In a much welcomed twist in life, I was blessed with the opportunity to have Saturdays off during February. This couldn't have come at a better time because it allowed me to do some really great things that I would have otherwise missed out on. What are these things you ask? Well for starters, Bodega Bay's Annual Chowder Day!
It all started rather innocently. I was sitting in the break room at work casually looking through the Press Democrat (Sonoma County's local newspaper) when all of the sudden the word CHOWDER jumped off the page. I read the short article talking about the upcoming annual event held in beautiful Bodega Bay, realized I had the day off and immediately sent a text to Dan letting him know that he was to not make any plans for February 11th. If you know Dan then you know that he absolutely L-O-V-E-S clam chowder. It seemed pretty obvious that to be able to taste and judge 15 different recipes of this fave dish would be right up his alley.
I tried to keep the details of what we were doing to myself so that he could put the pieces together himself but I was so stinking excited that I spilled all the dirty details two days before. May I just say that his reaction was better than I could have ever imagined and will forever be a favorite memory for me. I wish I had a recorded it! Needless to say he was absolutely stoked about this pending venture. Almost immediately he started looking up information about when, where, and who would be at Chowder Day. This posed a small problem only because we were in bed and now he was wide awake. Silly me.
February 11th came and he was wide awake and ready to go before schedule. In fact, he wanted to leave extra early so that he could ensure they wouldn't sell out of tickets. The whole trip there all I heard was "drive faster, drive faster!" I hardly parked before Dan jumped out of the car and got in line. Thankfully there were plenty of tickets still available. With our spoons and ballots in hand we embarked on Chowder Day 2012. We came. We saw. We conquered. Then we went home.
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| Dan and I at the beginning of the day...still naive and hungry. That's about to change soon! |
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| Each place gives you 2 oz to sample their creation. It doesn't seem like a lot but its actually 3-4 spoonfuls. And remember, there are 15 stops. That's a whole lotta chowder! |
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| Our completed ballots. Daniel was very thorough and methodical. He took notes on his phone then referenced them after tasting to complete his ballot. |
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| My mom was in town that weekend so she got to taste with us! |
It was a great day and a very fun event. We have zero plans of having chowder any time soon but it was so worth it!
