Lobster roll, anyone?

Still enjoying our week in Nova Scotia! I am not doing as well with my seafood-ingesting as I'd hoped, but I have thus far managed a very good lobster roll, excellent fish and chips (with haddock) and also some fried clams. For those not in the know, when lobster is in season, lobster rolls are popular in Atlantic Canada (although last month I saw them available at a Subway restaurant in Alexandria, Ontario, of all places!) No doubt it's the same in Maine; can anyone confirm for me that they have the lobster roll tradition as well?

The fish and chips we enjoyed were at the famous Shillelagh House restaurant in Truro, NS. YUM! And the aforementioned clams were fresh and delicious in Parrsboro. I've decided that this week, deep-fried is healthy! I'll just keep telling myself that until we get home.

Good lobster rolls consist of nice big chunks of lobster meat mixed with mayo and served cold on thoroughly bland and unhealthy white rolls (or even hot dog buns.) But you need a soft bland roll so that the full lobster taste comes shining through. I had mine with French fries. In fact, in one span of 24 hours this week, I managed three separate servings of French fries, which was quite exceptional for Ms. Multi-grain-Organic-Free range-"Baked not fried" here! But potatoes are my great love (it's my Irish blood), especially in the form of homemade chips (or French fries, as the non-British insist on calling them.) If I were stranded on a desert island and could only have two foods, they would be potatoes and cheese. I suppose I'd need something to cook the potatoes with, though. And some malt vinegar for my chips.

In case you haven't heard me whine about it previously, we lived in Nova Scotia from 1998 to 2003. It broke my heart to move away from here, but my poor hubby really needed to move out of province to get the hell out of a job he had come to loathe, so I suggested British Columbia, which is a beautiful place. That didn't work out as intended; among other things, I am not good with six weeks of rain in winter, and the average slob can't afford an oceanfront home there, which is what we had living in Nova Scotia. So we headed back east again to Quebec, but soon to return to Ontario, province of my birth. I still miss living here in NS and I suppose I always will.

But it's great to be having a vacation here, and our various friends are feeding us extremely well. We rented a car and because we did this so late, we ended up with a Mustang convertible! (Usually we just get the cheapest sub-compact on offer.) We keep making fun of the car but really, we're both enjoying it a lot. We've even had some great weather that has allowed us to put the top down. Gordon keeps saying that it's the first time he's ever had a car that people stare at. What, you don't want to stare at a black Mazda Protege 5 with a bash in the rear door from a hit-and-run in an Abbotsford, BC parking lot?

Today we are going up the eastern shore to see our friend Willie. Willie is originally from Germany and is a superb baker. He used to run a great bakery in Musquodoboit (pronounced a bit like "mosquito bite": muska-DAW-bit), but now he's more or less retired. We are also going to visit Martinique Beach while we are there. It is Nova Scotia's longest beach and very lovely. You can read more about it and the eastern shore here:

http://www.where.ca/halifax/article_feature~listing_id~22.htm

And I plan to get me more seafood before this trip is over! I need some Digby scallops, bad. As the locals would say, they are SOME GOOD!