It was a cold and blustery day – the winds were whipping, and the mercury had dipped into the 30s. It seemed the stars had aligned for our planned Soup Road Trip, which was to be a gastronomically adventurous and soul-warming foray into the belly of Long Island’s storied soups. But first, a long-awaited appointment with a nutritionist. How fitting.
After waiting for me in the car with our Havanese, Miguel, for nearly an hour, my daughter Justine was ready to embark on our expedition. As was I, having just been admonished for eating half a banana and some low-carb bread last week. “No fruit! No carbs! Eat more fish! And for God’s sake, woman, do some exercise!” still ringing in my ears, I flexed my calf muscle on the gas pedal, and off we went.
Twenty minutes later, we were the first customers of the day at our first stop, where steaming chicken soup, studded with hominy pearls and scented with a comforting corn aroma, was ladled into a to-go container. Ever prepared, we divvied it up into two red Solo cups in the car and dug into what could very possibly have been the best soup of our lives.
Calling ahead to our next two planned stops revealed they wouldn’t be open for hours, so we skipped to the fourth on the list, which had gained a reputation for their sublime mixed-seafood soup. Our order placed en route, the soup, thick with calamari, mussels, shrimp and a lone crab cluster, was waiting at the bar.
Back in the car, we gobbled it up, Justine going in for seconds – and that lone crab cluster. It was delicious – and gratifying to know that I’d followed doctor’s orders by ingesting that seafood.
Proceeding on our mission, we phoned ahead to place our next order and headed southwest toward another promising pottage. As I drove, I began to feel a tight, constricting feeling inside my head. Keeping it to myself for roughly 10 minutes, I eventually verbalized the strange sensation.
“Really? My cheeks are tingling!” my daughter replied. Hmmm. What to make of it? Within minutes, my lips began tingling, and so did hers. Miguel, the control, who had not eaten anything, was fine.
After pulling over onto a side street, Justine’s symptoms rapidly multiplied – she lost feeling in her hands, then her feet. A panicked decision was made to abandon the Road Trip and proceed to the nearest hospital, to which Siri directed us. I expect at least one red-light camera ticket in the mail any day now.
By the time we arrived, my symptoms had subsided to vague, likely due to a smaller serving and the pandemic weight I began the day attempting to address, so I declined medical care. But it was clear Justine needed help immediately.
Three hours later, she emerged with an explanation that would add a new phrase to our vocabulary: paralytic shellfish poisoning.
A week on now, Justine is still convalescing, but it appears she is out of the woods. And me? I’m writing this while eating a banana.
I’ll be back next week with the promised hydrangea pruning guide.