real, studied, tested, and documented chemical basis for amor. They're good for your general health, contain compounds that stimulate hormone production, or simulate chemicals that have effects on the brain.
However, there are some aphrodisiac foods that have no scientific basis whatsoever. None! And yet people still use them to woo a lover. Like men and women who pout their lips, put on a red dress, coyly look out of the corner of their eye and lightly touch the other's forearm, these foods have seductive powers based mostly on what they look like and how they feel in your hands, mouth, and throat. Sure, love is about those deep, warm, inner things, but there's something to be said about seduction through visual and sensual stimulation.
Here's a list of nine foods that have the "Look of Love."
A jar of honey can become a sticky mess. Next time you're adding honey to another dish or a mug of tea, use a honey dipper to prevent a thick gooey layer from spreading.
The Boston International Seafood Show
The hell?
Though I am personally not a big fan of 
Chocolate-stuffed bananas on the grill
Tyler Florence welcomes new daughter
Beware kids' menus!
