A Sunday full of food and fun

The woes of my lovely  netbook continue; I am currently doing a system restore to factory settings, so am updating on my Giant’s netbook. Oh the wonders (and sometimes nightmares) of technology!

Yesterday we visited the Giant’s parents. His sister came to pick us up since we don’t own a car and his parents live in the next town. On the way she stopped at the Wal-mart. Oh my god the Christmas traffic! It was downright mad! I’m so glad I’m done gift shopping. We realized that it was noon, and we weren’t eating till supper. Having also missed breakfast we broke down and ordered some MacDonald’s. It wasn’t a good idea.

I haven’t eaten at McD’s in almost a year. If I am getting fast food, it is usually Subway. If I want a burger and am not willing to take the time and make it, I ALWAYS choose A&W. Their ‘Uncle Burger’ is a sirloin beef burger and tastes almost like real BBQ.

I decided to order a Grilled Cheese Sandwich Happy Meal, and added a Junior Chicken sandwich from the value meal. I didn’t realize they had added grilled cheese as an option; it COULD have been a very good sandwich, but they didn’t melt the cheese. I think they grilled each piece of bread separately and then slapped two pieces of cheese between them. The cheese was not melted in any way.

I had tried to order apple slices with caramel dip, but apparently one of the workers ate the last one just minutes before (I didn’t think it was as funny as she did). Instead I had fries, and they were perfect. The one thing MacDonald’s can do is fries.  They were hot, crispy and ever so salty. I love licking my lips and getting all the salty, greasy flavour after you finish. Oh so good. The junior chicken was bland and covered in mayo (it didn’t help). The meal made me so very sick. I am not good at fast food.

Anyway, back to REAL food. Due to scheduling conflicts, Christmas Eve Lobsterfest at the in-laws was held yesterday. You see, the Giant and I will be at my parent’s house on xmas eve for our traditional lobster/steak feed, and the Giant’s sister’s man will be heading out of town to visit his fam. This means lobster/steak yesterday, lobster/steak again on Christmas eve! Everyone wins.

I am not a fan of the lobster, but am a giant fan of steak. It isn’t the flavour, in fact I like lobster bisque. I just dislike the texture of lobster meat. It isn’t like steak, it isn’t like chicken, it isn’t like fish. It isn’t even really like shrimp. Chewing lobster (even melt-in-your-mouth perfectly prepared lobster) is unpleasant for me, so I let everyone else enjoy a little more of the special treat!

Did you know lobster used to be considered a poor man’s food, and it was socially looked down on to eat it? As recently as my and my Giant’s parent’s generation it has the negative stigma attached to it. Now it usually costs a pretty penny, and is considered a delicacy! How times change.

This is a picture of the king of the pod, after cooking. The Giant’s family makes it easy and cracks them all over the utility sink before serving, so that no one needs to crack at the table. They are much much creepier BEFORE being boiled!

I like to call this “December Barbecue”, since we get tasty BBQ fixings (green cabbage coleslaw and potato salad with crusty white rolls. White rolls are a rare treat for me.) You can see the Giant’s plate with a helping of lobster on it, before he added generous helpings of the sides as well as a nice big steak.

This is my plate, sans lobster (as I explained). The steak was tender a juicy, slightly more cooked than I like. I’m a medium rare girl with tendancy toward rare over medium, and this was a very solid medium. The thing is, it was still very very tender and very very juicy. (The extra very’s were very very necessary.) I LOVE the green coleslaw and took a nice large bit. Oh what an excellent meal this was.

I didn’t get a look at what wine we were drinking. I had some red, and it was a very easy to drink one and went very well with the beefy flavours in the steak. The Giant had beer, as usual. He is known to drink wine once and a while, but prefers beer when it is available.

Later that night was my Giant’s staff Christmas party. It was more of an impromptu gathering of staff to exchange secret santa gifts while drinking, but it was a lot of fun. After we got home, I heated up a cottage pie I bought from The British Lady at the Saint John City Market on Saturday. I would call it a shepherd’s pie, because that is what it was, but they labeled it cottage pie and they were british, so… I didn’t get a picture but believe me when I say it was everything a shepherd’s cottage pie should be. The potato was fluffy and covered in melted cheddar cheese; the beef filling had peas and chopped up carrots and just enough really yummy thick gravy to match the amount of potatoes. The perfect ratio of filling to potato topping.  Late night food is good after you have consumed a few too many drinks!