Text 28160, 99 rader
Skriven 2009-09-01 12:54:24 av Michael Loo (1:18/200)
Ärende: More YK 106
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Got up at 6 and did a few work-related chores and went back to
sleep ... next thing I knew it was 10:30 and I'd had a decent
rest. We decided to delay lunch until 2 when Roslind could join
us and had a quick snack of leftover baked chicken thighs. Jim
had threatened to feed me seal meat, so he went to the freezer
and defrosted what he thought was the right package, but this
turned out to be some of those famous turrs, which he thought
he had thrown out. The current hypothesis is that the seal got
tossed by mistake; so sometime I get to taste what is reputed
to be the worst-tasting avian food in this hemisphere at least.
He skinned the things and put them to marinate for a couple
days in a ginger-garlic-soy soak.

Lunch was at the Vietnamese Noodle House, one of several
immigrant-run ethnic places in this very diverse town. It's a
very plain room sort of reminiscent of high-school cafeteria,
only worse lit. The food is pretty good, though, and it's
reputed to be the cheapest real restaurant in town. We split a
pork banh mi as an appetizer - this had sweet sauteed pork on
a bed of salad vegetables in a crisp but tender-crusted roll
that had to have been baked in house. Pretty yummy. Then we
had three mains. The pork vermicelli bowl had the same pork
and the same vegetables over slightly gummy rice noodles, the
whole studded with little slices of fried spring roll. Pretty
good. Roslind wanted stir-fried shrimp with green peppers, which
was fine, a not-too-generous serving of previously frozen shrimp
in a medley of sliced peppers and onions; I opted for the
salt-pepper squid with onions, which was a rather more generous
serving of previously frozen squid, battered and fried before
being stir-fried in a medley of sliced peppers and onions.

-

We had been seduced by a flyer to go to Loblaw's for the
amazing $5.88/lb AA-grade boneless sirloin strip deal. Of
course, they were out. Apparently, in order to satisfy the
customer protection laws, all one has to do is to lay in a
reasonable supply; then no rain check need be offered to
latecomers. So we'd left there empty-handed but with the
urge for beef.

Between the Co-op of which Jim speaks so fondly (it is in fact
a rather nice store) and the butcher shop of which he speaks
even more fondly, we laid in a supply of various sausages
and a couple 3-lb porterhouses to satisfy our meat urge.
Roslind, though by no means averse to such, is not quite the
aficionado we are, so this was planned as a sort of gentlemen's
night; however, Jim eyeballed the steaks and decided that these
were way too big for the two of us: so he invited Ray and Neekha
to help partake, but they weren't available; but it was negotiated
that we save the huge carnivory until tomorrow and make do with
the sausages, augmented by some more of those baked chicken thighs.
Three kinds of sausages:

beef smokies - similar in flavor to our "li'l smokies" but not
in texture - these were lean and meaty, the latter are fattier
and gristlier (which I prefer). Not too much in common with
the mid-Atlantic half-smoke, which is less smoky and fattier;

Italian-style pork and beef - pretty standard, very mildly
spiced, also quite lean;

buffalo bratwurst - quite a dark red, which was peculiar, as
brats are normally a white sausage, and the flavor was
correspondingly more robust; a bit of gaminess I thought was
alien to the style and didn't go with the hint of nutmeg with
which the sausage was spiced. Not a surprise, very lean.

Jim cooked up a potato-onion-pepper medley to go with.

Back Eddy seasoning salt, a good blend but nothing to drag
thousands of miles back, serves as a general perk-up: I think
that (besides its being from Hay River and thus a localish
NWT product) its secret is dehydrated lemon juice or perhaps
citric acid. It is comparable to Tacoma's Johnny's seasoning
salt, for example. Less herbal than Everglades, less aromatic
than Old Bay, less garlic and pepper than Montreal seasoning.

Bacon Salt was also available but went neglected, as we all
agreed it tasted halfway between BBQ potato chip and ashtray.

A salad appeared on the table, and I actually ate some of it.

Pillar Box Red (South Australia) 07 (mostly Shiraz with some
Cab and something else) - an inky purple, but the taste was not
so immature as that, merely a little on the young side. Very
plummy, black pepper, a bit of green pepper, dark fruit and roots
finish. Pretty good. Roslind really liked it a lot, so Jim's
thinking of getting a case next time he's in Alberta.

Roslind made snowballs, a mixture of advocaat, lemon juice, and
lemonade. It was a bit sweet but way better than advocaat alone
(which I sampled - very sweet eggnog with a raw alcohol taste).

The northern lights were back, but I missed them.

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 * Origin: Nocturnal State BBS - bbs.nsbbs.info (1:18/200)