three videos, Frogmore stew (no frogs or stew involved)

First, let's eat.  

July 4 dinner was Frogmore stew, which isn't really a stew but a low-country boil of shrimp, sausage and corn.  The recipe came from a New York Times story looking at the variations of seafood boils/bakes/steamers from along the coast.  The article compares local traditions of outdoor summer seafood meals.  For example, on Chesapeake Bay blue crabs are steamed, not boiled, locals saying steaming keeps the meat sweet and solid.  On the gulf coast the crabs are boiled, not steamed as steaming, in their view, dries out the meat.  Boils on the barrier islands of South Carolina use spice to add tanginess, boils in New Orleans use a lot of spice to add heat.  Onions and potatoes are often left out of low country recipes, the onions making the shrimp too slippery to grasp, starch from the potatoes making the shrimp hard to peel.  Yet onions and potatoes are common in the north east with clam bakes and lobster boils.  

Boiled, steamed, bakes, onions, potatoes, clams, crabs, shrimp, lobster and spice...it all sounds good to me.  

The Frogmore stew, a simple recipe of four ingredients and 10 minutes of cooking, was excellent. 

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And three sailing videos

Bufflehead, the three log canoe built at Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, goes for a sail.  My daughter and I saw the two-masted canoe, the first to be built on the bay in 35 years during our May visit.  At that time she had not sailed.  Take a look here.  Just beautiful.

And from Barry, a video from the spring float to Smith Island.  He has four videos of the trip coming to his site.  Enjoy them all.  This one, with Kevin and the Navigator Slip Jig, can be seen here.  The video gives a very nice feel of sailing the channels that connect the villages on the marshy island.  Makes me want to head back there right now.

I can't compete with the beauty of a three log canoe or Barry's fine editing, but here is a video, just rough cuts really, from my sail on Spartina yesterday, a day with a breeze worthy of a reef in the main.  (I've always heard people say there is no wind on Chesapeake Bay in July and August.  I beg to differ.)  You'll notice that Speedwell of Hong Kong is still anchored, along with her nice little dinghy, in Craford Bay.  It was a very nice day on the water.