Killing and Grilling - A special edition of WIAT

Warning: Graphic photos ahead...

Ah, Summer. It's hot here on the island, no doubt about it. Not long ago, A. suggested we do something nice. I figured, "It's summer, lets grill something." It just so happens that I know she likes grilled corn, and an increasing awareness of lobster led me to choose it as an accompaniment to said corn.

Full disclosure: I am not the world's biggest fan of lobster. 

My family, on the other hand, loves it, and at least once a year, sometimes more, my uncle will arrive with a cooler full of 2-3 pound monsters.  When I was a young boy, this feast would most often take place at my Grandparent's house in Gaspe, with newspaper spread on the table, and carpenter's hammers to break the shells, and the lobsters straight from the wharf. Lobster juice everywhere. Good times.

Lobster has been on the radar. On a recent trip to Metis, my fatherland, A. and I shared a lobster roll. It was good, and, it was my first. I've had shrimp rolls, but never lobster. I hear there are some good ones here in the Old Port, but I haven't found them yet.

Anyway. Lobster on the brain, and I decide to grill one up, something I have never done before.

Serious Eats did a piece on lobster rolls the other day, which included a philosophical foray into the morality of killing lobsters.

I was comforted/encouraged by this, and I knew that A. has some experience killing lobsters in a professional kitchen. At worst, I figured she could walk me through it/take over if I panicked. Emboldened, I purchased two very nice specimens. And I killed them. With a knife. Fun times.

I later described the experience to my mother (who hung up on me when I had told her my plans the day before; my uncle buys his lobster pre-cooked, clearly) as grim.

Tasty, but grim. I'll likely get over it. I'm with the Serious Eats fellow on this one.

More pics (all taken by A., who has some talent at these things) inside the Hall...

WIAT (Breakfast/Rant edition)

No pictures today, Gentle Reader. I've been remiss in my photo-documentation, and to be honest, I don't feel very badly about it at all.
But I see no reason that should stop me from writing a What I Ate Today post. While pictures are undoubtably worth a thousand words, words are also worth words, although the ratio falls closer to 1:1. For very good words, like "scintillating", it might hit 1:3, maybe 1:5, but still...
In any case, I don't suppose I'll need a thousand words. It's just breakfast, after all.
This morning, I had a cupcake for breakfast. Not only that, it was a cup cake made from a boxed mix, and iced in a prepared icing purchased from the same supermarket the mix came from. None of it, not a whit, made from scratch. Why? Because I wanted cupcakes last night, and I got lazy. There. I said it.
Not only that, but, because I was still hungry after my little cupcake adventure, I also had some pizza. A few month ago, I had chips for breakfast. Potato chips. And pie was breakfast for a while (admittedly, most of the pie was made from scratch).
Where, you might ask, am I going with this? Good question, one I asked myself, just now. Well, let me elaborate. Breakfast, they say, is the most important meal of the day. Good. Fine. Should have protein, and produce, and should be at least 400 calories, and maybe more. Great.
Bollocks. I have more than enough rules governing my life already. Deadlines, office politics. Academic writing. Propriety. White pants and Labour Day. And for years now, I've tried, quite successfully, to eat a healthy, balanced breakfast.
There is a lot of pressure out there to eat a certain way, and a lot of pressure as to what is and is not legitimate, or authentic, or good. And not all of that pressure is bad. I support quite a bit of it. But all things in moderation, even good advice, and local, fresh, organic or biodynamic produce.
But I can't do it every day any more. The routine is crushing. There are chips out there, my friends, and cupcakes. Just begging to be eaten for breakfast. It's time to have fun in the morning. I can (and often do) eat well at lunch, and dinner (or dinner and supper, if you prefer). But a man (hell, a woman too) needs to have fun, sometimes, no?
Look, I know I'm not the first person to eat pastry or pizza for breakfast. Far from it. But it's liberating, and, man, if we can't enjoy this little life of ours, then I ask you, what's the point?

Year of Pie Continues.

My mother said she had frozen blueberries. I said, 'sounds like pie to me'.

"Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"

Surely, in North American culture, the apple pie is the King of pies, Emperor or all Tartes. Arguably, here, in Québec, the tarte au sucre deserves mention, and of course, the pecan pie is, as always, a dark horse.
But, Gentle Reader, I have had apple pie my mind, on account of having been served it over the weekend, at the end of what had to be one of the most enjoyable family meals (outside of my own family, of course) I've had the pleasure of attending in quite some time. And so, I set out, as it is, of course, the Year of the Pie, to make, for the first time in my life, apple pie.
Behold!

This year in Pie...

I have, in the past, declared 2011 to be the Year of the Pie.

The Fairmont Queen Elizabeth Hotel seems to agree...

WIAT (weekend edition)

Because I ate several nice things this weekend, this is not so much what I ate today as what I ate this weekend...

First up: Home cooked pulled pork sandwiches with coleslaw. Very nice.

Complete list and more photos in the Hall...

2011 - Year of the Pie...

I told you it was the year of the pie:

The Piecycle at Serious Eats.

Made me some pie...

Guests tonight, and with a left over pie crust from my adventures in tourtière making, I decide a Lemon Meringue Pie was in order. Where I come from, lemon pies are generally, but not exclusively, made from Sheriff's Lemon Pie Mix. I'm not judging, but I prefer to make mine from scratch. And so I did. And the results were quite good, I should think.

Come on in for more pictures...