Christmas Dinner 2007

This was our Christmas dinner for 2007. Our tradition is to be non-traditional, so we never have turkey. By the time Christmas rolls around we are turkey'd out.

This year we had Christmas Crab. Kroger had a special on Alaskan king crab. Each leg you see in the picture is a pound of crab. We each got one leg a piece. Above is my mom's plate, and we used kitchen shears to crack open the leg meat, which you see in one huge piece in the top right photo.

We also grilled large shrimp and scallops, and I made garlic spinach.

Crab Legs:

Ingredients:
4 Alaskan king crab legs
1 bag of crab boil
Large pot full of water

How we prepared it:
To prepare the crab legs we got a huge pot of water to almost boiling, and then we threw in the crab boil bag, which you can find around the fish section of any grocery store. Once the water was colored with the crab boil we put the crab legs in. They were in the water at least 20 minutes, at least 5 or more of those minutes were spent at a rolling boil. The legs come out bright red, and if you look at the knuckle meat you can tell if it is done.

Garlic spinach:

Ingredients:
2 bags of spinach
4 cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon (one big pinch) of crushed red pepper flakes
2-3 tablespoons of light or extra virgin olive oil

How we prepared it:
The garlic spinach was easy to prepare. In a large skillet with deep sides you pour light or extra virgin olive oil two times around the pan. We chopped the garlic and threw that in the oil over medium high heat. We then added the crushed red pepper flakes. We let those flavors meld until the garlic start to turn a little brown, and then we added 1 bag of the washed and dried spinach.
Cover the skillet with a lid and let it wilt some, then with tongs just start tossing the spinach in the garlic oil until everything is coated; this helps the spinach wilt.
When that spinach is wilted add the other bag of spinach and do the same until all the spinach is wilted.
If there is any access water at the bottom of the skillet I usually pour the spinach into a colander to drain it off; nothing worse than watery spinach.

Shrimp and Scallops:

Ingredients:
4 large shrimp
4 large scallops
Lemon juice
Old bay seasoning

How we prepared it:
Cut the large scallops in half.
Squeeze lemon juice over all the seafood and then sprinkle on the old bay seasoning.
Flip and sprinkle some more seasoning.
Then grill the seafood until shrimp is pink and scallops are firm.

That was our Christmas dinner. We also had some baked potatoes and garlic bread, although I don't really remember eating too much of that. Hope you try this seafood feast with your family.