Alaska Mini-Roadfood Convention

Next week we have the pleasure of welcoming some Roadfood folks to The Last Frontier! In attendence will be Patti and Jeff Crane (RedPatti on the forum), Rick and Jan Flynn (RickF) and lleechef and Zman.

Plans are to take everyone out on our boat to fish for halibut and salmon and set some shrimp pots. In between fishing they will be viewing glaciers, mountains, fjords, icebergs, otters, sea lions, seals, whales, dolphins and eagles. The menu will be strictly Alaskan "Roadfood" fare.....halibut, salmon, Kachemack Bay oysters, Kodiak scallops, prawns from our pots, reindeer and caribou sausages....etc.

Pictures of folks catching fish will be forthcoming.

I wanna go!

Poverty Pete,
Come on up! We have lots of halibut and salmon poles and if you want we can turn you loose in a beautiful lake with waders and a fly rod!! Of course, you will be subjected to eat the same Alaskan "Roadfood" as the others........I think I forgot to mention copious amounts of King crab.

quote:

Originally posted by lleechef

Poverty Pete,
Come on up! We have lots of halibut and salmon poles and if you want we can turn you loose in a beautiful lake with waders and a fly rod!! Of course, you will be subjected to eat the same Alaskan "Roadfood" as the others........I think I forgot to mention copious amounts of King crab.

Subjected to eating Alaskan roadfood? Is that supposed to be some sort of punishment? cedar-planked salmon, halibut steaks? When I was last in Alaska, building the pipeline the food I most remember is the wonderful omelettes.
I can't get away this week. How about September? Where are you, anyway? Close enough to Juneau that I could drop in on my pals at Alaskan Brewing Co.?

I will be there too! Well,in spirit maybe........You guys have fun!
We will be looking forward to the pictures.

Looking forward to the pictures, it's been 10 years since last Alaskan trip and enjoyed the wonderful seafood.....I'll be there in spirit!

Oh, how we envy you Alaskans during your beautiful, if too brief Summer. Wish we could be there - guess we'll just have to drown our sorrow in some Maine lobster and Malpeque oysters.

Cheers, John

Hey Ileechef,

My sister just got back from Alaska, you failed to mentioned the wonderfull summer temps y'all are having!She said the one day it even got into the 90's. All kidding aside, she said she had just seen some the most breath taking scenery in her life.

The weather has been pretty spectacular, it got to 85 in Anchorage last week and it was 105 in Fairbanks!

Poverty Pete, we're in Anchorage but you could always take the ferry or fly to Juneau, as it's the only state capitol that you can't drive to!!!

Thanks for all your wishes......we'll take lots of pictures while we're forcing down all that King crab and halibut!

The ferry sounds relaxing. How long does it take?

Sounds spectacular! Maybe one day I'll be able to make it to Alaska.

Pete,
How fast can you row a boat with your truck sitting on planks, cross-ways, in a choppy sea?
Lisa, I hope all goes well. We will get there yet. Take good care of Rick!

quote:

Originally posted by Poverty Pete

The ferry sounds relaxing. How long does it take?

Pete, looks like Whittier to Valdez is 7 hours, Valdez to Juneau is 32 hours, but I bet it's a fun cruise!

Mr. Mayor, we'll be sure that RedPatti and RickF are well taken care of (along with their spouses)!!!! Anybody that goes home hungry.....it's their own fault!

Cool! Sounds like a great time. Can't wait for the pictures!

BON VOYAGE, YOU SNAPPY MACKERALS !!



From all of us prawn-envy suffering landlubbers!

____________________________

I hope that the following time-lapsed facial
expressions aren't representative of anyone from
stop-to-start on the S.S. LLEECHEF that day:

quote:

Originally posted by Al-The Mayor-Bowen

Pete,
How fast can you row a boat with your truck sitting on planks, cross-ways, in a choppy sea?
Lisa, I hope all goes well. We will get there yet. Take good care of Rick!

Al, are you suggesting that my lunch that day might become chum?

Nah..Not an old-timer like you!!
I think you'll be looking over the side and calling out to your friend R A L P H the Bucket-Tender !

You guys! We're all a bunch of OLD (emphasis on the word OLD) salts! From what I gather Patti and Jeff are experienced ocean fishers and RickF is just OLD.......not his lovely wife, though, she's just along for the ride with Rick.
To incorporate the RV thread into this one, we offered Patti and Jeff the use of our truck/camper rig......geeze, get out of Anchorage, up to Wasilla and through Hatcher's Pass, on to Talkeetna (the mecca for all Denali climbers), then to Byers Lake whose beauty is beyond words, even for me who is long winded and from the East Coast. The Grand Finale is Denali National Park. We're SOOOOO looking forward to our Roadfood friends spending time in our beautiful state!!!
And NOOOOOOO we're not planning anyone on the boat to do the
thing!

I NEED to go to Alaska. It's been too long.

Alaska is one of my favorite places. I have driven better than 5000 miles in this beautiful state. I enjoy Anchorage so much and the city market during the summer. I sincerely wish I could be there and share the time with Leechef.

Sundancer7
Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

Sundancer,
Come on up!! I promise I'll find a Marriott for you and won't subject you to staying on the boat. Although I will insist that I take a photos of you fishing for halibut......and salmon.......and bringing up the shrimp pots (I don't mind getting fish goo all over the deck, it washes off eventually). The Saturday Market in Anchorage is always a lot of fun.......I bought fresh morel mushrooms for $14/lb. last week!
Have you ever been to Eek? or Chicken? Two exciting places in AK! Really!

Sign me up for some halibut and salmon fishing and eating!

The last time I was in Anchorage, it was the last day of the city market and the weather was super. I bought all kinds of Alaska stuff.

I love the food and the ambience of Alaska.

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

First report of the Convention:

Picked up Patti and Jeff Sat. AM and headed down to the boat, weather was blue skies and sunshine, no clouds and looking hot for the rest of the day.
We gassed up and got underway. First stop: Perry Passage where we set out one shrimp pot. We then went to Tippy Point to fish halibut, Jeff caught a couple of good sized snappers. We then motored to Derrickson bay where Jeff and Zman set another shrimp pot......off to fish again for halibut. This time Patti connected with a 61-inch, 115 lb. halibut! We were all thrilled! Earlier in the day Jeff had netted some glacier ice (small icebergs) floating in the water so we put the 'but in the fish hold packed in glacier ice. Supper that evening was pan-fried halibut that I had caught earlier this summer. Zman picked a nice cove for us to spend the night. During the day we saw several eagles and sea birds. Earlier in the day they gave us presents they had brought......a custom-made reel for Zman and a lightweight high-powered pair of binoculars for the chef. Way cool!

Sunday morning we set out to retrieve the shrimp pots......we harvested about 50 live and kickin prawns. We ate about half for lunch which Patti and Jeff proclaimed "BETTER THAN LOBSTER!!". Jeff and I sucked the heads and found them unbelievable.....we could not convince Patti or Zman to join us. After a little more halibut fishing to no avail we headed back. We still had fish to fillet and portion, the boat to unload and the truck to pack. The 4 Roadfooders returned to Anchorage happy, hot, sunburned and tired.

Tomorrow Patti and Jeff take our truck/camper rig and head out on the open highways to explore more of Alaska. Thursday, RickF and wife Jan arrive and the 6 Roadfooders are going to meet, eat and enjoy libations outside, next to the busiest float plane lake in the world, Lake Hood. More boat plans are in the works for the weekend........

Pictures will be forthcoming at the end of the week's Convention!

Suck the heads and eat the tails? That sounds like a Louisiana mudbug way to dine. Seriously, it sounds pretty good. Congrats on the huge halibut. That is one of my favorite fish. How did you cook the prawns? Maybe some garlic or fried?

I like the way you pluck the glacier ice out. Beats paying $2.00 at the 7-11! Was the glacier ice blue. The last glacier ice I saw was at the glacier east of Anchorage about 40 Miles and believe it or not, it had worms living on it. Small black things. Could not believe it but I saw it.

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

I learned the goodness of sucking the heads of course in New Orleans with mudbugs. A fairly decent picture of these prawns can be found at http://www.novafish.com/pages/prawn01_lg.html
They are so succulent that no garlic, butter, lemon or frying is required of this sashimi-grade crusteacean, especially when they're jumping around and very much alive. I made a boil of 1/2 beer, 1/2 water, a little cajun spice and a small amount of salt. Poached them for about 2 mins., drain, suck, eat and savor!

We only recently started harvesting glacier ice for our catches. The really large pieces of ice are indeed blue, but too big for our fish net. We usually pick on 5-10 lb. pieces that are pretty much transparent by the time they get to be that small. The ice lasts an incredible amount of time, even when it's hot and sunny, due to it's denseness.....these pieces could be thousands of years old. And the blue ice does contain ice worms!

Congratulations to the "Catcher" and best wishes for more success this week. I know you all are having a great time, and we appreciate you sharing it with us.
AL

Quite frankly Lleechef, some of your southern starved halibut friends would appreciate a nice portion of such a succulent fish.

Perhaps you could fax it or email it to yours truly?
Later

Paul E. Smith
Knoxville, TN

OK, Lisa Lee, how do you cook an ice worm?
We truly envy your great fishing expedition and the tasty culinary results.

Cheers, john

Come to think of it, I'd like to try a few ice worms sitting at the bottom of my Martini some afternoon...

Cheers, John