Archive for the ‘ aioli ’ Category

Aioli Lobster Roll

by petermarcus | January 4, 2009 | In Photography, Recipes, aioli, dinners, food, lobster, sauces, shellfish 13 Comments

There’s a seafood store nearby that has some pretty good local seafood, but also flies in lobster from Maine. They have a sale from time to time, and for this part of Florida, $7.95/lb is almost half the going rate. I picked up a couple lobster and decided to make fresh lobster rolls.

Now, the New England lobster roll is pretty basic — fresh lobster, mayo, a lettuce leaf, a roll or bun, and maybe some seasoning. I don’t think lobster rolls spawn the same sort of debates that cheesesteaks do in Philly, or pizza does between New York and Chicago, but when I’m in Boston I don’t see a lot of debate over the ingredients.

On the other hand, I’ve found that substituting homemade aioli for mayo will almost always give an interesting spin on a meal. This is still a pretty simple meal, but Christey and I were sadly eying the crumbs on our plates when we were done, wishing for more.

lobstah

Fried Grouper Sandwich, with Cajun Aioli

by petermarcus | August 8, 2008 | In Photography, Recipes, aioli, cajun, dinners, fish, food, grouper, sauces 10 Comments

Christey and I met in St Pete Beach, Florida. We both lived in the area and a friend of a friend of both of us was in town, and we all met for drinks and dinner at Sloppy Joe’s, on the beach.

Yeah, it’s Hemingway’s Sloppy Joes, except the one in Key West that’s named Sloppy Joes isn’t the one Hemingway went to. Sloppy Joes either moved, or got bought out, I don’t remember which, nor do I know why they decided to put another on the Gulf Coast in Tampa Bay, but the sunsets are pretty and the beaches are white and powdery.

Sloppy Joes has a grouper sandwich on the menu, of course. Almost every restaurant on the Gulf Coast of Florida does, from the dingiest dive (where the grouper is most likely not grouper, but basa), to the high end resorts. One of my favorite grouper sandwiches was at south Clearwater Beach at the Bellevue Biltmore Beach Resort. They took the classic fried grouper, red onion, lettuce, and tomato, and substituted a chipotle aioli for the mayo.

Tonight, I made a beer-batter fried grouper sandwich, with a cajun spice and jalapeno aioli, on a toasted bun. A summer beach classic, and nostalgic for us both.

Can you hear the surf?