Slice of Clam Story

So last Sunday, went to a Chinese seafood restaurant for dinner. It was a classic miscommunication story involving English speaking Chinese people (us) and limited English speakers (waiter). On the menu was GEODUCK clam. If you are curious to see what it looks like... go to the Geoduck trade association site. Anyway, we express interest in getting some and the guy said, yes, $28. Okay, a little steep but its a delicacy and we were having a special reunion. You see 10 years ago three of us drove across the USA and so we have kept in touch over the years and so we decided to do the reunion thing. And if you know CHINESE culture, that will involve FOOD and mostly likely SEAFOOD.

So we order the stuff and some less exotic fare.

And eventually bill came...

STICKER SHOCK...

The clam dish cost over $90!!!!!

It was $28 *per pound* and the clam was over 3 pounds!

While we are talking about mollusks... did you know scallop can swim!

An excerpt:

The eye, or adductor muscle is the part of the scallop we eat here in the U.S. In Europe, the entire scallop is eaten. The adductor muscle is more developed in the scallop than in oysters and clams because scallops are active swimmers. They glide freely through the water and over the sea floor by snapping their shells together.

Amazing.