Adventures With Food

Recap of some culinary adventures from my weekend in Galway: Ever try to make gooey butter cake with carrot cake mix? I thought I'd bring a taste of St. Louis to my gracious host family, and that's all I could find at the store. Needless to say, it didn't taste quite the same, but I pulled it off okay and didn't poison anyone. They seemed to really enjoy it, and we polished off a whole 9x13 pan of it that weekend. I need to work on getting the baking time right, though. Slightly well-done, but still quite edible. What did I have for dinner on Friday night? Lamb liver. I knew it was liver before we got started, but only after I happily polished off two plates of it did was I informed that I could have been hearing Mama Sheep ba-ba-baaing in the field next to the house while I was dipping Baby Boy in soy sauce. After another feast on Saturday night (beef cooked in oyster sauce), we had the traditional Sunday afternoon "lunch" at the Sture's. Two full birds (chickens), three different kinds of potatoes, veggies from the backyard garden (leeks, spinach, carrots, parsnips), and for dessert, English pudding. Lunch? Thanksgiving dinner, more like. And before you ask, I still haven't stumbled across any haggis. That's a Scottish thing, anyway.