Fish

On Friday I tweeted about fish:

Fish on Fridays reminds me of all-you-can-eat fish places w/my Dad & him always angry because they never served the fish fast enough for himless than a minute ago via HootSuite Favorite Retweet ReplySusan Larkin
sllark

There is nothing like a fish sandwich from Pittsburgh, and my childhood growing up there involved lots and lots of them.


But when I was quite young, I remember Ponderosa had all-you-can eat fish on Friday night during lent. I remember my Dad talking about it for weeks before we actually got to go, because people had told him about it: how there were servers walking around the dining room with huge, overflowing platters of fried fish, dishing it out to everyone as fast as you could eat it. There was a great build-up for the Friday we finally went. Of course the place was packed, and despite their best efforts the staff just couldn't serve the fish quickly enough to make my Dad happy. He left totally disgusted and never set foot in a Ponderosa again. I don't think I ever did either.

An all-you-can-eat experience that he enjoyed was at Ground Round here on the Eastern side of the state. The waitress figured out quickly that it was going to require a lot of fish, and just left the whole platter that she was serving the dining room on our table and my Dad was overjoyed. That experience alone took him back to Ground Round a few times, and those few NON all-you-can-eat trips probably paid for the money they lost on the fish. Probably.


(Fridays during lent are nice because there are so many more food options available when you go out. Why can't more restaurants have that many non-red meat, non-chicken, seafood and vegetarian specials all the time?)

Totally Addicting Pretzels

This weekend I am using the Superbowl as my reason to whip up a batch of these completely addicting pretzels. The only reason I need an excuse to make them is because I've made them practically every weekend this year. I had them on New Year's Eve and was instantly hooked. They are simple to make and so much better than just plain pretzels.

Start with sourdough pretzels. This time I used the big tub from UTZ.


(We knew someone once who wasn't from this area and he didn't say Utz as a word, he said You-Tee-Zee. So of course now that's what we usually refer to them as also.)

Break the pretzels up into smaller pieces and put them into a big baking dish.



Combine: 1 cup canola oil, 1 package ranch dressing mix, 1 teaspoon each of garlic powder, dill weed, and lemon pepper. Mix well and pour over the pretzels. Stir the pretzels to coat them all with the oil and spice mix.



Put them into the oven at 350 and stir them every 5 minutes until the oil is almost all absorbed. I think it usually takes 20-25 minutes for this quantity. They are good warm, but I think they are best the next day. I think other spices might be interesting to try. Maybe a touch of cayenne? Or perhaps the bacon salt that I can't seem to find a good use for beyond home fries.

The nice thing about using the tub of pretzels is that you can store them right back in it. I imagine they would keep for longer than 2 days, but I can't actually confirm that....

I Have a Blog?

Wow, I had no idea that I hadn't posted here since last August. While I still have a few blogs that I read regularly, these days most of the time when I'm online I am on Twitter, or posting over on Tumblr.

I am finally putting some more time into learning how to take really good pictures, and I hope to have a few things to post here soon that I am proud of. Posting pictures is easy, though, so I need to try to also find some motivation to write too.

The key for me I think is content. I think when I was posting more frequently, when I first started, content came pretty easily. Now when something strikes me as an idea for a post I either just tweet something quick, or throw it up on Tumblr. So I have to figure out what that leaves for this space, which hopefully I will in the near future.