Crab & Rice Caserole Recipe

Since things are a bit slow I thought I would take a recipe from our original web site and re-post it here. It's one of my favorites! Written by David;

	This was a favorite of Damon’s when growing up and finally a couple years ago he finally asked his mom for the recipe. Crab can be substituted with shrimp or scallops, it’s good with all of them! ½ onion - minced 1 large can mushrooms 2 tbs. Butter 1 tsp curry ½ tsp. Salt ¾ cup rice (uncooked) 1 ½ cup broth 3 cups medium white sauce 4 tbs. Sherry 1 can water chestnuts drained and chopped 2 dashes Tabasco 1 lb. Lump crab meat, parmesan cheese 1. Sauté onion and mushrooms in butter, until onions are translucent. 2. Add curry, salt, rice and broth. Bring to a boil , cover, and steam for 30 minutes. While this is cooking make white sauce. White sauce: 1 tbs. Butter 1 tbs. Flour ¼ tsp salt 1 cup milk Heat over medium heat butter, four and salt. B. When butter is melted add milk and stir until think and bubbly. C. Cook for 2 minutes. (Makes one cup) 3. When rice is done add sherry, water chestnuts, Tabasco, crab, and white sauce. 4. Fold mixture into rice and transfer to a casserole baking dish. 5. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese. 6. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes. (Note: For time purposes I have made the rice in a pressure cooker. The only difference to the recipe is the broth and rice are a one to one ratio. One can of broth and one can of rice. By doing this I save about ½ hour.)

Happy Independence Day

Hope everyone is having a great 4th of July.

Where's the cheese?

While I'm in California I agreed to house sit for my brother and his family as they travel to Lake Tahoe for the weekend. And not wanting to make a mess in the kitchen I decided to take the easy way out for dinner and went to the grocery store to find something suitable for my growling stomach. After picking up some apples and oranges in the produce section of a nearby grocery store I browsed the frozen food section and decided on a small pizza. At least the photo on the box looked good enough to eat but after opening the package I had to take a look at the cover again to make sure I didn't miss anything.

As you can see on the photo the pizza doesn't look all that bad, I mean the cheese oozing all over just made my mouth water and my cholesterol jump a couple points. See how it just stretches off the piece being lifted?


But when I opened the box what I pulled out was definitely not what was shown on the cover. Where's the cheese? A couple of sprinkles?



Okay, just to rule out any possibility that maybe this was magic cheese that expands a thousand fold I decided to cook it carefully following the directions on the back of the box. After opening the microwave I was disappointed to see that my cheese did not grow as I had hoped. Actually, it was pretty hard to see that there was any cheese on the pizza at all.

Had I not been so hungry I would have just returned my piece of bread with tomatoe sauce on it but it would have cost me more in gas to get there and back so I just ate the thing. How do companies get away with a product that is sooooooo different than what is packaged? You can visit their web site at http://www.celestepizza.com, does my pizza look like any of their very cheesy pizzas? If what they showed on their web site was actually in the box I would go and buy another for tonight. Actually, that might be a good idea, I might go and get another frozen pizza to see how it compares to this one from Celesete.

Anyway, you won't see us buy any more pizzas from Celeste. Now, what's for dinner tonight?

Our friends in the San Blas Islands

Since we're still moored in Cartagena and haven't had any exciting things to report from the marina so I thought I would post links to some of our friends who are still sailing in or near the San Blas Islands. It'll also give another perspective of what life is like aboard a sailboat in the islands.

Sonny and Kay sail aboard their Tayana 37 named Valentina. They're also from Kemah Texas and you'll probably recognize their names in some of our log entries. http://www.sailingvalentina.com

We met Aaron and Lyla in Roatan, Honduras and sailed with them from Honduras to Panama. We continue to share anchorages with them throughout the year. http://www.blowmeawaysailing.com/

David just recently met the crew aboard The Visions of Johanna in Cartagena, they bought our old air conditioning system. While they're not in the San Blas right now they are on their way. http://vofj.blogspot.com

We met Bryan and Debbie in 2005 when we stopped for a couple months in St. Petersburg Florida, they were our neighbors at the marina. Bryan ended up crewing for us on our trip from St. Petersburg to Isla Mujeres Mexico. Bryan and Debbie left Florida last October to begin their cruise and are now in Bocas del Toro Panama and expect to meet us in the San Blas Islands for Christmas. http://www.sailblogs.com/member/uhane74/

Where's all the updates?

That seems to be the most common question we're getting lately, and well deserved. It's been six weeks since our last update, one of the longest stretches since we left Texas almost five years ago. So what's been happening?

David is still on Bruadair in Cartagena, he recently finished laying numerous coats of varnish on all our exterior teak. David also took care of some projects on the boat, hired a couple guys to do another wash and wax, sold some of our gear that was no longer needed but for the most part he's been hanging out, reading and socializing with our boating friends. Not much new has been going on with David.

I on the other hand left Cartagena a few weeks ago and traveled back to California to visit family and friends. I also took a short trip to Kemah Texas, our home port where we left out of almost five years ago. It's hard to believe it's been that long already. I had a great time visiting with old friends inlcuding Mitch and Debbie, Wayne and Elda and James and Carol. They all took very good care of me and fed me well. My last night there James and Carol had their normal get together with the two other couples above, I tagged along and enjoyed a wonderful feast of bbq ribs, sausage, potatoe salad, corn on the cob and home made ice cream. A true Texas bbq and it was excellent. And while they did treat me well I did get some slack from all of them about the lack of updates on this blog, so I hope this will satisfy them for at least a short while. My other task while in Kemah was to get some boat parts from West Marine which I shipped back to David. David's laptop has decided that it wanted to retire after five years of faithful service so I sent him a new one in the box I just shipped to him.

And while in Kemah I had a wonderful reunion with the crew from Boisterous, our buddy boat in Panama and the San Blas Islands. They returned from their one year cruise just about this time last year. It was great to see Paul and Lora again, we caught up on what we've been doing in the past year as well as future dreams. Their five boys are also doing very well. William, now 17, will be attending college this fall, Henry was busy in the family garden (he's grown so much, almost taller than me now). Warren and Parker gave me a tour of their garden the in back yard where they are growing corn, melons, squash, tomatoes and a bunch of other produce. Paulie was out for most of my visit so we didn't do too much catching up. The boys were all eager to hear about my fishing stories, I sure do miss my fishing buddies.

I have a couple more weeks in California with more family and friends to visit then I'll be returning to Cartagena via Medellin. Now let's hope our next update isn't so far down the road...