Saturday, September 6, 2008

Hurricanes or not, Trip.

Tropical Storm Hanna appears to be not more than a big storm and is currently harassing the Eastern Seaboard of the States. Hanna did cause some deaths in the islands but pictures shown of the Carolina coast 5 hours after it hit show people in the water and hardly a ripple. Hannah is busy racing up the coast and will drop some rain in places where they are not used to such storms. Ike is on its way and that is already a Category 3. They are predicting it will strengthen, after it has passed Cuba. Josephine is still a Tropical Storm. If you are interested, there are all kinds of videos on the weather channel if you click here you can see them. The picture was taken from the weather channel a day or two ago. Someone made the crack the other day "I don't like Ike". In case you don't remember that's a reference to the buttons people wore when Eisenhower became president "I like Ike". Well, only just over a week and we head on out for our trip. It will be nice to get away. The car is all ready, we didn't end up spending and arm and a leg, just an arm. Matt does the packing, I am useless at it and that won't get done til Sunday. We bought new suitcases for our trip to England and one of them is ginormous. I think we could pack for a couple of months if we took it. Picture from dawsonresort.com Manitoulin is actually quite a big island we are told and there is lots to see. Me being me, I wonder what the restaurants are like. We had a magazine in our mail box last week called Home Basics. I am not sure where it came from, but it is full of delicious sounding recipes. One I am particularly interested in was a cold soup which I will give you the recipe for. In fact they listed three cold soups all of which look pretty good. This one looks so good it caught my eye instantly. Chilled Cucumber, Avocado and Shrimp Soup Serves 4 Source Home Basics 1 medium Avocado 1 medium cucumber, peeled and diced 1/2 Cups chicken or vegetable broth 1 Cup plain Yoghurt 2 Tbs lime juice 1 tsp salt 1 cup diced, cooked shrimp 2 green (spring) onions, finely chopped 4 small, cooked, peeled shrimp. Cut the avocado in half and remove the stone. Wrap half the avocado in plastic wrap and set aside. Peel the other half and cut into chunks. Place the avocado, cucumber, broth, yoghurt, lime juice and salt in a blender. Process until smooth and creamy. Transfer the mixture to a bowl and refrigerate for at least 1 hour or until very cold. To serve, peel and slice the remaining avocado half. Stir the avocado into the soup along with the diced shrimp. Ladle the soup into 4 bowl, sprinkle with green onions and float a single shrimp on top of each bowl. The picture shows the tail still on the shrimp. I personally hate tails left on and always remove them otherwise the person eating them has to then find somewhere to put it. Have a great weekend.

9 comments:

  1. Just down into the Michigan peninsula we found some nice East European style restaurants. Not sure what you'll find up in Manitoulin though. Whitefish, maybe?

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  3. these kind of dawsonresort.com pictures make me dream ^^ i wish i could explore it too !

    Is it usual to have such a weather in your part of the canada Jo ?

    i've heard about very cold winter but i don't know very much about it really ^^

    (sorry it was me above)

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  4. Hmm. It certainly sounds interesting, but cold soup doesn't appeal to me. I don't like warm salad, either. Very pleb, very square tastes, me, even though I"m a vegetarian.

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  5. Ru - yes I am likely to get whitefish or other lake fish, I believe there are some good fish restaurants on Manitoulin.

    Gynie - in summer we usually get very hot weather although we haven't had a lot of it this year and yes, cold winters with, usually, lots of snow. I understand that the west coast is a lot warmer in the winter, British Columbia area.

    Satima - I would have thought Vichysoisse was right up your vegetarian street. Leek and potatoes. It is a delicious cold soup and one of my favourites. I probably won't try this soup until we come back now.

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  6. I love leek and potato soup - in fact, it's my equal first fave, along with pumpkin. But it's gotta be hot!

    I just saw the destruction left by the hurricanes on the news, How horrible!

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  7. Yes, they can do a lot of damage. Ike is causing lots of concern here. I think Cuba is going to get socked by it first before mainland America. Trouble with the islands, people have nowhere to go plus because of the poverty, a lot of the homes are not able to stand up to such winds.

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  8. I never saw the point of warm salad either, satima. I mean, it's just limp lettuce. :S

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  9. Ru - you obviously haven't tried what they call keeled salad in the southern States. You have a salad of spinach leaves and then pour bacon and bacon grease all over them. Bloody delicious although not healthy. You can do the same with lettuce of course. Then there is petits pois à la Française where you cook baby peas with lettuce and onions, the cooked lettuce is the best part IMHOP.

    I will also get Perch on the island Ru, couldn't think of the name the other day.

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