This past week I saw a post on Instagram that Halifax in Hoboken was having a special Canada Day menu with specials to celebrate that holiday on Tuesday, July 1. I had been wanting to go back to Halifax again after my most recent visit that I wrote about a few weeks ago. It is always so delightful there, and everything is always so wonderful, with the most beautifully prepared and served delicious tastes created and curated with the utmost care by the marvelous Executive Chef Seadon Shouse, and served with the excellence of the wonderful staff. It's lovely there too, and every moment is a pleasure for sight, sound and palate.
I arrived in the late afternoon, hoping to catch a glimpse of Chef Shouse who is always so busy creating wonderful things in his kitchen, and I sat at the bar so that I could sit leisurely and enjoy my time there and not take up a table for one right before the dinner rush. The light of the afternoon as it began to glow before the rain that was forecast was a beautiful time to enjoy this lovely space that was also designed with the care of Chef Shouse. I've written about this restaurant and this Chef several times in these pages, and each time I marvel at the beauty and beautiful experience on every level that is there to be enjoyed.
The Canada Day specials were a specially created strawberry rhubarb spritz, lobster rolls, and seaweed baked oysters. I couldn't have asked for a menu that was designed more for my own special loves and tastes. As I savored each, I remembered other times when I'd had flavors and creations that were echoed in these very special menu items, thinking about a summer years ago when my Father had bought crates of strawberries somewhere on a special and my Mother in trying to make strawberry jam made a solution that was delicious but too liquid and so we poured it into jars and had strawberry sparkling water all day long. Lobster rolls always remind me of summertime in Little Compton on the beach, with my beautiful Mother bringing her special touch to a pot luck shared with friends, spooning fresh lobster from a cooler into rolls toasted on an open fire, and of dinners with my Father over many years when he and I would share a lobster or sometimes more than one, and he would show me how to clean each one thoroughly so that there would be enough after our meal for leftovers of lobster salad sandwiches. Oysters at Halifax are always so wonderful, so fresh and prepared with the most joyful flavors, and they remind me of so many dinners over the years, at so many wonderful places with so many wonderful people, and when I am at Halifax, the oysters I have there are always the best.
Being a Chef is not an easy life, and working in the hospitality industry is not either. I admire the wonderful Executive Chef and staff at Halifax for all they do to make every moment so beautiful and so special, and I am so blessed and grateful to know them and have this wonderful place to visit and enjoy.
