Birthday Feast

Last week was my birthday, if you missed it, I'm still accepting gifts until the end of the month. If you know me, you know that I celebrate everything with food. So in order to celebrate my recent, larger than I like number, I took to the kitchen. Hubs of course, offered to cook for me, but that would entail much cleanup without the  flavor payout. A nice offer, but one I declined.

Now, my favorite food in the world is seafood. There is very little seafood that I don't like - sea cucumbers leap to mind - so I set off down to browse at Pacific Fresh Fish (check them out on their facebook and twitter pages). I like to go into PFF with an open mind since I am always delighted by what they have available, both fresh and frozen. You can even get frog legs there. yup. frog legs.

This time, however, I spied some fresh sea scallops, some fresh Ahi and opted for a frozen lobster tail as opposed to the live lobsters they have in their tanks, just because I knew I was going to make several small plates and was feeling lazy. I was not disappointed, however and the lobster turned out to be my favorite dish of the evening.

The lobster was split in half lenghtwise and poached in butter with a little chicken stock (since I didn't have the whole lobster, I didn't have a nice fish stock). I served it atop a crispy curry sweet potato cake and doused it in a simple sauce made with yogurt, scallions and capers. It was absolutely wonderful and the yogurt sauce was light enough not to mask the delicate flavor of the lobster.

I also made the sea scallops in a complementary flavor profile. I simply seared the scallops on both sides and used a green mango scallion sauce that is simply, sliced green mango (picked up from Tony's Indian Spice market) and chopped scallion, cooked with a bit of chicken stock and lime juice, just until soft and then pureed in a blender.  It's a tangy sweet sauce that boosts the flavor of the scallops instead of covering them up. Of course top it with the caviar of your choice for that nice salty finish!

If you want more detailed instructions on these, let me know and if you live in Regina, you absolutely have to check out Pacific Fresh Fish. Not only are the staff knowledgeable, the fish fresh and tasty, but they can also order things in that you are dying to get your hands on. Like squid ink!

You can also check out the fun video I did with them a couple of years back!

Yes, oysters on the prairies. Because. Oysters.