Just Ask Rosie. And Kelley Did. Thanks Kelley!

Dear Kelley, daughter of Marilyn, of FoodiesUntie fame, recently wrote to me: Auntie Rosie, I am officially requesting that you make something for dinner with squid in such a way that Mr. H cannot figure out what he is eating. =) Kelley Now, for those of you who don't know, Mr. Hawthorne despises, loathes, abhors, and basically just doesn't like squid. He considers squid, like so many in the South do, as BAIT. Back to Kelley's request. I'm quite comfortable with covert ops. If you recall, some time ago, unbeknownst to Mr. Hawthorne, I fed him sweetbreads. I considered this quite a coup. He loved the dish. But when he found out what it was, I thought he was going to immediately toss his cookies. He ran to his medicine cabinet for his colon cleanser.

Wuss boy. So, for Kelley, and for me, since I'm a bitch that way, we're going for disguised squid tonight.

I decided to make a Cioppino. First, I need fish stock. Here's shrimp, carrot, celery, onion, and bay leaf.

I put all the veggies in water, with some salt and pepper, brought to a boil, then lowered the heat, covered , and simmered for an hour or so.

I brought the broth to a boil, then added some beautiful shrimp. Cooked the shrimp for maybe two minutes. Then drained. And saved the shrimp broth.

Now, for the cioppino. My veggies: celery, carrots, multi-colored peppers, garlic, and onion.

I chopped up three anchovies and have red peppers on hand.

Heated up butter and olive oil, then added the anchovies and maybe a teaspoon of red pepper flakes and some bay leaves. Cooked until the anchovies kind of dissolved. The anchovies give it saltiness, not fishiness. The red peppers give it heat.

Then add in the veggies: onion, garlic, carrot, celery, peppers.

Saute then add about a cup of white wine. Simmer and reduce.

I went to my herb garden and picked fennel, purple basil, regular green basil, oregano, bay leaves, and parsley.

Chopped up the herbs.

Added the chopped herbs to the mix. Now, this cioppino has a tomato base. So, I'm fixing the tomatoes next.

I brought a pot of water to a boil, then added my tomatoes from my garden. For about 20 seconds or so.

This is so I can easily peel off the skin.

Here are my peeled tomatoes, which I'm getting ready to slice in half, then squeeze each half to seed and juice.

In the meantime, I added some cider vinegar with red wine into the pot.

Then I added some Lea & Perrins Worcestershire Sauce.

And some Tabasco Sauce.

Next, I added some of the chicken consomme I made today.

A can of tomato sauce.

Add in my 'maters.

Now, remember I was making a fish stock? Here's the shrimp on the left. I shelled the shrimp, then put the shells in the pot on the right - the one that was cooking the onion, celery, carrot, and bay leaf.

And to quote Anne Burrell of Food Network's Restaurant Secrets, "Cook the CRAP outta it." Such lovely imagery. I prefer to say I reduced the concoction.

OK, we're getting close here. My shellfish: clams mussels shrimp

And my fish (top to bottom): Chilean Sea Bass "SQUID STEAKS" Scallops

I called Harris Teeter this morning to ask if they had squid, since that was the ingredient requested by Kelley and certainly one I'd use to mess with Mr. Hawthorne. By the way, EXCELLENT CALL, Kelley. Yes, Harris Teeter had squid. So, just to further mess with Mr. H., I bought Rigatoni. The rigatoni would look like squid and the squid would look like rigatoni. It's a win-win!

Toss in the rigatoni.

Now, let's get into the meat. 6 scallops $16.99 a freaking pound! That's absolutely outrageous. I'd never pay that for anything. But I'm messing with Mr. Hawthorne and trying to satisfy Kelley's request. So anything goes. Oh, it gets better (worse).

Now, I'm at Harris Teeter, and I'm looking for the squiggly bodies of squids. No can find. What I do find is Calamari Steaks. What the hell are calamari steaks? Hang on, you'll find out.

Next, I picked out Chilean Sea Bass for FREAKING $18.99 a pound. Kelley, you're killin' me. I bought the smallest fillet. I just wanted to try it.

Here's the bass. Very oily fish. I had to slice off the skin you see here. Plus, the fillet had numerous pin bones throughout. I tried to pull them out. Impossible. Ended up cutting the fish into bites around the pins.

Here's my reduced shrimp stock.

I strained this fish broth.

Then added it to the cioppino.

OK. Fish time. This is "squid steak." I asked the fishmonger at Harris Teeter, "What IS this." He replied, "SQUID." "Yeah, I know, but squid doesn't look like that. What IS this?" "It's kinda pressed together." "OK, that works for me. Gimme a fillet."

So, I slice the "squid steak" into pieces. I was really looking forward to REAL SQUID. I so know how to clean it and prepare it. I just wanted to show off my proficiency. Also, I had bought the rigatoni to camouflage the squid. Now, I don't need the damn rigatoni. RATS.

Here's my fish: top left - sea bass top right - scallops bottom- SQUID!!!!!!!!!

Clams go into the pot.

Then the scallops, bass bits, and SQUID!

Mussels into the pot. I wanted fresh mussels, but alas, no. I ended up with New Zealand Greenshell Frozen Mussels. Drat.

Next, my beautiful shrimpies.

Here's some bread I bought at the Amish market last week. It's a sundried tomato/basil bread. Mr. Hawthorne is going to make croutons out of it.

I had bought a sourdough boule at Harris Teeter. Buttered it and toasted it.

Here are the slices of sour dough and the tomato/basil croutons.

Our dishes.

Even Youngest Hawthorne came in for this.

DELICIOUS. I'm too tired to describe the flavors. Maybe tomorrow.

Mr. Hawthorne, hard at work, on his cioppino.

Notice, Mr. Hawthorne goes in for more SQUID! Poor Bastard is getting wise to me, just because I'm taking so many pics. He just asked me, "Did you put some kinda shit in here that I hate?" HAH! Yeah, I did! ETA: (that's Edited To Add for people like Mr. Hawthorne, Mama, and Sister) In case you're wondering, it is now 12:50 am and I believe my post started at approx 9:38. So 3 hours is how long it takes me to do a post of the length. And that's just when blogger is acting nice. Just letting you know.