Never too late to try something new

This past week for a couple of days, Sarah came to visit.  We’ve known each other since high school and have kept in touch throughout the years even though we attended different universities.  As I’m still unemployed, it was the perfect time for her to visit: we could hit the beach, sleep in, and pretty much do whatever we wanted on our own schedules.  Sarah is always up to try new things so we decided to take the plunge and buy a whole fish to cook for lunch one afternoon.  We did research (thank you, Google) before we went to the market to find a recipe that seemed easy enough for two ‘fish idiots’ to cook properly.  Luckily we found one that involved lemon, butter, and spices.  Oh, and the whole fish… 

We got back from the market with a little over a kilo of ‘rodaballo’ or turbot, freshly gutted (in front of us) and ready to cook.  We read the recipe again, seemed pretty straight forward, and then youtubed how to fillet a flat fish.  We failed on the filleting part and just decided, screw it, and threw it in the over as it was.  Amazingly, it worked wonderfully-the scales, after baking, came right off and Sarah became fillet master as she sliced and diced our meal.  Complete with hollandaise sauce, we had a lunch fit for kings.  I think I’m going to have to buy more fish next year; I kick myself that it took me until late June to try it for the first time, but ya gotta start somewhere.   Below is each stage of our fish fiasco.

The rest of our week flew by with ensaimadas, ice cream, heat complaints, and beer.  We had a really good time together (even trying snails!), and I hope it’s not another year before we see each other again.  I joked with Sarah at the bus stop when I dropped her off for the airport that I’d see her in a couple years.  We laughed, but sadly, that’s been a reality before.  Thank god for internet, skype, email, and everything that allows me to keep in touch with friends and family, even when we’re worlds apart.