A Delicious Labor of Love...

Tonight I made seafood chowder. It is seriously the best thing I have ever made, not only because of the flavor but because of the pride I feel having made it! It took for-freaking-ever (the harvesting, soaking, cleaning, etc. Not the actual recipe itself) but, oh my GOD, it was totally worth it! The recipe will be at the end of this here entry so if you want to skip my rambling tale, go ahead and skip to the bottom. Jerk.

Mussels!

The other day when Dylan and I went to Newport Sands, it happened to be low tide and we stumbled across thousands of mussels. We decided to go home that evening and do some online research to see if they were okay to harvest and eat. I spent hours googling shit like "can I eat blue mussels?", "tiny mussels okay to eat?", and "will I poop to death if I eat wild mussels?". Don't laugh...I am a city girl. Not only a city girl, but a city girl that has spent the past 10 years of her life in a land locked state. This coastal living is all new to me, so don't make fun! Anywho, all signs pointed to "picking and eating your own mussels is a-okay"!

Tide Pools and Mussels @ Newport Sands

Sea Creatures: We Has Them!

Yesterday, we decided to go ahead and head back to Newport Sands for some bivalve goodness. We stopped on our way and purchased a bucket because we were SERIOUS about our mission. When we got to the beach, the tide was on its way out so we explored the tide pools while we waited for the mussels to make their appearance. Once the waves receded a bit, we began our harvesting. After about an hour and a half we had filled our bucket halfway with a bunch of mussels, one tiny clam and a few handfuls of winkles.

Yes, winkles. Let's talk about those, shall we? They're tiny sea snails and they have pretty shells so I was quite excited that whilst googling the safety of eating mussels I stumbled across people talking about how much they loved eating winkles. Yay! I could eat them AND keep their pretty shells. I had escargot once many moons ago with my dad. I was about 12 years old and I remember liking them so I figured I would also like winkles. I read that they were clam-like in both taste and texture so I was feeling pretty optimistic about them.

When we got home, I poured the mussels onto a cookie sheet, covered them with a wet dish towel and then popped them on the bottom shelf of my fridge. For the winkles, I put them in a cloth bag which I wet, tied the top closed, put them in a bowl and then set them next to the mussels.

Soakin' the Mussels and Clam (Can you spot the clam?)

So let me say now that I totally understand why shellfish are so effing expensive. Their preparation is SO time consuming. We had about 4 pounds of mussels, winkles and clam (remember, I found the one? Hahaha...) and it took me about 4 hours to de-beard, de-barnacle and scrub every last one of them. Ugh. My back is killing me! I soaked the mussels and clam in our sink for half an hour before I started the cleaning so as to give them enough time to cleanse themselves of any sand. I also soaked the winkles in a bowl of cold water for 30 minutes. I then brought a small pot of heavily salted water to a boil and then plopped all the winkles in.

Winkle Winkle Little Star

It was...interesting. For some reason I thought they would scream. I don't know why I thought that, but I did. Luckily, they didn't scream but they did expel a weird white liquid. I imagine it was all of their hopes and dreams that would never come to fruition because they were dying...all so that I could have a bowl of chow-dah! Life's a bitch, winkles. Next time around, come back as a human. It's pretty awesome. Anyway, after boiling them for about 5 minutes, I drained them and then soaked them in cold water. At this point I asked Dylan to remove the meat from the shells. I'm not gonna lie...this part SERIOUSLY skeeved me out. There are little ''plastic'' disks attached to the winkles that enables them to close themselves into their shells. You have to peel them off. They reminded me of toenails and I think toenails are gross. Anyway, you want those bits off. Then you take a pin, hook the pin into the flesh and then you like...''unwind'' the meat from the shell. When they come out, they look like corkscrews. They reminded me of the cursed merpeople from The Little Mermaid. Y'know, the ones that are stuck to the floor of Ursula's cave? Yeah. They are so gross looking but we kept on truckin'. They smelled really nice, though! I put all the little bits of corkscrew meat into a small bowl and put them in the fridge to keep cool.

Next up, I put about 1 inch of water and 1/4 cup of white wine into a pot and brought that to a boil - after thoroughly de-bearding, de-barnacling and scrubbing the mussels (and clam) I popped them into the pot about 10 at a time. After 3 or 4 minutes I moved the open shelled mussels into a bowl and the un-opened mussels into the trash. I did this until all of the mussels were cooked.

And then I came up with the following recipe for seafood chowder. It is absolutely decadent. Both Dylan and I indulged in two bowls each. So unbelievably tasty and even more delicious knowing that we picked the mussels, winkles and clam ourselves!! I definitely think I'll do this again and again! The winkles tasted just like clams. You've gotta try this :)

Seafood Chowder Amazingness with Crusty Bread

4 pounds mussels - cooked and removed from shells and coarsely chopped (made about 1 1/2 cups of meat)
30-40 winkles - cooked and removed from shells and coarsely chopped
3 small filets of white fish (I used pollock) - boned, skinned and cut into bite sized pieces
200g cooked and peeled prawns
1 cup frozen mixed vegetables (I used broccoli, carrots, cauliflower and peas)
2 1/2 cups vegetable stock
2 1/2 cups milk
2 1/2 cups heavy cream
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 T dill
4 T cornstarch mixed with 1/4 cup water
salt and pepper to taste
parsley for garnish

1. Combine milk and stock in a large pot and bring to a simmer
2. Add vegetables until cooked through
3. Add fish
4. When the fish is just about cooked, add the mussels and winkles
5. After 3 or 4 minutes add the heavy cream, the garlic powder, the dill and the prawns
6. Bring to a very very gentle boil and then add the cornstarch mixture stirring gently but constantly until thick.
7. Salt and pepper to taste, bowl up and serve with some crusty bread and fresh parsley for garnish

Homemade Laundry Soap - UK Style!

This blog entry isn't food related, well, I guess technically it could be because you might need to wash food stains out of your clothes or something? Anyway, I've become increasingly annoyed by everyone pinning the ''Cheap Homemade Laundry Detergent!'' business on pinterest.

The recipe(s) on pinterest calls for American products which I just CANNOT get here in Wales so I did a little bit of research and finally found a simple recipe* requiring no grating or cooking and more importantly, using products one can easily find in the UK.

It basically breaks down to around £3.60 a kilo and that covers about 40 washes. I just checked the Tesco website and a box of 38 wash laundry detergent will set you back anywhere from £6 to £12. Word.

I've already used it to wash my kitchen towels and they look and feel great. I'm currently running a load of denim jeans and so far, so good. Also, it smells awesome in my house right now. I am seriously so thrilled with this. I love saving money!!

So here's the recipe:

500 grams of soda crystals (1kg bag can be bought at Tesco for 90p) 
500 grams of Borax substitute (I bought mine through Amazon for £3.40 but next time I'll buy actual Borax through Amazon for cheaper. It's still on the shelves at Walmart, so it can't be that harmful!! Right?)
2 tablespoons of soap flakes (425g box for £1.89 at Tesco)
4 tablespoons of OxiClean (I bought a knock off brand. 450g tub for £1.99)
As many drops of essential oil that you want (I bought a bottle of tea tree oil and a bottle of lavender oil packaged together for £5 here)

Mix all of that business together. That's it. Oh, I think I used about 15 drops of tea tree and 15 drops of lavender. Then dump it in a container with a lid. I used an empty plastic ice cream tub. You only need to use 2 tablespoons per load of laundry.

Sophie Approved!

* Original recipe found here (I doubled it)

A Fish & Chips Picnic Kinda Day...

Holy hell in a hand basket! The weather here in Wales has been IN-FREEEEAKING-CREDIBLE this past week. 70ish degrees and not a cloud in sight. Absolutely gorgeous and so totally NOT the weather one might expect in the UK in March. Holy shit. Seriously awesome. Needless to say we've pretty much spent every day going to various beaches. I LOVE MY LIFE. Having grown up on the east coast, I have always been in love with the sea. The only thing I hated about living in Oklahoma for the past ten years of my life was the lack of ocean. It is so so so so amazing to be living near the water again. I love that there's a marina within walking distance of our house and I will NEVER get sick of cresting a hill and seeing the ocean spread out before me. It's so magical.

Newgale Beach, Pembrokeshire

 So anyway. Today we woke up nice and early and decided to spend the day at the beach...again. We packed up the dog and a few bottles of water and hit the road. Since Dylan and I were both super hungry we stopped at our ''go to'' fish & chips establishment. It's called Something's Cooking and it's my absolute favorite ''chippy''. It's both a takeaway as well as a sit down restaurant - go in one side for takeway, the other side for sitting down. It is a bit pricey for what it is but it's so nice and the portions are HUGE which is always a plus for this fat kid. The last time I was there I ordered a starter of fried squid - not rings of calamari but giant strips of incredibly tender squid with a light bread crumb crust - SERIOUSLY tasty and then of course my  fish and chips. I wish I could just get a TON of fish and skip the chips. I'm not a big chip fan. Moral of the story, if you're ever in the area - go to Something's Cooking. It's FANTASTIC.

Chunks, Chips, Curry Sauce, Husband Hand

So we decided to get a takeaway and they had ''cod chunks'' on special. We ordered two portions of ''chunks and chips'' (that sounds so gross), one portion of curry sauce and one portion of garlic mayo. Curry sauce for me, mayo for Dylan. It all came up to £10 which I think is a really good deal. I'd never had ''cod chunks'' before, although I have seen them on the menu at Something's Cooking every time we've been. Let me say, I was really surprised at how good they were. I thought they'd be less-than-stellar reconstituted cod bits (think fish fingers) but they weren't! They were big pieces of incredibly delicious cod fillets. They're obviously just the bits that can't be sold as actual fillets.

Mmm...flaky, moist and delicious...

The fish was absolutely divine and I do believe from here on out I will exclusively order the cod chunks because they are JUST as delicious as the filet and about 40% cheaper. Huzzah!

Can we talk about chip shop curry sauce real quick? I don't know what it is. It looks super unappetizing and it tastes like sweet chicken bouillon with just a hint of curry powder but...I'm SO addicted to it. I love it. I hated it the first time I tried it but then I tried it again and I now must have it whenever I have fish and chips. If anyone can shed some light on it and tell me what it is, exactly, that'd be awesome.

Sophie jumps up and is all ''Heyyyyy, can I get some of that chippy goodness?'' No.

After our little pic-a-nic, we went to Newport Sands beach. We played fetch with Sophie for hours, traipsed through rock pools, swam in the sea and generally just enjoyed yet another incredibly glorious day. Sophie (who is just under 9 months old) swam for the first time and she was so awesome. Not scared at all! If I was an itty bitty Cocker Spaniel, I'd be terrified of waves crashing over me but she totally loved it.

We are going back tomorrow because we stumbled across something mighty interesting today which for the time being shall remain a secret. I am going to do a bit of research and perhaps my next blog entry will be about what it was we stumbled upon!

Stay tuned!

Mmm...All Day Breakfast...

Okay, so some of my most favorite things about living in the UK are the ruins, the old cemeteries, the castles and of course, the massive breakfasts. Denny's, IHOP, Waffle House and Village Inn pale in comparison. Sorry, but they do.

Dylan woke up this morning craving a big traditional breakfast so we decided to hit up a cafe before commencing with our daily errands. I love cooked breakfasts because, just like in the US, they are "cheap as chips" but stretching a quid feels better here because practically everything is extortionately priced. I'll take my penny pinching victories in any way I can!

For just under £5 (roughly $7) I received an egg, 2 slices of bacon, 2 "quality" sausages, baked beans, a grilled tomato, 2 slices of toast (not pictured), a slice of black pudding, a hash brown, fried bread, and a cup of tea!

So let's explore this English breakfast in further detail, shall we? Okay, so the baked beans are just that...the cheapo depot "tinned beans in tomato sauce" that people here can't seem to live without. Seriously, there's an entire aisle devoted to them at Tesco. I don't like that they're called baked beans...because when I think baked beans, I think of not those up there in that picture. Those are what my mom eats for Weight Watchers and tries to pass off as "baked beans". Anyway, I can take or leave those baked beans but...that's just a figure of speech. I obviously ate them all because I freaking paid for them, dammit and I needed something to sop up with my toast.

Bacon. When I think bacon, I don't think of what is served as "bacon" here. Bacon, for all intents and purposes, is supposed to be thin, melt in your mouth, meat candy. Bacon here is essentially ham. Don't get me wrong, it's good...but it's not bacon. They sell "streaky" bacon here which is supposed to be like "real" bacon but even that just isn't quite right. The fat doesn't melt away when cooked, it just kinda hangs around and I don't like that. The one good thing about this bacon though, is I don't eat it in under 5 seconds before even unraveling my cutlery from its napkin. One must use an actual knife and fork to cut it. It cannot just be shoved into your mouth. So that's a good thing.

Moving right along we come to those "quality" sausages. I don't know what made them "quality" sausages but that's what the sign said so there we go. Remember how I said in my first blog how sausages here are creamy? Well, they still are. Nothing has changed in British sausage manufacturing over the past 72 hours. I tried to figure out what gave them a "creamy" consistency and I think it's just they're a finer grain or something. I don't know. It's weird. They're good when paired up with a bit of egg, ketchup and toast though. The toast masks the squishy sausage and the flavor is alrite. Cripes, I miss some good ol' American Breakfast sausage!

Next up, we have an egg. It's an egg. Tastes the same the world over, I imagine. Oh, and a grilled tomato. It tastes just like a grilled tomato ought to taste. Not entirely sure why they serve them with breakfasts but that's fine. More for my money, I'll take it. Oh, and I get to think "I am eating a tomato. This evens the score when it comes to my fried everything else. I am so healthy". Ah yes, and a hashbrown. Not a pile of shredded potato that you'd get in the US but it's still oh so tasty and I think there may be onion in them? I don't know. Think McDonald's hashbrown only thicker and better (that's what she said).

There are two things that remain on that plate that I'd never eaten before moving to the UK and those two things are black pudding and fried bread...

According to Wikipedia, "black pudding, blood pudding or blood sausage is a type of sausage made by cooking blood or dried blood with a filler until it is thick enough to congeal when cooled". According to me, "black pudding is fucking awesome". I'll be the first to admit that the thought of black pudding is absolutely abhorrent but omfg. Originally from Philadelphia, I was raised on  Scrapple. Scrapple (once again according to Wikipedia) is "typically made of hog offal, such as the head, heart, liver, and other scraps, which are boiled with any bones attached (often the entire head), to make a broth. Once cooked, bones and fat are discarded, the meat is reserved, and (dry) cornmeal is boiled in the broth to make a mush. The meat, finely minced, is returned to the pot and seasonings, typically sage, thyme, savory, black pepper, and others, are added. The mush is formed into loaves and allowed to cool thoroughly until set". On paper, that sounds just as horrifying as black pudding so I guess being in love with Scrapple has opened up my mind to the prospect of black pudding. Black pudding tastes VERY much like Scrapple. It's so savory and is pan fried so it has a nice crisp outside with a delightfully smooth inside. I've had it most often with cooked breakfasts but have also had it with sea scallops and boy howdy, that's a flavor party in this fat kid's mouth.

Lastly, we have fried bread. I'll give you one guess as to what fried bread is. YES. It's essentially a slice of white bread, cut into triangles and then DEEP FRIED. You betcha, it's awesome. As Dylan said, it's basically shrimp toast without the shrimp, hahaha. It's so good and is such a wonderful vehicle for getting the ooey gooey delicious egg yolk from one's plate into one's mouth.

The other option for a cooked breakfast at this particular cafe was "The Belly Buster". 2 eggs, 3 slices of bacon, 3 sausages, fried bread, toast, tomato, beans, mushrooms, black pudding, 2 hashbrowns and a cup of tea for under £7. I was so tempted to order that one but I decided to hold out until NEXT TIME.

Mmm...next time...my belly's gettin' BUSTED.

Super Duper Carrot Bread

So for my first recipe I'm going to post this one that I came up with the other day. I was craving some carrot bread a la Mimi's Cafe...but there aren't any of those here in Wales. I went through my cabinets to see what I had and came up with the following recipe.

It's not QUITE like the carrot bread from Mimi's Cafe but it's definitely close and definitely delicious!! It's super filling and tasty. I recommend shmearin' some fake butter (or real butter, whatever) on a warm slice of this bad boy. Give it a try!

Since it's chock full o' carrot, fruit and seeds, I feel that I can trick myself into thinking that this totally has loads of health benefits. Amirite?

1 ½ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 ½ cups brown sugar
3 medium eggs
1/2 cup desiccated coconut
1/4 cup seeds of your choice - I used a mixture of sunflower, pumpkin, sesame and golden linseed
1/2 cup pineapple drained well and chopped fine
1/2 cup raisins - the raisins I found here are massive. Next time I'll use ''sultanas'' which are what I think of when I think of raisins. Oooo or dried cranberries. I bet that'd be awesome...mmm...
1 cup shredded carrot - Shred your carrots SUPER fine and then once you get a cup, squeeze all excess moisture out

1. Preheat oven to 350F or 175ish C.

2. Mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt in a large bowl.

3. In a separate bowl, mix eggs, oil, and brown sugar.

4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix. Then toss in the seeds, coconut, pineapple, raisins, and carrots. Mix.

5. Pour batter into oiled/floured 8 inch baking dish

6. Bake until knife inserted in center comes out clean - took me about an hour but my oven is really temperamental so you may have a different cooking time!

My first ever food blog entry!

So this is exciting, eh? Well, where to begin?

Many friends, including my husband, encouraged me to start a food blog. Perhaps it's just because they were sick of seeing all of my ''OMG THIS WAS SOOOO GOOD'' status updates on facebook? Either way, I figured I might as well give it a shot. Everyone else has a food blog, so I want one too!

A little bit of background information? I'm 28 years old and up until this past summer, spent the last 10 years of my life in Tulsa and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. In May, I got married to a British fella and at the end of July I moved to Wales. Hellooooo culture shock! You wouldn't think it'd be all that difficult seeing as we speak the same language and all but boy oh boy, trust me when I say it's different. Way different.

Firstly, EVERYTHING is SO expensive and there aren't piles of coupons included in the Sunday paper. There isn't even a ''Sunday paper'', hahahaha! So much for my love of coupon clipping! Secondly, the food is different. The meat has a different flavor. Bacon is not bacon, but ham or something. I miss breakfast sausage in a very serious way. And since we're on the subject of sausage...it's weird here. I don't know how to describe it. Creamy? I just don't know. You have to try it to understand. The grocery stores are laid out differently, the fresh and frozen food sections are much smaller than what I am used to. The potatoes aren't the same (my kingdom for an Idaho spud!!) and lots of items have different names here. Cilantro? Try coriander. Eggplant? Try aubergine. Zucchini? Try courgette. I can't find elbow macaroni at the local Tesco so it should come as no surprise that the pasta selection is dire. Even ''cheap'' food like canned beans and shit are expensive. Christ help me. Oh, but ''baked beans'' are a dime a goddamn dozen.

But it's not ALL bad. Ya can't get smoky bacon crisps (potato chips) in the US! There isn't a ''chippy'' (a place where one can hop in and get fish and chips wrapped up in paper) on every corner in the US! I don't know if I could ever live without a kebab shop nearby now, and I went 28 good years without a kebabbary. Is that a real word? It should be.

After working pretty much constantly for the past 10 years, this is the first time I've been jobless. It's hard enough for a local to land a job here in the UK, let alone a foreigner with no local references. So, needless to say, between perusing the jobseekers website and sending off CVs and applications, I have a lot of time on my hands to ALSO peruse grocery ads, pinterest and my cupboards.

So, that's where this blog comes in. Why should you ''Trust a Fat Kid...''? Because a fat kid will never lead you astray when it comes to really good food. If a fat kid says something tastes good, you should believe them. Oh, also, I'm a fat kid. My husband and I are trying to lose weight, admittedly. When I told Dylan (that's the husband) that I was going to name my food blog ''Trust a Fat Kid...'' he asked ''Well, what happens when you're not fat anymore?'' My response? ''Even if I'm not outwardly fat, there will ALWAYS be a fat kid living in me who knows wtf she's talking about when it comes to feeding her face''. Fact.

So sit back and relax. I'll blog about food I make using my own brain. I'll blog about food I make using recipes I find online. I'll blog about food I buy in packets/boxes/bags/etc. found here in the UK. I'll blog about food I order out at restaurants/takeaways/etc. I may also blog about homemade dog treats or other things I make using food products that may or may not be for actual consumption (just saw a pin about making cleaning spray with orange peels and vinegar on pinterest). We'll see!

Enjoy :)