Senior Sea Kayaker

My annual practice is to pick up a few local hard shell lobsters (@ $10/lb. this year) to steam and serve with herbed butter and a few sides TBD.

I'll be attending a traditional, in our family, turkey dinner. My contribution will be the desert and cheese course. My neighbors, who are my BIL's sister and BIL, hosted their annual open house yesterday evening. This is their 40th year doing so and there is a huge pot of seafood chowder with some traditional breads and deserts (also lasagna as an alternative to the chowder). This was my third time attending and it was a good time. Happy holidays to all.

A quick dinner out of the fridge after a busy day. Hummus, house gravlax with a dab of mustard, pickled herring, olives, pickled red onion and a tomato, avocado and romaine salad.

@Alex Interesting article which, in many ways, mirrors the time when the simple burger became something costing thousands!!! incorporating things like caviar, edible gold leaf and other, in my opinion, ridiculous ingredients just to make it more 'upscale' and expensive. I think I'll stick with decent versions of panettone under $20.00 Cdn.

Some recent breakfasts including this morning's. I've been eating a lot of fish and seafood lately and it is one of my favourite breakfast sandwich inclusions. Egg with Thai and shishito peppers and green onions, haddock, tomato and shredded romaine. Egg with shrimp, Thai chilis and basil, green onions on toasted baguette. With a mandarin and a glass of extra spicy Clamato. Egg with leftover Italian sausage and mushrooms, green onion, pepper jack, tomato and shredded romaine.

Some very nice panettones posted. This was a new brand for me, TreMaria, which was quite good and I would buy again. Moist, aromatic and not overly sweet.

Three pepper (orange bell, shishito and green and red Thai) shakshuka with toasted sourdough.

I can assure you traditional Maritime Canada chow chow is 100% vegan 😇

This was my first attempt and it turned out pretty well. It was something I grew up eating and IMO is the best condiment to serve with tourtiere.

A modified western sandwich, dubbed the 'east meets western' by @blue_dolphin, of egg, onion, ham, shishito and Thai peppers, green onion tops, Thai basil and cilantro on toasted sourdough.

I dropped into a local pop up market on Sunday and picked up a very good sourdough loaf and a tourtiere. Tourtiere, which I would rate a 7 out of 10, with a baked potato and pickled beets and green tomato chow chow.

The current state of the window herb garden (the jalapeno, habanero and Carolina reaper pepper plants have been harvested and the plants into the composter). In no particular order: Thai basil, basil, rosemary, green onions, chives, garlic chives, cilantro, dill and flat and curly leaf parsley. Some things recently reseeded. This is a great location, at least when the sky isn't clouded over, with southern exposure. I've also put up a white backdrop to increase light exposure.

The best part of, as a child in my family growing up in the 60's, the Christmas turkey dinner wasn't the dinner but everything we got in the time after. Turkey pot pie. Turkey stew with doughboys (steamed herb dumplings). Turkey and vegetable noodle soup. Turkey sandwiches rather than peanut butter and jam.

@Dejah I'm still envious that you can get pickerel 😇 which I still consider one of the best eating fresh water fish.

Started with a 2 Kg. boneless leg of lamb (froze the upper portion for future use), flattened, rubbed with a mixture of @ElainaA 's slow roasted tomatoes and sauteed chopped cremini mushrooms, tied and seasoned, and stored in the fridge overnight. Roasted with fresh sage leaves and rosemary sprigs. Served with potatoes, defatted pan juice and peas. Desert was a peach and blackberry galette.

@Smithy In my opinion the addition of additional brine will not do any harm as it's much more important to ensure the fermenting cabbage remains in contact with either brine or a CO2 saturated headspace. The partial freezing pre fermentation shouldn't hurt. My original post, as quoted by @FauxPas, was concerned with frozen hot peppers destined for hot sauce, where after a post fermentation puree and straining out the solids, texture did not matter. I'm also curious to how this will turn out.

I don't use any additions to the water (which is non-chlorinated well water) which is changed every 2 to 3 days.

Potted 2 basil and 1 rosemary cutting. First photo of the basil root development after 2 weeks in water (excuse the blurriness). The rosemary cutting took 4 weeks. I've always had a high rate of success with this method of propagation.

A breakfast I'll make 4 or 5 times a year. Over easy egg, sauteed cremini mushrooms, beans, grilled half tomato, toasted WW English muffin, blood sausage, white sausage and chorizo (appr. 25 gm. of each) with a mandarin on the side.

Jerk chicken wings with a tomato, mandarin and arugula salad, coleslaw and pickled zucchini ribbons.

One of the few things I'm good at baking is focaccia and I wouldn't consider that focaccia. Maybe 'focaccia inspired Italian loaf' or some other marketing label but not real focaccia.

Unfortunately these are neither Montreal or New York style bagels but are what I call 'bagel shaped bread' so not a 'smoosh' problem'.

Some recent breakfasts. Egg, ham, cheddar and the first grocery store tomato since late July. Sigh. Sunny side up eggs over a potato, ham, sweet and hot peppers and onion hash and finished with fresh herbs. Egg (with half a Habanero, green onion and cilantro), haddock 'tail' and tomato on a WW bagel.

@Shelby Just a thought. Instead of tossing your cranberry salad use some of it in an apple gallette. FYI apple cranberry pie is very popular in my neck of the woods.

So after close to a year what's the final prognosis? I'm asking because these are going for $50.00 Cdn. so just curious.