Shrimp Creole

Tuesday night I made a super-fresh shrimp creole for Betsy. I found some huge, fresh, head-on shrimp and decided to take advantage of them. I peeled all the shrimp and put the heads and shells in a pan of water to make shrimp stock. Whole shrimp are surprisingly easy to peel; the head snaps right off, the legs come off with the tail, and then all you have to do is run your thumb up under what's left of the shell and pop it off.

I chopped up all of Betsy's ripe tomatoes--about 27, seriously--and started by sweating out chopped onion, garlic, celery, green pepper, and a little jalapeno in butter. I added a couple smoked alligator and pork sausages, then reduced that in a little white wine. I added the tomatoes, tomato paste, and shrimp stock, along with a healthy dose of salt (to help the tomatoes break down) and seasonings--bay leaves, paprika, chili powder, cumin, cayenne pepper, oregano, basil, parsley, and thyme. At the last minute I threw in the shrimp and a handful of chopped okra.

Serve hot, over rice, with Abita beer. Sit in the backyard and watch the fireflies.

Atlanta, GA; Mobile, AL; and Gulfport, MS

With 2400 miles under my belt, I think the road trip is finally getting started. I can safely say I was unimpressed with Georgia and Alabama. I'm sure there are many fine things about both states, but if there's anything in this world I'm an unwilling expert in, it's small Southern towns. I've seen approximately 900,000 pecan trees and magnolia trees, and I've realized that sometimes it's better to take the freeway.

Sunday I drove straight up 19 from Tampa to Atlanta. I'd never been to Atlanta before, and it was different than I'd imagined--there were a lot of hills and a lot of trees, and the city layout was very poorly designed. I realize there was no real design, the city just evolved and sprawled, but really. You can't expect not to have traffic problems in a city where the layout makes no sense and all the roads are filled with blind curves and trees. Pretty though. Apparently whoever designed the art museum was following the same format, because that was the most oddly laid out and confusing museum I've ever been in. The other supposed highlight, the Margaret Mitchell Museum, turned out to be a bust. They've turned an apartment building where she used to live on Peachtree Street into a museum, but they have none of her actual stuff and I didn't learn anything I didn't already know. I couldn't even bring myself to buy a tacky Gone With the Wind refrigerator magnet, so you know it was bad. I stayed with some friends from high school who live in the 'burbs. They introduced me to the Big Green Egg, which I now have to buy.

Monday morning I got up early for the drive to Gulfport, to stay with my sister. I wanted to stay off the interstate, but it took me three hours to reach the Georgia-Alabama border on back roads. I made it as far as Opelika before I decided I'd seen quite enough Confederate flags at 35 mph, thank you, and hopped on the interstate down to Mobile. I had a lovely lunch of fried pickles and a soft-shell crab po' boy at Wintzell's, and drove along old highway 90 to Gulfport.

After driving for two days solid, I had an advanced case of what my mother so colloquially calls "butt rot." Today I've been relaxing, catching up on laundry and computer stuff and enjoying the 90-degree sunshine and my sister's proximity to the beach. I went to the beach this morning to take some pictures; one of the best things about the beaches in this part of the world is that they're largely deserted. Katrina knocked out most of the beach industry (waterside surf shacks, bars, restaurants, hotels, etc.), most of which has not been rebuilt, so it's possible to be the only person on the beach for as far as the eye can see. Tonight I'll make some shrimp creole with huge, head-on, fresh Gulf shrimp, and have some frosty cold Abita Turbodog. Mmmmmmm...Abita.

Tampa, FL

I found out last night that one of my friends from New York will be flying out to New Mexico to join me on the Utah leg of this trip. We'll meet in Albuquerque, then head up to the canyonlands in Utah for some camping and national park-ing. My plan is to drive up through Four Corners, through southeastern Utah to Salt Lake City, then back down to southwestern Utah, and hitting the north rim of the Grand Canyon on the way to Vegas. The national parks in Utah will be among the more remote areas I plan to hit, so having some company will be lovely. I envision us cooking bacon on my camp stove, splitting a nice bottle of red, and tussling over tent real estate in the night. It'll be like Thelma and Louise, only without the crime and, you know, death.

And my friend from Tampa is considering flying out to join me on the Oregon leg of the trip. So maybe this starts a nice precedent! Speaking of Pockets, I love her dearly, but I'll be glad to restart the road trip tomorrow. Partly because I'm excited to see the Margaret Mitchell Museum in Atlanta (come on, you knew that was going to happen), partly because I'm excited to see two old friends from high school that I haven't seen SINCE high school, and partly because--and I love Pockets dearly--she has too many pets in too small a space. I'm sharing a one-bedroom apartment with her, two dogs, and four cats, and let me tell you, I was not aware that much animal hair existed in the world. Also, let's just say there was an incident involving my backpack and a cat. After repeated washings, the backpack was not salvageable, and has been replaced.

So tomorrow I'll head up to Atlanta, and then down through Alabama to Gulfport, MS, to spend a few days with my sister. I'll hit New Orleans, Cajun country, and Mobile while I'm there. For the first time, I'll visit her in my own car, so this affords me the perfect opportunity to stock up on Abita beer for the rest of the trip, and possibly beignet mix, which might come in handy in Utah. I'll also visit at least one Gulf Shore beach--I haven't had a chance to hit any Florida beaches. I spent yesterday catching up on back episodes of "Lost," and then wandered down to the Green Iguana, a South Florida bar known for the giant iguana on the roof. The bar was advertising grape Jager bombs. Grape. Jager. Bombs. The mind boggles.

Tonight I'm told we're going to a South Florida club, where I'm sure I'll have ample opportunity ("ample" being the key word) to make fun of the various silicone implants, fake tans, and man jewelry. Come to think of it, South Florida is just like Jersey, only with palm trees.

Savannah, GA and Tampa, FL

I left Charleston early this morning, intending to blitz Savannah on my way to Tampa. But it was pouring in Savannah, with a forecast for heavy rain all day, so I gave up pretty quickly. As soon as I stepped out of my car, I got drenched. So I headed directly to Florida instead. I took 95 down, so that I could get there as quickly as possible, but I'll stick to back roads from now on. The interstate is fast, but mind-numbing. Why is it that all truck stops look the same?

And P.S.: people in Florida canNOT drive. Nor are they aware of the correct usages of the left lane. Grrr.

I'll be staying here for a few days, visiting my oldest and dearest friend. No sightseeing to speak of, but I hope to get in some beach time. We're currently sitting on her deck, drinking wine and discussing mutual crushes. You know who you are!

Charleston, SC: Day Two

You know, all this internal blather about what I'm going to do with my life was put into perspective pretty effectively today. I got up early this morning and decided to go exploring. I walked around for a couple of hours, taking pictures of various interesting buildings and fauna. I heard a middle-aged Southern lady in a hat exclaim about taking pictures of window boxes, and I secretly laughed at her--until I realized I, too, was wearing a hat. And taking pictures of window boxes. Anyway, I started to wonder why the attraction. Charleston is pretty and all, but there didn't seem to be much of a scene (restaurant/nightlife/cultural). A city that builds its reputation on the past usually has little regard for its future: Appomattox is a classic illustration. Old houses and window boxes are nice and all, but I wasn't particularly excited by the city.

Until I found all the things that make Jenny really, really happy. To wit: food and booze. I didn't go to the aquarium, or Fort Sumter, or take any plantation tours. What did I do in Charleston? I took a cooking class and bought bourbon-aged beer and about twenty metric tons of gourmet salt. Yes, folks. I went to Charleston and bought salt.

As I was walking around, I stumbled across S.N.O.B. (Slightly North of Broad), a new restaurant and foodie haven. They have a kitchen store right next door. I went in, bought tea-smoked salt, green tomato pickles and dried cowpeas (like black-eyed peas, but smaller and darker) and discovered they were also offering a cooking class in lowcountry classics--pecan-crusted catfish, cowpea succotash and chocolate chess pie--for $25. Of course I signed up. I went back to wandering, to kill time before the class started, and stumbled across The Spice and Tea Exchange, where I bought applewood-smoked salt, alderwood-smoked salt, hickory-smoked salt, lime coconut-smoked salt, a great big rock of pink Himalayan salt (you pass it around the table and shave the salt off of it with a microplane grater) and a big pink salt brick, which can be heated and used to sear things like scallops right at the table, or chilled and used to serve sorbets, or simply used as a neat serving platter. Then I found the Charleston Beer Exchange--they did not let me exchange empties for full ones--where I discovered Allagash Curieaux, an ale that's been aged in old bourbon barrels. As far as I'm concerned, anything can be improved with the addition of either bourbon or bacon. Anything. Case in point: I learned in the cooking class that when baking anything with chocolate, bourbon can be substituted for vanilla, as bourbon makes chocolate taste more chocolatey.

I was so excited by my purchases that I went back to S.N.O.B. for a late lunch of shrimp n' grits and peach pie, complemented by a 2007 Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand and a 2008 Hughes Picpoul de Pinet from Languedoc. Then as I was hauling my twenty metric tons of salt and beer back to the hostel, I stopped in at O'Hara and Flynn Wine Bar for a glass of Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc. It was a terribly hot day, after all.

I got tired of trying to upload all my pictures. You can see them all at Flickr, under Two Blind Cats.

Charleston, SC

I started the real journey yesterday, when I left my parents' house for Charleston, SC. It was a relief to really get going--I'm excited to see new things, of course, but I was also anxious to leave my dad's anxiety behind. I know the constant questions were a way to relieve his own fears, but by the end, I was starting to feel that I was being constantly second-guessed.

And what better way to overcome that than on an empty highway, at 75 mph, with the XM satellite radio 80s station blaring? One of the many advantages to road-tripping alone is that no one judges you when you sing along to Tears for Fears at the top of your lungs. Turns out singing along to anything 80s at the top of your lungs is very therapeutic. I wanted to stay off the freeways, and it turns out that was the right move. The two- and four-lane highways I took to Charleston were largely deserted, and I got to see things I wouldn't have seen from I-95. 95 is a constant battle for lane supremacy; plus I got to avoid eastern North Carolina, which is nothing but hound dogs and scrub pine. I went down the middle of the state instead; old Highway 1 between Rockingham, NC, and Cheraw, SC (right on the border) was unexpectedly beautiful, especially when everything suddenly flattened out and the hills of Appalachia were left behind. Unfortunately, past Cheraw, the interior of South Carolina is exactly what you'd expect: flat, poor, and full of Jesus. The recession has hit this part of the world hard; at least one out of every two businesses I passed were shuttered.

Happily, Charleston is not like the rest of the state. It, too, is exactly what you'd expect--an antebellum town, full of lovely old architecture and lots of tourists. I wandered around for a bit, looking at the lovely old houses and trying to avoid the knots of slow-moving tourists. A couple of the restaurants I'd wanted to try were mobbed with them (note: never go to a restaurant mentioned in a guidebook), but never fear: my nose led me to ribs and beer at Sticky Fingers.

Once I'd checked into the hostel (Not So Hostel), I wandered over to the marina and treated myself to a real Dark and Stormy at a real sailor's bar, right on the docks. I sat on the dock and smelled the salt air and watched the sun set while I drank my Dark and Stormy and New York felt like a million miles away. I fell in with a group of boaters and we had a late dinner at 39 Rue de Jean . My first road trip friends! Today I plan to do more of the same: architecture, water, beer, etc., punctuated with fresh seafood and shrimp n' grits.

On the last night at home, my grandmother informed me that a driver's license was only good in one state. "No, Grandma," I said, "I'm pretty sure they're good all over the US." Then she wanted to know where mine was from. "New York," I said. "Oh, well, that's okay then," she replied. Glad we got that straightened out.

Free at last, free at last

I apologize for the lack of posting--my parents live in a technological dead zone. No internet, no wi-fi, no cell phone service, no cable. And Dad wonders why I don't want to move back home.

I officially start the road trip tomorrow. I'll spend a day in Charleston, SC, then on to Savannah and then to Tampa where I'll stay for a bit. The cats are acclimating themselves nicely (though not with the dog) and I've managed to get the car into some semblance of organization. I tested out my folks' camping equipment one night, and discovered at about 4 am that the tent was not in fact waterproof. So I've ordered a new (waterproof) tent; the rest of the camping equipment was functional, thank God, and sleeping on an air mattress outdoors is no different from sleeping on an air mattress indoors. My old bones will be creaky in the morning regardless.

My dad remains amazed that I plan on camping; but I contend that camping in national parks is sort of the point, and all the camping experience I've had up to this point was with my family. Now, no offense to my family, I love them dearly: but not when we're all camping together. My dad's idea of a great vacation was to pile five people and assorted camping gear into a Toyota Camry and take us back into the wilderness for several days at a time. Now, would you be happy crammed into a tent with your parents, assorted small children running around screaming, and no flush toilets or hot water? Especially when your dad then herded you all back into said Toyota Camry and spent the day oohing and aahing at various Civil War battlegrounds? To further the torture, extended relatives were often involved, meaning there were even more screaming small children and at least one grandmother badgering me to play Scrabble with her. In contrast, I will be camping all by myself at actual campgrounds, with modern plumbing, and nary a battlefield in sight. Many people have questioned my intention to drive cross-country solo; but I enjoy my own company all the time. I'd rather be alone than spend extended periods of time in a car with...well, just about anyone. Even the people I love dearest in the whole world would start to irritate me after about hour 10 on the interstate.

I've been playing with my new camera, which is super-cool. I've attached pics of the homestead.