Marbella, Spain: Day 10

This morning our parents went out to get pounds and pounds of seafood for our in-home lunch.  Mom has always wanted to buy a lot of seafood while in Europe, but has never had enough people to do it with.  Once they got back from the store around noon, we all set to work on putting together the simple, but large meal.  We used various combinations of white wine, butter, garlic, onion, tomato, and flat leaf parsley to make all of the seafood.  You would think that it would be a boring meal with all the same seasonings, but the different shellfish made the sauces quite distinguishable.  We had a lot of seafood, but it was only about $87.00 USD.  That's pretty good for a party of eight big eaters. 

At first I stayed out of the way in the small kitchen because there were too many hands trying to help, but once Nick got to the onions I took over because they make his eyes water and slowing down progress.  I think that I'm also a faster chopper than he is because I do all of our food prep at home.  Once we were done with the chopping, Nick and Mom started cooking up a storm.

We cleaned out a large portion of the market's stock. 

Mussels and cockles.

Cleaning the prawns.

Mom, Nick and Ye Ma hard at work. 

Nick working for his keep. 

Mother and son cooking together. 

A couple of days ago when we were getting lunch at the poolside bar we noticed that they had prepackaged cups of olive oil and salt.  Being Chinese and quite thrifty, we made Sister stuff a bunch in her beach bag so that we didn't have to buy large containers at the store when we were only planning on cooking once.  We blew through all of the olive oil and most of the salt and pepper packets. 

The mussels were plump and juicy. 

Jerng Jerng staying out of the way and enjoying the view. 

Raw cockles

Raw razor clams 

Mussels

Cockles

Prawns

Razor clams

A pretty hefty lunch feast for an apartment-sized kitchen.  This was much better than eating at the resort restaurant again. 

After this plate of shellfish I'm glad that we had a six hour difference between lunch and dinner. 

Empty pots and plates.  We did a good job at finishing up all that food. 

In the early evening we ventured out to Old Town Marbella.  Much like last night, the streets were cobbled and narrow.  I can see why people like visiting that area since it's very much what movie sets were modeled after.  We had an 8pm reservation at an Italian place called Casa Tua.  The Italian food in Spain is really good and it is a nice change from the seafood we've been consuming.  Restaurants here salt their food so heavily that my feet are starting to swell like how they do when I'm on a plane.  I may have to try another juice cleanse when we get back. 

It's really hard to see, but Dennis is crawling over to the passenger side of the car to get out.  The spaces in Old Town are really small and it took many tries to get our cars into the spots in the garage.  I can't even imagine trying to find street parking. 

Nick's fist showing the distance between the car and the post.  Clearly other people have bumped into the post before. 

Bread and olives

They gave us an amuse bouche of a monkfish mousse on a crostini with a pesto oil. 

Even though we were not very hungry, we wanted to get a few appetizers.  This is the tuna tartar. 

Grilled octopus over polenta. 

Lemon scented ricotta wrapped in an Italian cured beef. The beef was similar in texture to the Jambon that we've been eating.  It's still soft like the Jambon, but has the beef flavor like it's turning into jerky.  The lemon scented cheese was pretty potent, so I actually had a hard time tasting the meat. 

The alley where we were eating at dusk. 

Nick got the seared sea bass over a black rice risotto. 

Den, Sister, and I each got the spaghetti with Irish meatball.  It was a nice change from all of the seafood that we have been eating.  I'm not sure what the difference between a regular meatball and an Irish meatball is, but it was nice and soft on the inside without being raw.  

Ye Ma got a calamari-like pasta called Calamarata with lobster. 

Mom's dinner is waving hello.  ...Or, don't eat me!  She got the scampi tagiliatelle in uni cream sauce. 

Dad got seared tuna.

From left: potatoes, potato gritan, and tempura artichoke hearts.

Walking by another restaurant, I think these are the biggest clams that I've ever seen. 

The kids left the parents back in the quaint Orange Square to take all of their pictures because they were taking a long time and kept getting stuck in the crowds.  We walked about 15 minutes to find Fresca Passione, which Trip Advisor claims to be the best gelato in Marbella.  It was pretty darn good gelato. 

Nick got the Kinder and tiramisu flavors.  I did actually purchase a Kinder Egg at the gas station today on recommendation from a friend.  He said that they don't have these back home because of US regulations with mixing inedible items with food.  The eggs are hollow with a small toy in a capsule. 

I got the lemon sorbet in a mini cup. 

Tomorrow we plan to take a road trip to the Strait of Gibraltar.  We've been in Marbella for five days now and are getting a little bit of cabin fever from staying at the resort all the time.  You wouldn't think that you'd get tired of lounging by the pool all day, but you really do.  Until then: Buckle up! We're going for a drive.