Why can’t I write a simple post anymore? Seems like everything I eat, and therefore blog about, it not just food, there is always something else going on there. I guess the more conscious I have become about where my food comes from, the more stories are behind it. And in light of being transparent with you, my readers, I have been talking more lately about personal struggles along the way. I mentioned a few posts ago that we are trying to start a family and towards that goal, we have been trying to eat more seafood lately. Living in a landlocked state, although it boasts many rivers and lakes, there unfortunately doesn’t seem to be a lot of access to good fresh or local seafood. I would love if someone in my area that knows of a good place to get some local trout could let me know, though!

So since local seafood has been impossible to find up until this point, we have always tried to navigate the murky waters of cost vs. freshness vs. sustainability vs. etc. and murky waters they are. I eat a fair amount of canned tuna and salmon (wild caught), but Robert o is allergic to both of those. We both enjoy canned sardines and anchovies, yet, they are far from local. We also found some delicious canned mackerel from the coast of Maine, which we were so excited about, until we couldn’t seem to find it anywhere anymore. But recently I found an unlikely source for frozen wild caught salmon, cod and flounder.

DUN, DUN, DUN… Costco. Now I am NOT a fan of big box stores, and shop locally the majority of the time, but there are just a few things at our Costco that are not only good products, but budget friendly and fall into the category of “doing the best we can for now” or “why would I buy the exact same product for double the price just because I can buy it from a non-box-store?”. For example, imported cheeses – we can get a large container full of buffalo mozzarella from Italy for about $9, the same price that we can get at the local shops for ONE ball of the same stuff. Same goes for REAL Parmigiano-Reggiano and prosciutto from Parma. I am the first one to shop locally, but I am also a thrifty consumer and I won’t overpay by double for something I can get for much less somewhere else for the exact same thing. That just doesn’t make good sense.

The second problem with seafood in this house is, aside from pan searing and making fish cakes (which we LOVE), I never know what to do with seafood. I also never know what to serve with it. We have not bought it much in the past years (except when we lived in Florida) because of the whole sustainability issue. But since we are trying to eat as well as we can, in hopes of boosting our fertility, we are making some hard choices.

But scallops are easy! Frozen seafood, like the sea scallops are also something we get from Costco, and nothing can be easier than pan searing them in butter and lemon juice. I like to serve them up simply on a bed of soft creamy polenta, or as an appetizer with some fresh homemade aioli and capers. We eat them as a snack this way, or sometimes a meal, served with a side of veggies. They are sweet and delicious, and so easy to prepare that we make this dish about twice a month. We try to eat some form of seafood at least 3-4 times per week. Right now, at this point in our lives, doing the pros and cons of everything, here we are.

Do you have any food situations in your life like this that you wish were different? Any local folks know of any gems I am missing?