Food Tourism

Food Tourism – I had never really thought about the concept, nor heard the term, but when I accidentally ran across an article from the Baltimore Sun

http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/dining/bal-fo.kasper26sep26,0,1235196.column

regarding the subject, I realized that that is what Clara and I have always done – look for the local, the unique, the experience made possible by the traveling you're doing.

Let's see, Clara has had two whole lobsters in the shell, one hard, one soft (prior to this trip, I didn't even know about soft shell lobster), one "Lazy Lobster," three lobster rolls, two lobster stews – has she gotten into the Maine food schtick yet?

Sunday, at Bob's Seafood in Raymond, ME, I learned about "dry scallops" and we fixed some for dinner that evening – superb! I never knew that scallops are soaked in some vicious chemical that "opens" them up to absorb water – so that the scallops you're buying weigh more, and when you cook them, you get a whole lot of water in the pan and you're wondering "where did that come from?"

When I sautéed the "dry scallops" in some butter, two things happened – 1) the scallops got a nice little brown tinge, and 2) when the sautéeing was done, I had butter in the skillet – nothing else! But most importantly, both the taste and the texture were far superior to any scallops I've ever had before!

Unfortunately, I doubt that I'll ever find "dry scallops" at any place other than Bob's . . . and Raymond, ME is a long way from home.

Monday afternoon we got together with our friends Jim and Sally from Carlsbad, NM and went for lunch to the Lobster Trap in North Conway, NH. It was their first experience with lobster in the shell -- it was fun to watch them tackling it. Clara had another lobster roll and I had some delicious broiled haddock.

Tonight for dinner we happened upon a place called Maestro's in a little shopping center between the train station and Jim and Sally's condo. On their menu they had an item called "Filletto Espresso" described as beef tenderloin pressed into finely ground espresso coffee and cocoa, then pan roasted with garlic, mushrooms and sun-dried tomatoes in a sauce of bourbon and cream. Had we not traveled to North Conway, New Hampshire we would never have heard of such a thing! And it was exquisite!

A couple days after that "tonight" I was in a New Hampshire "liquor outlet" – they have the same ridiculous laws regarding sales as Washington – and ran across some hard cider that had been treated the same way that champagne is. It was quite interesting – I liked it, but none of Clara or Jim or Sally cared for it at all. I had never heard of such a thing, so we had to try it . . .

Today (several days after that "today" above) Clara and I were in the Pleasant St. Bistro in Woodstock, VT for lunch and I had one of the lunch specials – a smoked bacon, caramelized onion and Swiss cheese omelet with a salad of tossed greens on the side. Have you ever been offered a salad with an omelet? Neither had I, but the overall result was quite satisfying.

Earlier today (same one as above) we "tasted" four grades of maple syrup just to see what the differences were, and we tasted six different kinds of cheddar cheese – do you know why cheddar is yellow? Would you believe it has to do with taxes? No, cheese is not made by Republicans who want to cut taxes, but back in colonial days, the British put a tax on cheese. By putting carrot juice in the cheese, the colonists could claim that it was not really cheese and hence did not have to pay the tax! Now the color is traditional everywhere except up here where it started in the first place . . .

Ain't food tourism fun?