liamsaunt

Sunday, spaghetti puttanesca with cod. I kept the olives whole so my nephew could pick them out of his portion. Monday, roasted butternut squash soup flavored with green Thai curry paste, fish sauce, ginger, and lemongrass, topped with toasted coconut, cilantro and chopped up cashews.

I dislike turkey, and don't eat it at Thanksgiving. I have no problem cooking it for others though. This is the second year that I have to cook the entire meal at my house and then transport everything to my Dad's. It's not ideal, but my Dad's pretty much housebound now, and he doesn't like to have people over for as long as it would take to cook the entire meal at his house. Last year I tried the Ina Garten method for make ahead turkey, cooking and carving the turkey at my house, resting it on the gravy and then flash reheating it at my Dad's. Ina Garten's make ahead turkey It was fine, but my brother was disappointed that I brought it over already carved. This year I am going to try and transport the whole bird over there, counting the drive over as the resting period (we only live 15-20 minutes apart). I have two turkey roasters available to me, so plan to swap the cooked bird into the cool pan for the ride between houses. Other dishes are dressing (cooked outside the bird), mashed potatoes, butternut squash, a cauliflower gratin for myself and my niece to share (she doesn't eat turkey either), green beans, and cranberry sauce. Oh, and turkey gravy of course.

Friday, bay scallops with angel hair and crispy panko in lemon sauce Saturday, broiled sole with a different lemon sauce, mashed potatoes and asparagus

tomato-carrot tortellini soup with spinach Served with ATK spicy cheese bread

Chicken tenderloins piccata style over spinach. I did an egg and flour coat on the chicken before cooking it, but I probably won't bother next time.

I've been busy and making lots of repeats lately, so haven't been taking a lot of pictures. Sunday we had cavatappi with a quick tomato basil sauce And last night I made mutter paneer

Black bean soup with pickled onions

That sounds really interesting. I have that cookbook, though have not looked at it in a long time, and I have brussels sprouts from my CSA right now. This might make an appearance later this week. My nephew requested that I make Moroccan meatballs with arugula for dinner last night. He said he used to make it with elk while living in Montana, and it was a favorite meal for him and his roommates. We cannot get elk here as far as I know, so I used beef instead. I also made vegetable "meatballs" for myself and my sister from roasted eggplant and mushrooms since we don't eat red meat. This is my plate, with the vegetable balls. I thought it was fine. He was happy, and that's the most important thing. I was out of couscous, so made rice pilaf instead.

My CSA has been giving me lots of carrots every week. I must have at least 10 lbs. in the house right now, even after making this dinner recipe from the NY Times. Recipe: carrot risotto with chile crisp The recipe calls for 2 1/4 lbs. of carrots. To amp up the number of carrots used even more, I made carrot juice in my vitamix and swapped that in for some of the broth, which took care of another 1 1/2 lbs. It was pretty tasty! The roasted carrots were quite spicy, and we did not need any extra chile crisp drizzled on top like the recipe suggests.

spiced chicken chopped salad

bucatini with corn, bacon and scallions

Tried a recipe from Milk Street's Tuesday Nights Mediterranean for Turkish style flatbreads stuffed with roasted butternut squash and haloumi cheese with a lemon cumin yogurt sauce. The recipe called for large tortillas for the wrapper, probably to save time, but we all liked it enough that I found a recipe for how to make the flatbread from scratch and will make it that way next time. I stuffed my nephew's with spiced ground beef instead of squash so everyone at the table was happy. Next time I will do a salad instead of oven fries.

Ravioli with roasted beet sauce, wilted arugula, and toasted pine nuts

Sunday I made chicken souvlaki with tzatziki and what might be the last of the local tomatoes. Last night, paneer butter masala and maharajah's rice

Gnocchi with roasted cherry tomato sauce, basil and fresh mozzarella cheese

Noodle bowl with seared tuna, choi sum, napa cabbage, and miso glazed harukei turnips

I am so sorry to hear this. I loved reading the Mantoulin blogs, and the Ladies who Lunch.

It did not go to waste. My husband's brother took it home with him. Belated end to this visit. Sunday we went back to Oysterfest to watch the shuck off finals. It was a lot less crowded, which was nice. The fellow who won was from neighboring Eastham. After the shuck off they had an auction to raise money for the local school. This fisherman contributed a 16 pound lobster. He said the winner could keep it, but he was hoping that he would be allowed to put it back in the water with a GPS tag so that it could be tracked. It went for $3,000 to a vegetarian who wanted it back in the water. We didn't eat anything at the festival other than a shared special Oysterfest gelato from Gelato Joy Next day we went for a couple of beach walks. At Fisher Beach in Truro, we saw our first shark fin from shore. It was patrolling down by this bird filled jetty. Pretty cool Then we went to Provincetown for a visit to my favorite bookstore and a long walk at Herring Cove beach Followed by dinner at Ciro and Sal's. It was too cold to sit out in their lovely courtyard But the inside was cozy too We shared an order of mussels in marinara and then husband had shrimp scampi, which he did not enjoy. He said the garlic was bitter and raw My shrimp puttanesca was better, so we shared that Which brings us to Tuesday, and time to go home. We stopped for one last hike at Fort Hill in Eastham to take in the views. The foliage was starting to change And then had lunch at Mac's in Chatham. Warm lobster roll for husband Shrimp fried rice for me ...and that's probably it for us on Cape Cod until next year.

As expected, OysterFest was extremely crowded. We did manage to sample a few things. An oyster booth Main stage for the shucking competition. My husband and I are going over in a bit to watch the finals. We could not get close to the stage yesterday. Oysters (of course) Fried oysters and fried clams Scallop stuffie (I thought this was mushy but my husband's brother liked it and finished it) More fried oysters Salted caramel ice cream (not the best) My nephew cannot have a lot of the food at the festival because of his crustacean allergy. There was one food truck that didn't have any lobster or shrimp, so we stood in line there (for an extremely long time) and then waited for a very long time for the food to come out. After an hour, he got these things to try: pretzels, chili dog, and churros. Mac's Seafood was selling fried lobster tails and oyster rolls. Those were all enjoyed. All the beverages were in cans this year. They used to have free water filling stations, but not this year. Maybe because of covid, I don't know. They did let me bring in my Yeti filled with water though. My sister had a rose from a local vineyard. and nephew had more oysters, just because I tried a mushroom, kale and butternut squash galette from the vegetarian booth. It was pretty bland. It reminded me of something I would have made in college when all of my recipes came from the Moosewood Cookbook Beer drinking is a big thing for some at OysterFest of course Post festival my husband and I stopped by Gelato Joy for an affogato and a mint gelato Later that night, everyone but my nephew went out to dinner at the Pearl. He was not too hungry and wanted to relax at the house, so asked me to bring him back takeout.... Drinks I got a salad with grilled salmon Husband had a lobster roll. He was not too hungry so just ate the lobster out of it. Sister had scallops and brother in law had cod For my nephew, I ordered a chicken pesto alfredo penne to go, and mentioned his allergy, which the waitress noted on the ticket. The meal came out in a brown bag and I did not check it before leaving. We got home, opened the bag, and found this! Chicken pesto alfredo penne WITH lobster and shrimp! What the heck? I checked the bill and it was listed as chicken, and they only charged us for the chicken dish. All I can think of is that the kitchen misread the "allergy" on the ticket as "add"? Maybe? Luckily he was not very hungry, and just ate some gelato that I had picked up at Gelato Joy earlier. Crazy.

We are back in Wellfleet for a few more days. We are staying at that marsh house I have shown pictures of before. It's walkable to town, which is great, because we are here for this weekend's Wellfleet OysterFest. My husband and I have tickets for both days, and today, my sister, nephew, and brother in law are joining us today only. The fest started at 10 AM, and we are walking over in about half an hour. I have already seen photos, and it looks pretty packed, so I am not sure how long we are going to manage to stay. This is our first OysterFest since Covid. We came in last night and had our usual opening dinner at Mac's Shack. Drinks Nephew wanted some oysters and a spicy tuna roll The rest of us shared some jalepeno yellowtail and halibut turadito Sister ordered fried clams Nephew and husband both ordered Ritz cracker crusted bluefish with mashed potatoes and creamed spinach and I had a grilled swordfish special with a butternut squash and chickpea stew. This was excellent, and I ordered another one to go for my brother in law, who was arriving later in the evening. He concurred that it was excellent. Hopefully I will have some pictures from the OysterFest to share later. Sunday is always quieter and less crowded than Saturday (today is sold out), so I might have more luck tomorrow. We will see.

I let me nephew choose what I would make for dinner the past couple of nights. Wednesday, he wanted spaghetti and meatballs Tonight, chicken Milanese with marinated tomato and arugula salad

Haddock with shiitake mushrooms, scallions, and rice

Final dinner in Vegas was at Mercato de Percheria. I was not particularly hungry so nothing on the menu looked appealing. I think I am just ready to get out of here. Vegas is just too overwhelming. Anyway, restaurant setting Drink for husband and sister Menu we ordered the truffle board to start but they were out. So, calamari (WAY too salty) salmon tartare (this was nice) husband and niece both got the tortellini filled with prosciutto. They said it was fine My sister and I split an arugula salad and a pizza. The salad was tasty but too cold. The pizza was undercooked and too saucy No dessert. And a couple of concert photos, just for fun, one from each night, so different perspectives. It was visually stunning and the sound was perfect, but I won’t come back to Vegas, even for another concert at the Sphere.

We are seeing it twice. Last night we were in a small reserved section on the floor that the band sells tickets for to raise money for their charity, and tonight we have seats up in the Sphere so we can take in the visual effects. It’s quite the show. Last night’s dinner was at SushiSamba. Crispy Hokkaido scallop (they are priced by the piece and I was the only one who wanted to try it) yellowtail taquitos Cocktails. My berry smash mocktail is on the right and my sister and husband got the same cocktail, but I did not catch the name. Grilled miso sea bass (this and the scallop were my favorites) Sushi rolls. Tuna in the back, and a four fish roll in the front. It had salmon, yellowtail, tuna and fluke. And the el Topo, which was the house specialty roll. We did not like this one because it had cheese on it. We kept passing it around the table trying to foist it off on each other 😂 dessert was a coffee panacotta with coffee tuille.

Dinner at Estiatorio Milos in Las Vegas. (I would normally put travel photos in regional boards but we are only here for a couple of nights to see a concert, and I never plan to return to Vegas as there is pretty much nothing about it that I find appealing, so it’s not worth doing a full report) Display of fish on offer. We chose a loup de mer cooked in salt crust to share Husband and sister got the same cocktail, a Monks in Mexico (tequila, Cointreau, elderflower, grapefruit, lime) Shared appetizer of fried zucchini and eggplant with tzatziki and saganaki cheese (best thing of the night) niece’s filet with fries grilled vegetables to share The fish, filleted table side and served with Swiss chard no room for dessert.