New Year, New Food

Our family had no New Year's plans this year. Our six year old could not wrap his head around this concept. He said, "How will we celebrate the New Year!?" I was not about to stay up all night so, being half Cajun and half Creole, I decided the best way to celebrate at a decent hour must involve food. So I offered this idea to my poor confused son. New Year, New Food. He said,"huh?" So I explained: this is a new year we've never had before so let's look through my recipes and find some food we've never had before. He was cool with this. Especially since he got to help me choose the food.

So on a search we went. My son, being the fruit of my labor, got excited about a soup recipe in my "Eating for IBS" cookbook that has crab in it. He loves crab. I would have never chosen this soup myself because, reading the recipe, it sounds a lot like Chinese egg drop soup with crab in it. I've never had egg drop soup but I've seen it on a buffet. It just looks unappetizing. But I DID tell the child we'd try something new....so here we go! Off to the store on New Year's Eve to find the few ingredients we didn't have. The store we went to was close to home and, in case you've forgotten, we live out in the boonies. So, unsurprisingly they were out of crab.  My son was HIGHLY disappointed. I told him we'd just substitute some small shrimp, which the store did have. He tried his hardest to convince us that this was a culinary emergency that warranted a trip to "town". I, however, assured him that it would be just fine with shrimp. He was not happy with this decision but knows that what Mom says goes.

Back at home now we made the soup. It took, quite literally, less than 30 minutes to throw together. Then the hubby and I spent a few minutes fine tuning seasoning because it was rather bland. Once we got it to our liking we served it with some rice (of course). Both my husband and myself thought it was pretty good. My daughter doesn't like anything these days (so she says) but she ate two bowls. And the tiny gourmet? He said, "it would be better with crab.......can I have some more?"