166/365: National Lobster Day

You just might be clawing your way to the nearest crustacean tank in order to shellfishly enjoy today’s food holiday. June 15 is National Lobster Day!

Now, we’ve already discussed lobster before, so I won’t repeat the same details as before. How about a few fun facts instead?

1. Lobsters only turn red when they are cooked.
2. Lobsters have blue blood. This does not mean they’re rich, but rather, they’ve got copper in their bloodstream.
3. Lobsters were once considered food for the poor, and were fed to prisoners and servants. Nowadays they are a delicacy.
4. A lobster’s brain is in its throat.
5. Lobsters hear with their legs and taste with their feet.

Interesting creatures, eh? Plus they can live to a very ripe old age. You know, if they aren’t caught in traps and fed to hungry prisoners first. To celebrate the holiday, Tara and I went to Quizno’s for a lobster and seafood salad sandwich. I had no idea they made such a beast. Good stuff, too!

And now, as promised, I’m going to share a few stories from you, our faithful readers! Thursday was National Kitchen Klutzes of America Day, a day to celebrate your favorite kitchen follies. Tara and I told you about ours. Here’s what you had to say.

“One New Years Day I was opening a canned ham (back in the day when the cans were made of metal and you used a key to open it) and I ended up in the emergency room getting 9 stitches in my finger!” This one came from my mom, and I remember that day well. I was 9 or 10 years old. Most traumatic start to a new year ever. I have no idea what we ended up having for dinner that night – probably hospital food. Yum.

“My daughter was coming over for dinner and I wanted to try something new, exciting, and different. So, I tried salt-roasted pork tenderloin. When finished, it looked great. But, it tasted like salt lightly flavored with a hint of pork. I couldn’t eat it. Sue couldn’t eat it. Danica couldn’t eat it. The dog couldn’t eat it. I still don’t know what I did wrong, but that was bad.” Courtesy of my uncle Tom, who is quite the gourmet cook – which makes this story all the more surprising.

“I cut my hand on a frozen waffle.” Short, sweet, and painful…but I laughed my ass off when I read that. Thanks for sharing, Donna. I hope you were able to leggo of your Eggo fear.

“Years ago I made brownies (from a box) for my new co-workers, so they would like the new girl. I am terrible at following directions. The brownies had been in the oven for a few minutes when I discovered that I had left the eggs out. So I took the brownies out of the oven, stirred in the eggs and resumed baking. The next day when my co-workers were eating my brownies, this one mean girl yelled out for all to hear, “Hey, there’s hunks of eggs in these brownies!”. If anybody had to get a hunk of egg in her brownie, I’m glad it was her.” Thanks for the funny story, Marilyn. Two words for the mean girl: karma, bitch.

“My family tells a story about the first time I made meatloaf for them, when I was in junior high. Instead of using a teaspoon of pepper (or something), I used a tablespoon, and the resulting meatloaf was too hot and spicy for my bland family’s tongues. However, the next evening, Mom rescued my by crumbling my meatloaf up into the spaghetti sauce; my too-spicy meatloaf made a fabulous pasta sauce.” I bet I’d enjoy your spicy meatloaf, Jonna. I love food with a kick!

And then there’s Wendy, who apparently is so klutzy around the kitchen it’s a wonder anything ever turns out. She had multiple stories to share. “I tried taking cheese sticks out of the oven by grabbing the foil edges and the foil ripped and my hands went up and hit the top burners…..blisters on both hands….on Christmas eve no less!” “Tom: I did that trying to “brine” a chicken. Tasted like salt. That’s all, nothing else.” “When I was in the 6th grade my mom had to work Thanksgiving morning and it was my responsibility to put the turkey in the oven so we could eat when my mom got home. Well I didn’t remove that pack of innards and the turkey was still raw when it was time to eat. To this day I refuse to make turkey in Thanksgiving.”Oh also, when we got our first microwave I put a hot dog in for 5 minutes. Yes, minutes!” Remind me never to accept a dinner invitation to Wendy’s house. Especially around the holidays!