Sheltered Girl Meets World

Eaten: Frozen Custard @ The Merry Dairy & Luv-It (Ottawa, ON & Las Vegas, NV)

Jimmies, pecans and  cherries - oh my!

While I'm on vacation I need ice cream.  In Italy I sampled various gelaterie's across the country, in Germany I tried scoops of ice cream layered with thick cherry liquor and in Las Vegas I tried frozen custard.  Frozen custard is similar to gelato except it's made with an egg yolk base and has a slightly higher milk fat percentage (gelato is 4-8%, frozen custard 10-12% and ice cream 14-18%).  It has less fat and sugar than ice cream and has a creamier, denser texture thanks to the eggs.  It also melts slower, which in the 40°C Las Vegas sun is very important.

In Las Vegas the locals get their frozen custard fix at Luv-It Frozen Custard, a small building located off the strip beside the Olympic Gardens Gentlemen's Club.  Perhaps not the best neighbourhood but that hasn't stopped tourists and regulars from visiting and indulging in sundaes, cones, shakes, malts and floats in over 30 different flavours since 1973.

I'd be merry too if I was dishing out cups and cones of creamy frozen custard.

In Ottawa the only way to get your frozen custard fix is by tracking The Merry Dairy truck (yes, I said truck) using the Google Latitude powered Track the Truck feature on the website.  Although owner Marlene Haley can't fit 30 flavours in the truck, she does offer a wonderfully creamy vanilla with jimmies, butterscotch and chocolate sauce to decorate.  We may not get the blistering heat that Las Vegas does but a cool cup of frozen custard sure tastes great on a muggy Ottawa afternoon.

Eaten: Lobster Roll (and much more) @ Street Food Block Party (Toronto, ON)

Don't be fooled, Street Food Block Party before the 3,000 people arrived with their appetites.

Combine the Toronto Underground Market with Food Truck Eats on a day notorious for being celebrated with music, drink and food and you get a an amazing combination of food trucks, vendors, wineries and breweries serving up Cinco de Mayo themed food at the picturesque Evergreen Brick Works.  I volunteered my car and driving expertise (don't laugh) to help Ottawa's Stone Soup Foodworks and their crew get to Toronto in time to set up and serve their local and sustainable cuisine they've become known for.

Eaten: Uyghur Cuisine @ Café Kashkar (New York City, NY)

The colourful Langsai Salad with heavily cumin spiced Samsa in the background.

I've said before that I like to travel by the seat of my pants, tossing the guide book in the back seat and visiting whichever roadside attraction has the brightest lights but I've changed.  Since the mishaps of last years American Road Trip I've learned that a flexible itinerary with details like addresses, hours of operation and alternatives can be useful and can avoid the dreadful vacation argument.  I still find making an itinerary painful but it's not the planning that gives me anxiety it's seeing the attractions, hotels and restaurants written down that reminds me of the expense of the vacation and how ill prepared my wallet is.

Eaten: Freshly Steamed Lobster @ The Lobster Place (New York City, NY)

Order a live lobster or buy one that's been cooked earlier in the day.

My first time eating whole lobster was on a family trip to Nova Scotia.  We stopped at a family run restaurant overlooking the water and I ordered a whole lobster.  I was outfitted with a white bib, given tools and I did my best, with the occasional tip from our server, to get as much meat from the shell as I could.  I didn't expect to find lobster that fresh anywhere but in the Maritimes so it came as a surprise when we saw people hard at work deshelling lobster meat, dipping the white meat into a plastic cup of clarified butter on the concourse of the Chelsea Market in New York City.  We stopped window shopping and went on a search for the source and it didn't take us long to find it, the store is named after lobsters after all - The Lobster Place.

Yeah, he looks like a good size for two people to share.

The Lobster Place has been serving New York fresh Maine coast Lobsters since 1974 when they started making runs to Portland from its original location in the Upper West side.  Their approach was simple, deliver a high quality, hard-to-find product and do it with integrity.  Over the years they've moved from their original location to Chelsea and increased their product line to include not only lobsters but everything under the sea and quite the menu of prepared seafood.

In addition to steamed lobsters there are many different types of sandwiches, salads, sushi and a collection of chowders available for take away.  We walked past cases of whole fish, fillets, shell fish, oysters and the prepared food section to get to the back of the store where customers had cued to buy live or precooked lobsters.  We chose to steam a live lobster instead of buying one that had been precooked earlier in the day.  The cost is the same (market price) but there is a 20 minute wait for the lobster to be cooked which is easily spent browsing one of the many specialty shops at the market.

 

Don't look at me like that, you know you're tasty.

When we returned to the back of the shop our lobster was ready, sitting on a cardboard plate with a lemon wedge and small container of clarified butter.  We spent the next 15 minutes in silence, prying and coaxing meat out with the occasional 'ow' when a hand got too close to the spiky shell.  It was simple steamed lobster meat but it was deliciously luxurious and sweet without needing to open the container of butter.  Eating on a cardboard plate on a dirty table on the concourse of the market may not have been as beautiful as a small restaurant on the coast but the flavour and smell of the lobster made you believe you were there, for 15 minutes anyway.