Monday, May 26, 2008

The Worst of Times, The Best of Times


Axis of Evil on Memorial Day (Bentonville AK)


It was the worst of times…………………

This weekend was Memorial Day weekend, and our family was off to Laurie’s Mom's house on Hood Canal (They were away taking the boat up to Alaska, so we had the place to ourselves. This weekend was also Laurie’s birthday, so the idea was for us to be able to have some relaxing downtime, and for some fun family activities.

After having two families over for dinner on Friday night, it was up early on Saturday to begin our journey. My idea was we’d hit the Pike Place Market on the way to the ferry, pick up some killer salmon and vegetables, stop by the dahlia bakery to get a coconut cream pie, and hop on the Bainbridge ferry for the short drive to Shine.

Well, in spite of the best laid plans….. we ended up deciding that the market would be a zoo, and we could do just as well at Town & Country…so it was off to the ferry terminal at 9:30 from Queen Anne…. Heading south on Alaskan Way, we negotiated the cruise ship fiasco to be greeted by the “no right turn” sign at the ferry terminal. A “Car Pool” exception was noted on the sign, so I forced a right turn…we waited for 10 minutes in line until we arrived at the fare booth, when an officer of the law walked in front of us and told us we needed to go to the back of the line, down by Safeco field. I pleaded that we were a high occupancy vehicle, but no quarter was given, so it was off to other points. We motored down the road, and noticed that it was at least a two boat wait, so I said we should drive around – we got to the point of no return on I-5 where you have to choose to go north or south. In a split second, we were headed north to Edmonds to get the Kingston boat.

As we headed down the hill in Edmonds, the pleasant sign said a 90 minute wait – oh well, the die was cast. We shuffled down the hill, and at one moment I came very close to the car in front of us, stopping abruptly fractions of an inch from their bumper. The gentleman in the car then proceeded to get out of his car and examine his bumper….I though this was taking things too far, and politely asked “any damage?” at which point he returned – “be patient”… moments pass, the cars move a few feet, and we stop…at which point his wife gets out and looks at the bumper…now Mr. Anxious (that’s me) can’t wait to be done with this line.

As we leave Kingston, after a relatively short one-hour wait the decision is made that “well, Central Market is in Poulsbo, and we’ll go right by it, we can get provisions there. We come to 305, and take a right – guess what? While we are going the right direction to get to Hood Canal, we are going the wrong way to groceries.

We end up in a place I never want to find myself again Wal-Mart –

Now normally I wouldn’t even dream of being in this situation – remember I originally wanted to be shopping at the Pike Place Market – but we had now been in the car for 5 hours, and I didn’t want to stop us from getting to our destination in the most expedient manner possible.

So as Laurie, Jamie and Stacy waited, I went in to vanquish the beast. I took this challenge sort of in a top-chef manner – here was my challenge – make the best possible meal I could from the lame store. Quickly, the salmon extravaganza was thrown out the window. What would Wal-Mart have that they couldn’t screw up - Let's see: a classic Steak dinner of an Iceberg Wedge with Bacon, tomato & Blue Cheese, Corn on the cob, Prime Tenderloin, and Strawberry shortcake? Produce was terrible, but the corn looked as ok as non ethanol May California could. The strawberries in their plastic clamshell looked non-moldy. The iceberg lettuce had hints of crunch inside, and the tomatoes looked and felt like red tennis balls….. At this point I should have bailed, and gone with a simple Pasta…but no……..it was off to the meat section where I was amazed at the selection of “Select” grade beef - a lesser grade not usually found where we typically shop. In the beef grading system, Prime is the best, Choice is second, then Select, utility and cutter….I did find some interesting "Choice" T-bones and Spencers, and picked the two best, bright red, good marbling pieces I could find – yet these paled to what I would normally find in my usual haunts – but the pricing was much similar- in fact I think it was more expensive.

The last piece of the puzzle was the blue cheese… in the thousands of square feet, hundreds of pounds of processed American cheese food could be found but nary a wedge of blue……finally I picked up a small piece of “gourmet” blue cheese from a Wisconsin producer who probably makes semi truck fulls of the stuff.

We arrived at the house, the sun was out, and we were all happy – we played on the beach, sat and read – drank champagne, read, played Risk, and it was time for dinner.

I tried, I seasoned the beef, I made an herb butter to help, I timed it on the grill, but alas on the plate it looked sad. Everything looked sad. We all made the best of it – but all agreed, it was the worst meal I'd ever made. We had brought cake that James had made the day before. It was chocolate, with cinnamon and other spices in the frosting. Dying for something good – I 86’d the strawberry shortcake and served the chocolate. It was the best! James comes through!

It was the best of times

After the steak fiasco, the plan had been that I would go into Poulsbo on Sunday morning and do real shopping – but we found a freezer with about 1,000 pounds of fantastic looking Salmon from last year. I took a piece of what I think was Campbell River King, and let it thaw. Since we didn't need to hunt for salmon we decided to go off to Port Townsend. We looked at art and books, had lunch, went to North Point where wetook a fun little hike (and watched a few of the Swiftsure boats head south). We stopped at the P.T. Food Co-op for a few odds and ends – like celery root, potatoes, onions, garlic, tomatoes, ginger, asparagus, artichoke, GOOD strawberries, food I felt good buying… we got back to the house and relaxed some more.

Then it was time to make the red wine reduction sauce, the celery root puree, prep the salmon with diced ginger and black pepper roast the asparagus – and then grill off the salmon- and put it all together. See the photo above - Roast Salmon with Ginger & Pepper, served on Celery Root Puree with a red wine reduction sauce- along with grilled asparagas & Cherry Tomatoes, in the top left is a glass of Adelsheim Pinot Noir ............

Tres magnifique! We all were quite happy and agreed that next time; even if we took a “wrong turn” we’d make sure we kept going right on past the store that shall not be mentioned!