Tag Archives: food

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Clam-tastic!

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When the universe speaks, you have to listen. And the other day? It was screaming clams.

It started when the husband and I dropped by our local pub and had clam chowder for lunch. This was an oddity because they rarely make it.

The clam-athon continued when this story popped up in my news feed.

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I never even knew a purple pearl was possible.

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Good thing he didn’t trade them in on French onion soup. Offers have been made but the man is going to give the pearl to his daughter.

The third clammy thing that happened was a friend of ours showing up with a bucket. Her son had dug too many and she was willing to share. After a dinner of fried clams?

I heard about this:

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Yes, this time it’s real.

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Last year the crazy people behind Cards Against Humanity spoofed an old jar of Hellmans in a Black Friday ad campaign, but now? It really exists.

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You can’t say this company takes themselves too seriously.

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Or even the least bit seriously. Nope.

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I feel like I’m going to have buy a jar at some point, just because.

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#eatmyclam. Ya gotta love it.

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Get yours today.

Tell ‘em River sent you…

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Stonington

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On a beautiful fall day in Maine, we drove up the coast to Stonington.

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A picturesque village… quaint and quite pretty.

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With the feeling you’ve stepped back in time.

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Stonington is a fishing town and known for being the largest lobster port in the state, if not the world.

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Last year they hauled in $43.26 million dollars worth of the glorious crustacean.

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And though I can’t eat it anymore… cue the random sobbing noises… I was still hungry after the two and a half trip.

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Enter the Harbor Cafe, one of only two restaurants in town.

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It sits right across the street from the harbor and at first glance seemed like a good choice.

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There were cocktails and my Pimms cup was delightful.

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The clam chowder was thinner than I like, but had a wonderful flavor as well as being loaded with clams.

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$23 seemed a bit steep for my crab roll but it was delicious, not the overly dressed crap that passes for crabmeat elsewhere. Husband was less than thrilled with his fried haddock as it was extremely thin and arrived in a plastic basket. Want to piss off my spouse? Charge him a high price and serve him a meal without a plate. The mashed potatoes that accompanied the fish were truly inedible. Real, but so over whipped as to be nearly liquid with an overpowering taste of margarine. Epic fail for what turned out to be a $102 bill with tip.

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But back to Stonington. Tourism has tried but thankfully failed to change the flavor of the town.

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And so we explored….

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You can’t go home again. Or apparently to the Waterwheel restaurant either….

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When we’re in the Jefferson New Hampshire area we always make a point of stopping at an excellent little family run restaurant called the Waterwheel.

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There’s an actual wheel that was turned by water back in the day and every meal we’ve ever had there was delicious.

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It’s a down home country place only open for breakfast and lunch, but since Covid they’ve had reduced hours and are closed a few days a week. Naturally every time we’ve stopped in the last two years they were shut up tight.

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So we were thrilled to find them open on our trip home and stopped for lunch. Though there were a lot of empty tables, they were short handed for staff and we had time to browse the gift shop before we were seated.

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I really should have bought some of these for gifts.

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Or at least a few of those. But our name was called and we quickly sat down to order, mouth watering at the memory of homemade chicken pot pies, fresh roasted hot turkey sandwiches and creamy chowders. And then I opened the menu.

Gone were all the previously delicious selections… and what was left wasn’t even worth considering . Hot dog, hamburger, grilled cheese. I was beyond disappointed and though we weren’t really in the mood, we ordered breakfast instead.

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Ugh. Biscuits and gravy that looked (and tasted) like Alpo with home fries that looked and tasted like cubed frozen french fries. Husband ordered poached eggs with Hollandaise and didn’t fare much better. Tiny eggs, tiny portion of Hollandaise.

They say you can’t go home again, and it’s a shame but I doubt we’ll going back here either.

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News you can’t use.

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Because it’s more fun than the kind you can.

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I know staffing shortages around the country are bad, but… wow.

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This is good news, but it does make me wonder who studies these things… and how they got a worm to spit on command.

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Worm spittoons. Does Amazon sell those…?

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I’m going to pay $75 for an animal that eats dried poop in the park? No.

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I can’t find my own umbrella when it rains, now I’m supposed to remember my phone’s?

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Should we?

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This is a little disturbing.

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Makes me glad I never developed a taste for it.

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Let’s play.

48 Comments

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It won’t take much time.

I promise.

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This is an easy one for me. Calves liver with onions. My parents were fans, but I’ve been known to run screaming from the room at the mere sight of it. Basically any organ meat will elicit a similar reaction, but my mother cooked this on a regular basis so I had lots of practice avoiding it.

Liver tonight? Gee mom, I can’t. Softball practice.

Liver? Sorry mom, art club meeting.

Dessicated cow organs? I’d love to… but the circus is in town and they need a new elephant handler.

Any excuse would do. But she got wise after a while and decided to force me to eat it one night. Silly woman, thinking she could out stubborn 10 year old me.

She served dinner… I ate the potatoes and vegetables and left the liver untouched. She told me I would eat it. I told her I would not. She said I couldn’t get up from the table until it was gone. I said no problem and settled in for the night. If I wouldn’t eat it freshly cooked and hot did she really think I’d eat it cold and congealed?

The war of wills had begun, but after an hour and a half my father… ever the peacemaker…. let our notorious food stealing beagle in the back door and I ( accidentally, of course ) dropped my plate on the floor.

Bye bye liver.

My mother lost that battle and never tried to force me to eat it again. She did continue to serve it though.

🤢

How about you? What meal haunted your childhood dinner table…

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The last Notch drive and a little shopping.

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Heading back to the resort for the last time it looked like there was a hole in the sky…

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And before long we were approaching the Notch.

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These signs are on both entrance sides to the road and it took me a few minutes to figure out what they were talking about.

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TT’s won’t fit?

How odd.

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As we entered the Notch, rain. I swear the mountains make their own weather.

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Godzilla barfing?

No, just falling rocks.

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Not sure if you can tell from the photo, but the road is positively pink. Vermont has the oddest color tar in places. Perhaps it’s mixed with Ben and Jerry’s Strawberry Shortcake…?

Since our neighbor was caring for Lord Dudley Mountcatten… as well as feeding the fox and deer.. a thank you gift was required. This meant dragging my husband shopping and you know if it isn’t antiques he isn’t happy.

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A bottle of local Vermont wine…

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And some Vermont chocolates were perfect, but then I lost the husband in the store.

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You knew he’d find something vintage, right?

He actually collects these old gas station oil bottles and was thrilled to find a complete set with the holder. He was less than thrilled to find they were being used as decoration and not for sale.

He was so grumpy about that he wouldn’t let me go back and purchase this special maple syrup.

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Which in hindsight was probably a good thing…

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Because as soon as I saw they had various Dog liquor I wanted one of each.

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But at nearly $200 for the pair it’s a good thing they were under lock and key.

😬

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One of our favorites.

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As we were randomly driving around Vermont we hit Montpelier, the capitol, and remembered there was a fabulous high end restaurant we’d enjoyed on previous trips.

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Welcome to J. Morgan’s Steakhouse.

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A fabulous place that’s actually part of a hotel. It has a very retro, 1920’s, prohibition era type feel….

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And we hit it at the perfect time since you can rarely get in without reservations.

Apple cider mule?

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Don’t mind if I do.

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It was 3:00pm… but since we hadn’t eaten since breakfast, we decided to be tacky (really) early birds and go straight to dinner. Do not pass go. Do not collect two hundred dollars. Which kind of sucked because this place can be pricey.

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A marvelous wedge salad with maple bacon and homemade blue cheese for me, the prerequisite French Onion soup for the spouse.

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The rack of lamb was tempting but I opted for the jumbo shrimp scampi instead.

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Good call. It was scrumptious, with just the right amount of garlic and wine.

And because we were in a steakhouse?

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The filet mignon with burgundy reduction for the husband.

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We basically had the whole place to ourselves, just a few customers scattered here and there. And those amazing lights?

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Made sure the rare filet my other half ordered was definitely that.

If you’re ever in Montpelier? Be sure to stop here. You won’t be disappointed.

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Miscellaneous nonsense.

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Autumn in New England. The pumpkins, the apples, the brightly colored foliage. You really can’t beat it.

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Nice try Florida, but you’re not even close.

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The poor man has been eating tofu burgers and kale sausage… can you really blame him?

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Gee, here’s an idea…. how about cleaning the litter box you freakin’ idiot.

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I think the parent foxes have booted the kids out of the den. They’re here every evening now.

💕

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News you can’t use.

31 Comments

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Seriously, no one needs to know this stuff.

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After reading that, I’ve come to the conclusion my beloved Red Sox are just phoning it in. Rather like their playing this season.

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Yeah, right. Do they think I haven’t seen Children of the Corn?

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A three foot long earthworm? That’s a large amount of ick factor.

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Of course it is.

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I’m going to have to take their word for that.

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Thank you, but no.

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The best? I don’t know.. but it was pretty damn good.

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As we headed out on the morning of our only full day in Vermont ( 3 days, 2 nights is simply too short a trip) we enjoyed the leaves and the scenery and headed for what I was told was the best bread in the state.

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The Red Hen.

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It’s a bakery and cafe.

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So we sidled up to place an order.

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And watched the pros at work.

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I grabbed two loaves of fresh bread to take home, (a crusty peasant white and an unbelievably tasty lemon rosemary) but had to try a mushroom toasty while we were there as well.

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The husband had some sort of homemade soup I didn’t get around to photographing because my sandwich was simply too divine to ignore. 3 types of sautéed mushrooms with spinach and melted cheese on whole grain bread. Sounds simple but there was an unidentified herb in the cheese and it had me smiling ear to ear.

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Clearly this long armed chicka by the door could have used one.

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Onward….

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