Seafood, Eatfood

Sushi. How can something with a couple of ingredients be so delicious? I swore off going to sushi restaurants for the past month and a half because I was DETERMINED that I was going to make my own. It took a month and a half because when the weekends rolled along, I was either busy, out of town, or lazy. Alas, the day has come! I went to the Santa Barbara Fish Market to get my ingredients: 2lbs. of ahi tuna, 1lb. of hamachi (yellowtail), 3lbs. of littleneck clams (I also bought 2lbs. of littlenecks at Whole Foods), and 2 trays of uni.

The clams were bought to make clam chowder. I'm normally not a fan of clam chowder because I don't like creamy soups, but that craving needed to be satisfied and I was not going to buy store bought clam chowder. So, I made my own without butter or cream (I never use butter or cream, sorry Julia). I also am not a huge fan of bacon, but it'll give the soup a smoky flavor, so I bought 3 slices of jalapeno-garlic bacon at Whole Foods. The final product was a perfectly thick corn and clam chowder. The greatest feeling was seeing that only 1 clam out of the 5lbs. not opening up! I thought my other half would need to pry open the unopened clam, but it opened up quite easily. Great results for my first chowder!

Ingredients for the Corn and Clam Chowder:
5lbs. of littleneck clams+clam liquid
1 can of corn+liquid
1 large white onion
3 small organic red potatoes
ground black pepper
thyme
smoked paprika
garlic+garlic powder+garlic salt
cayenne pepper
1.5 cups of non-fat milk
1 cup of flour

I used my amazing 7.25 quart Le Creuset.

Jalapeno-Garlic Bacon.

The chowder may not look like much, but it was really good!

I used the hamachi to make hamachi jalapeno sashimi. Normally, yuzu sauce is needed for the recipe, but I decided to make my own citrus sauce for the sashimi. I squeezed juice from an orange, grapefruit, and lemon. Added ground black pepper, a splash of low sodium soy, a few slices of jalapeno and voila!
I sliced the hamachi as thinly as I could, topped them off with jalapeno slices and drizzled my citrus sauce on top. It was the perfect bite of melt in your mouth fatty hamachi, with citrus cutting through the fattiness and enough heat and crispiness from the jalapeno. Amazing.

With the ahi, I made a simple spicy tuna with sriracha, ground black pepper, and a tiny bit of sesame oil. I used the ahi in a roll with brown rice and sliced cucumbers and made a little spicy tuna don and topped it off with a piece of uni. Uni is delicious on its own, so I made 2 brown rice uni nigiris and ate the rest by itself. Delicious.

I know my photos aren't that great, but I'm trying to get more light into the apartment to make it look better.

Until next time!

CheFelicia