Nero's feast

New Years weekend was a gluttonous affair, not intentionally mind you, but our bacchanalian revelry ended up looking like something out of satyricon. Where's that feather?

Leslie and I decided to take a rainy New Year's Eve off and go to the Costco Business center in San Marcos. Get us some provisions.

I had promised her a big box of crab to put in the freezer. I saw some king crab there a while back. She loves crab, I am more of a lobster guy. But marriage is a series of endless compromises, as we all know.

I want to keep her happy.

We got to Costco, bought short ribs and beef ribs for later but the only crab was dungeness that was unfortunately frozen. Her friend bought fresh crab from them recently so we passed.

We ended up at the Nordahl Costco and they had fresh dungeness claws, which I bought even though she would have preferred to wait for the whole crab. 

For the hell of it I bought six fresh lobster tails too as well as the wild caught Argentinian red shrimp.

She protested both purchases but there are times when a man has to make his move.

We drove home looking forward to some sort of feast and then a bit of panic set in. 

You see, the crab and lobster were fresh, previously frozen and probably could not stand a re-freezing without a real breakdown in texture and taste.

That meant cooking everything that night. 

And you are supposed to eat lobster within 24 hours.

But when we took the lobster tails out of the pack, there were not six of them, as we were fooled to believe, there were actually twelve, they had been stacked.

Whoa!

Hmmm, what to do? Who could possibly eat all of this food?

We ended up baking and broiling eight lobster tails and steaming the other four in our large stockpot with the wire colander on top. 

I  cracked the malocostracan decapod thorax in a dish towel, cut the shells down the center, made two bottom cuts, fanned the tail and carefully pulled the succulent meat out and placed it on top of the tail. 

I watched a youtube video. Now I know.

We melted a butter garlic sauce and added a touch of paprika to the mix.

Squeezed a lemon over the tails and painted on the butter. Dash of salt and pepper.

Pre broil iteration

Bake at 425° and then a quick broil at the end.

Holy shit, how were we going to eat all this treif?

Well the good news is that we did, or we made a great stab at it anyway. 

The first night we had seven tails and a large portion of the crab, which was great out of the package, not even steamed.

We liked the grilled method better than the steamed for the tails but we tried them both ways.

Dungeness crab was superb. I didn't realize how much I loved it.

Last night I made lobster salad with two of the remaining steamed, celery, lemon juice, mayo, salt, pepper and dill.

Three to go, they will probably go into a lobster risotto tonight.

And what am I forgetting? 

Leslie had marinated a rack of lamb all day Wednesday that was supposed to be our dinner before I got the selfish shellfish itch. 

We had to cook that too. Lamb should not be over marinated or it breaks down or so she tells me.

We were so stuffed that it had to sit in the fridge until last night.

It was unbelievable, I nailed it at the perfect point of medium rare. So tasty.

I honestly can't believe how much food I/we ate. 

Amazing.

I won't need lobster for a while. My fault. But it was an incredible feast.

And while somewhat expensive, the price for all of the food was far less than what one would pay for a seat for one at a swank New Year's Eve restaurant soiree.

So there!

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Yesterday morning we went to Del Mar to meet old friends and have brunch at Davanti Enoteca.

I broke my alcohol fast with a bloody mary. First cocktail in a year.

The place has new owners and try as they might, is just not the same. Focaccia is not as crisp, my orrechiette with fennel sausage was just good and not great, the drink a feeble memory of a forgotten masterpiece. 

Which instantly clogged my sinuses. Not sure if it was the alcohol or the tomato juice but I am susceptible to such occurrences, especially with white wine and champagne. Leslie gave me a benadryl, which got me slightly dizzy. She drove home.

Didn't taste much alcohol, she didn't either. In any case it was an underwhelming experience. My next drink will be a greyhound and I will see if it triggers my respiratory system as well? If so, all bets are off and my dreams of becoming a late in life lush might be extinguished.

Perhaps it will be a sober year after all?

In any case it was great to see Lena and Ron, Bob and Shela.

Hope you all had a great New Years and best of luck this year. The country and world will need it.

Try not to overeat. ☺

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Yes Linda, I am seeing Dr. Mells. What a sweetheart.