The Adventures of a Calamari Queen
Christian, Wife, Mommy, Homemaker, Retired nurse, Fur-mama,living a simple and minimal life!
Hello everyone! I can finally “see” spring in our own yard! I cleaned some parts of the yard today because the gardener who was suppose to take care of our messy yard got sick and who knows when he will get better. So I just started to clean some parts and will continue to do so in the coming days. I don’t mind because the weather today was sunny and the perfect time to spend outside. I will probably buy some flowers and herbs/veggies next month so I can start gardening. I’m kinda excited!
I’ve been living here in Washington State for the last 7 years and I’ve never seen the Cherry blossoms at the University of Washington (the area is called the Quad). This weekend the Hubs and I went to see it, and it was so pretty. It rained a little (for like 5 minutes after we got there) then the sun showed up and it was lovely. Riley had the most fun because there were dogs at the Quad and he loves Springtime;)
After our little Cherry blossom outing, we had sushi and ramen at Genki Sushi in Factoria Mall (Bellevue,WA)
My hubs prepared these manila clams in white wine sauce early this week. It’s one of my favorite dish because it’s quick and easy to make (aside from cleaning the clams). I make sure that it’s really clean by brushing each clam, it can be time consuming but I really enjoy the broth so I want to make sure there’s no sand in my soup. I normally add flour and soak for 30 minutes then start brushing the shells. Ina Garten says the flour helps remove the sand (I totally agree!). We get our manila clams from the Asian market in Bellevue,Wa.
Ingredients:
3 tablespoons butter
3 cloves fresh garlic, minced
1/2 cup dry white wine or dry Vermouth
2 pounds of clams (Littlenecks or Manilla), rinsed and cleaned
3 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
*optional 1 small lemon cut into wedges
Directions:
Melt butter in a medium pot over medium heat. Add garlic and cook for 2-3 minutes until garlic is fragrant but not burned. Add wine and increase heat to medium-high until wine is brought to a simmering boil. Add clams and cooked covered for 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally, until clams have opened. Discard any clams still closed. Add parsley and give the pot a quick stir. Transfer clams and broth to a large serving bowl, serving with lemon wedges on the side.
While in Portland, we visited our favorite places again( we didn’t really branch out). We went to PokPok thai restaurant for their fish sauce chicken wings. I personally love their wings,while the Hubs finds them OK. I’m disappointed with their other dishes though(just like the first time we were there) but I will still go there for the wings alone.
Lunch at PokPok:
Enjoying some Ice cream at Salt&Straw (PokPok and Salt&straw are just walking distance from each other). We sampled 4 different Ice cream flavors and my favorite was the Strawberry Honey Balsamic with Black pepper, sounds weird but I really enjoyed it.
Podnah’s Barbeque (we stopped at Podnah’s to get some bbq for my In laws who took care of Riley for 2 days). Podnah’s was featured by Guy Feiri on his Foodnetwork show; we’ve been here before so we know it’s really good bbq).
We went to Portland this week for 2 days because I wanted to watch the NBA game between Portland Trailblazers and Dallas Mavericks. I’m a big basketball fan (the Hubs not so much) and Portland is the closest team to watch. I’m still sad that Seattle gave up the Sonics and we no longer have an NBA team. It was a great time with Hubs, this was our 3rd NBA game that we’ve seen (we’ve been to Madison square, San Antonio’s stadium and the Moda center). We stayed at the Marriot which is really close to the stadium. We took a taxi going there so we didn’t have to deal with parking and we took a pedicab after the game to enjoy the City view (it was pricey but fun to see Portland at night!). I do enjoy watching the whole “behind” the scenes at the games because it’s so different when I watch it on TV. You miss the entertainment of the stuff going on between time outs, halftime show and the energy the crowd the whole time. Thanks to my Hubs who took time to bring me to watch the game. Till next time:)
