May 14, 2018 Lunch – Anatolia Dinner – Deviled Eggs and Lobster Bisque

I rode to Rio Bravo at 7:15 and then ate my usual tropical fruit salad, yogurt, granola and a splash of milk allowed to convert to a light yogurt.

At noon I took a flash memory stick with documents to Bill Turner’s office and we walked  to Anatolia at 313 Central NW for lunch.

I ordered the daily special ($6.99), which today was Chicken Donar Kabob without the rice, grilled marinated chicken served on a salad dotted with pieces of pickled red onion, red cabbage, and diced tomatoes.  Bill ordered a falafel sandwich with extra salad instead of fried potatoes.  Bill did not eat his pita bread wrapped around the falafel and salad. I loved my dish of marinated grilled chicken pieces strewn across a plate of salad, served with a small ramekin of yogurt sauce.  I realized something about dieting with diabetes.  You can order and eat creatively or you can treat certain foods as your enemy and discard parts of your meal. This meal was a good example.  We both chose not to eat a lot of pita bread.  I was served a pita bread on the side of my main dish and I enjoyed my main dish of grilled chicken bites on a plate of salad.  The pita was a secondary element of the dish that I chose not to eat without destroying the integrity or enjoyment of my meal.  Bill, instead ordered a pita sandwich with three falafel and a bit of salad wrapped in a large pita bread.  He did not eat the main element of his lunch the large white flour pita bread.  He looked a little disappointed that he had ordered a dish he could not fully enjoyed, while I thoroughly enjoyed most of my lunch except for a few slices of pita served as a side dish.

I was a bit bad and ate both my and Bill’s small squares of baklava after the meal.

I worked until 5:00.  When I called Suzette at 4:30 to discuss dinner she said, “We need to eat the last of the Lobster Bisque and please hard boil six eggs and I will make deviled eggs.”  I was relieved that Suzette had a menu plan and hard boiled six eggs.

When Suzette arrived around 6:00 I had had my first rye cracker covered with slices of the last of the old wedge of Jarlsberg cheese and was opening the new wedge of Jarlsberg cheese.  I ate an additional two crackers covered with slices of Jarlsberg cheese.  I lived in Sweden and Denmark so I love their foods.  I call this my Viking diet.  Norwegian cheese on Swedish rye hard bread. If we had any crema left I would have spread it on one of the crackers and laid pieces of red onion and Danish pickled herring on one of the crackers for the total Viking experience.  I know the Vikings took rounds of rye hard bread on their voyages in their Viking ships.  They surely could have taken cheese and probably took dried, smoked or cured fish in salt, herbs, and sugar to which they would only need to add salt water to create a pickling brine.

Tonight while blogging I searched the Internet for Viking diet and on the first hit discovered an article on the health benefits of a new Nordic diet at  https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/eating-like-viking-lose-weight_us_56004f8ce4b00310edf80088

Back to dinner.  Suzette made 12 deviled eggs by mixing the hard boiled egg yolks with mayonnaise, prepared mustard, and fresh dill from the garden and topped with pieces of teriyaki salmon.  I put out a container of dried black olives to add contrast of flavor to the eggs and a picnic flair.  Here is a picture.

The rest of the meal was even easier Suzette heated the PPI Lobster Bisque in the microwave at a low heat to not boil it and she ladled it into soup bowls.  At 4:30 I had chilled a bottle of Famille Perrin Reserve 2016 White Cotes Du Rhone ($7.99 at Trader Joe’s).

We drank 2016 Emma Reichard Rose of Pinot Noir with the cheese and eggs and then drank the white with the Lobster Bisque.

We both agreed that this was the best lobster bisque we had ever tasted.  Sitting in the fridge for a few days gave it a more integrated, improved flavor.  I do not know how to fully describe best.  It it a gauge one carries on one’s palate and in one’s memory like other memorable life events.

We had no interest in any other food after eating three deviled eggs (six halves each) and the best lobster bisque ever and went to bed happy a bit after 9:00 after watching bits of the Stanley Cup playoff game between Las Vegas and Winnipeg, the Antiques Roadshow, and the news and drinking a sniffer of cognac for Suzette and for me Calvados with a cup of tea to settle our stomachs a bit.

 The moral from today’s food is if you make good food choices you do not need to compromise what you eat to stay healthy.  I also learned I am quickly approaching the newly discovered New Nordic Diet.  I just need to add a little more rape seed (canola) oil and more salmon. Voila.

Equally interesting is that my instincts about the benefits of what I called a Viking diet  are an actual diet, the new Nordic Diet “NND”.

Bon Appetit