Pumpkin and Spice

It's been a busy two weeks! As I mentioned, I've switched to the midnight baker shift at work, Kyle and the family have been in town, and I've been fighting a wicked cold (and missed a few days of work because of it! Blegh!) Before I tell you about all that, though, I have the promised Kyle-blog! (Kyle declined my invitation to write the blog entry himself- instead he gave me the 411 and the pics so I could write it myself.)

Kyle is a wonderful guy- he's patient and understanding, he puts up with my clutter, he didn't complain when I decided to come to Utah, and he gamely tolerates my Alton Brown/Good Eats obsession. He even watches the occasional episode with me... I'm not sure he likes it as much as I do, but I do appreciate the time together.

Since Kyle and I don't see each other much Monday through Friday, given that he works during the day and I work and go to school and don't get home until midnight or so, Saturdays are usually our "date night". We generally go out to dinner, but this weekend, I was in the mood for seafood and we couldn't decide on a local seafood place, so I decided I'd cook. We couldn't really decide on anything in particular, but decided to go to our favorite seafood market to see what they had.

As we looked around the market, Kyle caught sight of some pretty soft shell crabs in the case, and suggested them for dinner. I commented that yeah, they looked good, but I had no idea what to do with them once I got them home. One of the guys working overheard me and asked to what I was referring. I pointed to the crabs, and he responded, "Oh, you just clean 'em, bread 'em and fry 'em." He then pulled one out of the case and gave me a quick tutorial on cleaning a soft shell crab. He offered to clean our for us, but added that it was best to clean them right before cooking. I decided that it looked easy enough for me to handle, and we bought two, packed them in our cooler and took them home.