Feast (August): Shrimp Boil

In January there was the roast chicken feast.
In February, there was the Big Mouth, Big Bowl: Soup Challenge.
In March, we had a Red Lobster Fake-out feast.
In April, we had our feast at Nakashima - no photos involved,
In May, we had a Mother's Day Brunch.
In June, we had an impromptu dinner party.
In July, we had a shrimp salad feast.
In August, we hosted a dinner party honoring Jane Eyre.

And, in August we had a shrimp boil feast.

I first got the idea when Ezra Pound Cake posted menu ideas for a True Blood premiere party. Labor Day weekend seemed like a great time to try it.

On a visit to my parent's house in July, I spotted my mom boiling corn in a giant pot. I asked to borrow the pot. She asked why. I told her about the shrimp boil. She offered to come to the boil and bring the pot.

This was the scene from the kitchen for most of the day. With these two at the stove, I really had to be vigilant (and loud!) if I had an opinion about something.

This was the scene from the living room; it was raining most of the day.

Sometimes, the living room dwellers would attempt to help in the kitchen.

 

And, other times the living room dwellers just came into the kitchen to provide some entertainment. (Imagine Luke saying, "I am a robot. I am a robot." in a very monotone voice from inside the metal bucket.)

Somehow - in the midst of all the chaos - we managed to cook a pretty delicious meal. The process did get a little hectic at times. We followed a recipe for a shrimp boil from Ezra Pound Cake.

Makes 6 servings

Broth:
3 Tbsp Old Bay seasoning (or favorite crab boil mix)
3 lemons, quartered
2 Tbsp salt
2 bay leaves
1 can or bottle of beer
1 onion, quartered
1 head garlic, sliced in half horizontally
Cayenne pepper
Hot Sauce

2 lb small red potatoes
2 lb Andouille sausage, sliced on the bias into thirds
6 ears corn, shucked and halved
2 to 3 pounds raw shrimp, peeled and thawed

Melted butter

Fill a large stockpot with about 5 quarts of water. Add all broth ingredients and bring to a rolling boil.

Add potatoes, lower heat to medium-high, and simmer, uncovered, 15 minutes.
Add sausage, and cook for another 5 minutes.
Add corn, and cook for another 7 minutes.
Add shrimp, stir, and cook for about 3 minutes or until shrimp turn pink. Drain.

Dump everything on to a table lined with newspapers.

Serve with melted butter, hot sauce, salt and pepper, and ice cold beer.

 

A few notes about the recipe. . .

• I opted for Penzey's shrimp and crab boil.  I've never been disappointed by any of Penzey's spices. . . until the shrimp and crab boil. Next time, I'll just go with Old Bay or Zatarain's.
• I also didn't think the final product had enough salt or pepper.
• I almost skipped the sausage. I normally don't like the spiciness of the Andouille. I am so glad I added it, though. It was the most flavorful part of the boil.
• We doubled the recipe but attempted to cook everything in one pot. We should have used two separate pots because we ended up transferring some of the ingredients to a second pot (which wasn't as carefully seasoned) part way through cooking. And, the cooking times were impacted a lot by having so many ingredients in one pot.
• Overall, I just didn't feel like our final product had a much flavor. It really needed the sausage. Using a different shrimp seasoning, and adding more salt and pepper would help. I might also add a little more spice next time - maybe even some lemon pepper.
• We covered the counter top with a few flattened garbage bags before adding paper bags to actually serve the food on. Clean-up was super simple!
• The menu was super simple. Appetizers were light - a veggie tray, a bread dip, and some deviled eggs. Dinner was just the shrimp boil and some crusty bread (with plenty of butter). Dessert was an ice cream sundae bar.

Everyone enjoyed the food - especially the littles. Dottie couldn't get enough corn, and Luke (no big surprise here!) was a huge fan of the shrimp.

So - we declared 2011 the year of the feast. And, we've been pretty successful so far in hosting a monthly feast. It's been a great way to eat well at home, try new recipes, and do something the kids and grown-ups can both enjoy.

I'm not sure what our September and October feast menus will be. Any ideas?

November will be Thanksgiving. We're really good at Thanksgiving.

I'm not sure about December. Maybe something for New Year's Eve?

And, if you're interested in coming - just let me know. The more the merrier.

Layover

I am enjoying the people watching on beautiful concourse C in the Minneapolis / St. Paul airport. I have seen and heard many things I wish I hadn't including a man (in white velcro shoes) shouting loudly into his phone, "Let me talk at him!" and a woman wearing Zumba pants in a Coca-Cola print with Sketchers Shape-ups.

I digress.

I'm still digesting (both the food and the experiences) a fabulous Fourth of July weekend. It seems like I should process it all before I head off on my next adventure.

I'm so lucky to have Mike, Angie, Luke, and Dottie as part of my life. They just, basically, let me move in for the weekend.

The festivities started with pool-side Popsicles on Friday afternoon. Excuse Dottie's exposed parts. A suit that fits the girl on the bottom doesn't fit the girl on the top.

It continued with a modified Shrimp Cobb Salad for dinner. We quadrulped the amount of bacon, doubled the amount of shrimp, cooked the shrimp in the bacon grease, doubled the dressing, added cucumbers, added green and yellow peppers, added red pepper, and added (of course!) cheese.

The salad was a rousing success. Try it. Well, don't try the recipe. Try our version.

A little shot of the post-dinner mess on Friday.

Somehow, I didn't take any pictures of Friday night's strawberry balsamic jam adventure. Angie? Did you take any?

Saturday started bright and early with a trip to the Farmers' Market and butcher. I was trying to explain to Dottie and Luke (I'm not sure why) that some people and animals are vegetarians. Dottie shouted, "No!" and shoved a beef stick in her mouth. Geez. I love that girl.

After a little nap (for the grown-up and the kiddos), I embarked on a fun-aunt-Barb babysitting adventure. There was lots of swimming, more popsicles, and some coloring.

Dinner on Saturday night included this amazing cheese, bread, garlic dip concoction and steaks on the grill. The bread recipes suggests you jam one pound of thinly sliced cheese in the bread. You will get impatient, and you will think, "Sheesh. I don't need all this cheese." You would be wrong. Just keep jamming that cheese in there. You will love it.

And, after dinner Luke needed to go for just one more swim. Man. I love that kid. He can always make me smile.

Not pictured:
Sunday's day of rest
Memphis's sheer exhaustion after Friday and Saturday
Monday's fireworks extravaganza
Luke and Dottie's play date with Miri and Henry
Packing for CA

How to Plan a Dinner Party

Me (to Facebook from the checkout at Gooseberries Market at 11:57 AM):
Summer cart - wine and food for the grill.

Angie (at 1:05 PM):
What time should we be there? I'll bring more wine!




I quickly followed up with a phone call explaining that she'd need to bring more than just some wine - especially if Luke and Dottie planned to eat anything.




By 4:30 we were all in the same city and simultaneously cooking dinner, drinking wine, and entertaining (and being entertained by) the little people.


We managed to put together quite the dinner: a beautiful cheese plate, a flight of white wines, baked potatoes, steaks for the adults, hot dogs for the little people, tomato salad with cucumber and feta, and s'mores.

And, Luke put on a concert for us. He wants to rock. Rock! This is the first dinner party in which we have ever had the good fortune of having live music.

And, I will officially say that this is the first time dinner party guests have ever taken a bath and put on their pajamas before leaving my house. That's how any good dinner party ends, right? You're so covered with food you can't get in the car without a bath, and you're so exhausted you need to wear your pajamas home.

Feast (March): Fake Out

I do love to eat. And, I love people who love to eat. That's just one of the many reasons (and probably one of the least significant reasons, actually) that Angie and I are such great friends.

We declared 2011 to be "Year of the Feast." It was in part because we had lots of great ideas for meals, and it was in part because feasts let us stay home and eat well. We can enjoy Luke and Dottie and have far better (and far more!) food than we could if we went out.

January was roast chicken.
February was the Soup Challenge.
March was a fake-out.

The cooking included plenty of playing with Miss Dottie who is getting increasingly hilarious with each passing day.

Each feast starts with a cheese plate. We hadn't really planned that. It just sort of happened.

This month's plate featured two cheese favorites: Ossau-Iraty (cow, France) and Piave (aged cow, Italy). We tried a new soft cheese, French Cremeux. It was delicious slathered on a piece of bread with some strawberry jam.

And, then there was the blue. We went the same blue we tried in February, Roth Kase Buttermilk Blue (a raw cow's milk cheese from Wisconsin). We served it with pear slices and fig jam.

And, we served it on a baguette with. . . wait for it. . . bacon and honey. I can tell you're thinking it sounds gross. You are wrong, though. IT. WAS. AMAZING. AMAZING. AMAZING.

We snacked on the cheese while we cooked. I had some help in the kitchen from a certain Little Man for awhile. (This, by the way, is my favorite picture of the day.)

We started with a wedge salad with blue cheese dressing. (It's actually the same salad we made for Angie's birthday.) This is most definitely not part of the Red Lobster menu, but we decided to substitute it for two reasons. First, we have a new-found infatuation with blue cheese. Second, Claire and Phil talked and talked and talked about wedge salads on last week's Modern Family. It made us want one.

We continued with our version of Red Lobster's cheddar bay biscuits.

Our original plan for the main course was a butter and garlic grilled shrimp and salmon with a sweet marinade. The salmon didn't happen because there was not a good lookin' fish to be found at any nearby grocery store.

We ended up with shrimp two-ways. The first batch was marinaded and grilled.

The second was a simple shrimp cocktail with a sauce that was fancied up.

We served the shrimp with some (not pictured) steamed broccoli and baked potatoes topped with bacon, cheese, sour cream, and green onions.

It wasn't the fanciest of meals, but we had a great time and ended with full stomachs.

The meal got two thumbs up from the pickiest palettes at the table.

Possible future feasts include:

Tea party

Summer picnic (with a Cobb salad)

Olive gnocchi

Smoke Out (barbeque)

Appetizer Bracket (maybe in April for the Final Four)

Big Mouth Big Bowl, Soup Edition

Angie and I decided to make our February feast a little bigger than just us. We made it into a cooking challenge, and the Big Mouth Big Bowl Challenge, Soup Edition was born.

Preparations started Thursday night. I was busy making place mats and sewing cloth napkins and printing my recipe on a special card to be exchanged with the other chef-testants and buying a few more dishes (and a ladle).

Friday night I went to Angie's. There was grocery shopping and pom pom fluffing to be done.

Saturday morning preparations were in full swing. After a quick stop at our favorite cheese shop we came home to make our soups and the cheese platter and decorate the kitchen.

Special touches included. . . 

. . . simple floral arrangements (baby's breath and red carnations) in Campbell's soup cans.

. . . a personalized spoon (as a trophy) made by Wooden Hive framed and mounted on paper.

. . . recipes printed on cards from Honeybee Designs.

. . . poms from Prost to the Host.

. . . handmade cloth napkins (with Helen Dardik Mod Kitchen fabric from Lucky Kaeru Fabric).

. . . personalized place mats featuring the name of each soup.

The guests started arriving around 3:00 (with their soups).

We snacked on a gourmet selection of cheeses and meats while we waited to eat/judge the soup and bread at 4:30.

Cheese included:
Pleasant Ridge Reserve (WI cheese)
Trugole (cow, Italy)
Black River Blue (WI cheese)
Dorothea (goat with potato)
Ossau-Iraty (sheep, France)

Meat included:
Spicy Sopprasata
Prosciutto

Nibbles included:
breadsticks
chocolate covered espresso beans
grapes
stuffed peppers
salted almonds
pears
fig jam

(The WI cheese plate in the front is a little sampling of WI cheese from the grocery store to keep the kids happy.)

See the little red peppers in the lower right corner of the picture below? The might be my new favorite appetizer. They are pickled peppers (from by the peppers and olives at the grocery store), cleaned out, and stuffed with feta seasoned with salt and pepper. Delish!

I also found out that I actually do like blue cheese. This was a WI blue. We served it with fig jam and pear slices. DELICIOUS!

And, then it was time to serve the soups. We drew names and served the soups one at a time.

Contestant # 1 was Barbara. She served split pea and ham. I still cannot explain how amazed I was by this soup. I had no idea I even liked split pea and ham, but Barbara convinced me that I do. She filled hers up with spinach and leeks and other vegetable goodness. Perfection!

Contestant # 2 was Angie. She served up her extra-special Hois-i-licious Shrimp Bisque. Little did we know as we tasted it, but this soup would go home with the winner's spoon!

Angie's Happiness on a Spoon (aka chicken dumping) was soup # 3. The hostess of our festivities definitely served up a competitive soup. It got my vote with its homemade chicken stock and subtly sweet flavor from rutabaga.

My soup - minestrone - was the final soup of the night. I've eaten it a million times before, so I think it paled in comparison to its competitors, but Brad and Angie both assured me it was tasty.

Here is my place mat after all the soups were eaten. I definitely ate too much; I was easily more full than I normally am at Thanksgiving!

And, then it was time to cast the votes. We each got one vote, and the chef-testants could not vote for their own concoction. Casting my vote was far more difficult than I thought it would be. Each soup was so different, and each had its own little something special. In the end, though, I went with the chicken dumpling.

I should probably also have mentioned that the fun of the evening was greatly enhanced by a sampling of fine beers. Angie and I selected:

Stella Artois

Capitol Brewery, Supper Club (WI beer)

Lake Front Brewery, Wheat Monkey (WI beer)

Leinenkugels, 1888 Bock (WI beer)

We finished off the night by just hanging out and chatting. Dorothy - of course - got Brad's undivided attention.

Congratulations to Angie and her shrimp bisque for taking home the trophy!

Thank you to the other Angie (my Angie) for being the best hostess and the bestest friend!

Thank you to Barbara for making me laugh and showing me that I do, in fact, like split pea and ham soup.