Gastronomy - A Place To Share it!

Went to a new place called Sweet Caroline's Crab-N-Que http://sweetcarolinescrabnque.com/ It was Saturday night and they had a waiting list so we ordered Carry out. We got Barbecue Pork Nachos, Smoked Chicken Wings and Fried Jumbo Shrimp. The pulled pork nachos and the chicken wings were exceptional.

 

The USDA came out with a pretty nice food safety application called FoodKeeper which shows guidelines for keeping food safe. Things like, if I open a jar of mayonnaise, how long can I safely keep it in the refrigerator? and/or If I buy fresh chicken, how long can I keep it refrigerated or frozen?...etc... It's available for Android and iPhone:

Android
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=gov.usda.fsis.foodkeeper2&hl=en

iPhone
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/usda-foodkeeper/id978186100?mt=8

 

Went to the Smokin' Pit BBQ http://smokinpit.com/ for dinner. I had the 1 Meat Platter with Chicken, Cornbread, Coleslaw and Onion Rings. The wife had the Smokin' Club with Smoked Turkey, Hickory Smoked Ham, Smoked Applewood Bacon, American Cheese, Lettuce and Tomato, with a side of coleslaw.

I give the Smokin' Club an A+. It was delicious and my wife could barely finish it. With my 1 Meat Platter, I give the Chicken an A+. It had a nice smokey flavor, plus you get 1/2 pound The Cornbread a B, it was a little dry, The Coleslaw and Onion Rings a C. The Coleslaw was pretty soggy, I think it came out of a carton, rather than homemade and the Onion Rings were soft, so I would guess they are frozen, not home made.

 

Friday night and it's time for a little Coconut Cream Ale - Aloha!

 

I love mesquite smoked shrimp

 

Here's what I do:

I soak about 2 cups of mesquite chips for 30 minutes.

I set like 8 coals on each side of my grill for indirect heat and wait about 15 minutes for the coal to get covered in grey ash.

I drain the mesquite chips and pour them on the coals and put the shrimp on in the middle of the grill.

As you can see from the grill thermometer the heat is real low during the smoking (200-225),

After about 20 minutes the smoke stops and the heat starts to rise quickly and I immediately take the shrimp off. If you wait too long, you'll have shrimp jerky and I have made that mistake in the past.

The mesquite smoked shrimp I made tonight were outstanding.

 

Nothing special. I use a little olive oil on the shrimp and make a dipping sauce of mayonnaise with a few shots of mustard.

 

Pasta avec fruits de mer - Seafood Pasta with clams squid, mussels. Frejus, France

 

4th of July Mesquite Smoked Surf and Turf

 

Wife and I always like to go to the local festivals in the summer. We went to the Taste Of Roselle this weekend. A new local pub had Maple BBQ chicken wings. I was amazed at how much maple flavor they had. They were pretty good

 

I love seafood, and have had just about every type of seafood, except one, that I just don't want to try.

Some friends of ours that we have met up with in France, decided to spend Thanksgiving in France. They're foodies like us and always post great food pictures that will make your mouth water. One of the things they had was something I will never try. They posted a picture of it. A sea urchin

 

You are a very brave man!

 

got tired of the cold and snow in Chicago so the wife and I have been enjoying the sun and 80 degree weather in Florida. We found a pretty good seafood place. I checked out the buffalo shrimp with blue cheese dressing today and they were delicious. The place is called the The Great Catch: http://www.thegreatcatchseafood.com/

 

Teriyaki Chicken, Dragon Fire Grill, Busch Gardens, Tampa Florida. It was better than I thought it would be, plus there must have been a half pound of chicken on top.

 

I'm not the least bit Irish, so St. Patrick's Days really doesn't mean anything to me, and I never go out on St. Patrick's Day.

Many years ago, I worked for an Irish contractor and I was told we were starting at the shop tomorrow, which happened to be St. Patrick's Day. I didn't give it a second thought. When I arrived at the shop at 7am everyone was drinking and that's how they spent the day.

Tonight, I am in Tennessee and wanted to get something to eat. Across the street from the hotel was a bar and grill. Not thinking anything about the name beginning with O', I walked in and quickly remembered it was St. Patrick's Day. The hostess told me it would be 45 minutes to an hour for a table. I told the hostess I would go to the bar and get something to go. After about 10 minutes a chair finally opened at the bar and I ordered overstuffed potato skins to go and a beer while I waited for the order. The next thing I know, people at the bar are ordering shots for everyone at the bar. I had 2 shots and had to leave the 3rd.

Anyways, the potato skins were pretty good.

 

Even though I've been to Italy and have checked out many grocery stores for unique products, and even toured the olive museum; yesterday I discovered olive pesto. I have never seen it before and it was at my local grocery store. It contains black olives, basil, pine nuts and cheese. It can be used as dip for chips or used on pasta. I am going to make some olive pesto pasta today.