Happy Valentine’s Day! Okay, I know it’s a couple days early, but I wanted to share some romantic Valentines Day dinner recipes for you in time to get your ingredients ready. Guys, if you’re looking for easy romantic recipes for your loved one, this is the place! She’ll be amazed at your prowess in the kitchen. Oh yeah, and it’s CHEAP! But she won’t think you’re skimping out if you make her a meal like this.
3 keys to wowing your gal with a romantic dinner: Read more
This time of year in Washington, I want hearty warm meals like soup, stew, and chowder. Some of my stew recipes simmer for hours to reduce and thicken, so I make a huge batch that I can freeze for a quick meal later. But sometimes I want something right away and don’t have any in the freezer. That’s when my seafood chowder steps up to the plate. This is such an easy seafood chowder recipe, and totally satisfies that heartiness craving.
These are the oysters I served at our all local ingredient Christmas dinner party last week. If you head there and watch the video you’ll see Eric and I eating ours raw! But not everyone likes raw oysters, so here’s a really simple recipe for grilled oysters without a grill. We like cooking them under the broiler if it’s the middle of winter and we don’t want to go out in the cold to grill oysters. I’ll also walk you through how to preserve fresh oysters if they’re not being eaten immediately.
I was asked to try making a Safeway holiday recipe of my choice this weekend. I decided to try out three of their recipes! I love our local Safeway, and not just because my husband used to work there 
(Yesterday was his last day! Woo-hoo!) Although I’m getting reimbursed for my ingredients for these three posts, I am only doing this because I shop at Safeway and Eric and I both enjoyed these dishes. Check out Gingerbread Cookies and Fudge Ring.
The first thing I made was the Marinated Shrimp with Lemon Dill Sauce. Part of why I picked it was that the photo on the site didn’t look that appetizing and I felt a challenge to do better! I discovered the key is to not have so much sauce on the shrimp for the photo, and that toothpicks are really tough to make look attractive. Anyway, we ended up liking it better with less sauce anyway (and it’s better for you!) so next time I make these (and there WILL be a next time) I’ll halve the sauce or use more shrimp.
Spicy Dungeness Crab Sushi Roll
Yesterday I promised you crab sushi, and today I deliver! I guess these are basically a California Roll, or a Spicy California Roll since I add chili sauce. Eric and I love sushi, so it just seemed right to make it with our leftover crab. There are two reasons that I don’t make sushi very often. The first is that sushi is a lot easier for someone inexperienced like me to make when it’s a nori (or seaweed) wrapped roll. The second is that Eric doesn’t like sushi wrapped in nori. Fortunately, I learned about soy wrappers, which totally changes the sushi ballgame.
