That doesn’t wear
the crown..as of last Wednesday night, my one year reign as King Oyster came to an end,
as I passed the royal robes, crown, and scepter to the next King Oyster to
begin another reign. The succession plan
is that the retiring president of the Rotary Club becomes King Oyster for a year,
presiding over the Oyster Festival, and then accompanying the festival’s
Champion Shucker to the world oyster opening competition in Galway,
Ireland. Which means that MFO and I will
be journeying off to Ireland late in September.
I must admit that after getting over the initial
embarrassment, it really was fun being King, and I enjoyed it immensly.
Not only at the two day Oyster Festival, but he also attended many local
events like First Friday’s, wine fests, charity events, and so forth. The little ones are the most fun, at first little
nervous to approach the King but eventually warming up and want their picture
taken, or an autograph. As I was
lamenting the passing of the torch (so to speak) a friend reminded me that the President, once a President, is always Mr. President. That applies to Royalty as well, so (at least
in my mind) I will always be King Oyster.. but I will miss the adoration of his loyal subjects ..
More on trucks…
As I mentioned last time, food trucks are a huge national
trend. A friend from food friendly
Seattle passed this site along. Worth a
click/look to see what extent they go to. Think that would look good in the Park?
On the Road... Again
As I mentioned in passing the other day, this coming Monday MFO
and I are joining a tour group composed mostly of friends of Historic St. Mary’s
City and are winging our way to Scotland.
This is mostly the same group we enjoyed Ireland with a couple of years
ago. We will be mostly in the southern
half of the country, Glasgow, Ayr, the Isles of Mull and Skye, Inverness,
Edinburgh. We’ll visit historical sites
that were important in the beginnings of Maryland history as well as other
famous places, not the least of which is the Old Course at St. Andrews. No clubs will accompany, but I will be able
to touch the grass (I hope....sometime I’ll
tell you about my trying to touch the ice in the Montreal Forum).
On the culinary side of things (always important to the Feeder), a lot of meals are included as part of
the tour, so striking off on our own will be limited. This is not bad, since experience has shown that the tour folks have excellent choices for places to take us. But the thought of food in general brings up a problem that has been
troubling me for a while and now will be brought to a head. When you think of Scotland and food, what
comes to mind (AFTER Scotch)? Yes, it is
that enigmatic dish: haggis. Always a
feature of Robert Burns dinners, it remains lurking out there for the
feeder. As a proponent of sampling traditional and indigenous
cuisines I suspect I cannot come back without at least sample taste. Put up or shut up. But knowing what I know, that will be
tough. Here’s a (I suspect classical) recipe passed along by that noted
food scientist and guru Alton Brown:
Ingredients
1 sheep stomach
1 sheep liver1 sheep heart
1 sheep tongue
1/2 pound suet, minced
3 medium onions, minced
1/2 pound dry oats, toasted
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried ground herbs
Directions
Rinse the stomach thoroughly and soak overnight in cold salted water.
Rinse the liver, heart, and tongue. In a large pot of boiling, salted
water, cook these parts over medium heat for 2 hours. Remove and mince. Remove
any gristle or skin and discard.
In a large bowl, combine the minced liver, heart, tongue, suet, onions,
and toasted oats. Season with salt, pepper, and dried herbs. Moisten with some
of the cooking water so the mixture binds. Remove the stomach from the cold
salted water and fill 2/3 with the mixture. Sew or tie the stomach closed. Use
a turning fork to pierce the stomach several times. This will prevent the
haggis from bursting.
In a large pot of boiling water, gently place the filled stomach, being
careful not to splash. Cook over high heat for 3 hours.
Serve with mashed potatoes, if you serve it at all.
+++++
Appetizing, no? So we’ll see if the feeder can follow through…it has been mentioned that
a wee dram (or half a bottle) of the “water of life” helps.. I know I can do that..
Okay, off to do some more
PFS (Packing For Scotland) so i can be
DF(Haggis) and
DFD
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