Please give me ideas for an 'exotic' dinner. I usually go all out on Sundays, so time/hard preparation/watching the pot etc... are not Issues. (Please no generic responses like 'have steak. We have steak all of the time.)

How exotic..?

Try this. I know, Rachael Ray lolol, but it's actually pretty good. Plus, if you can find them, soba noodles make it taste even better.  Also, if you don't have/ can't find Tamari sauce, regular soy sauce works fine.
Not sure if that's the kind of "exotic" you were looking for, but it's different atleast.

The sky's the limit. Just please, no entrails or insects.


That sounds great, I love seafood!

Got mussels in Ohio? I should have asked first: Do you like mussels?
Got Seabass?

Yes, and yes.

1) mussels, my grandma was belgian so you better invite quality friends over so not Tina
mussels 1 kg
Onions 3; slices circa one millimeter fine
Celery; 2 branches roughly minced
bay leaf 2
bottle of white wine (of which you will pour two-three glasses)
freedom fries


put some butter in you pot and quicky add the onions & celery (they need to stay firm)
add the mussels, no liquid yet as they will sweat a little use your spoon to control the cooking
add water, two, three glasses (follow the gut feeling it never betrays and if it does you can always invite Tina)
add wine, two three glasses of white plus say a handful of thyme
add salt and pepper
Shake the pot every now and then
When the mussels are open it's ready
serve with the fries and enjoy

How about..Steak! .. oh wait.. sorry.

Insect entrails are nice if they are cooked properly.

again.. sorry.

Got One! Stea... Damn it.

You could try Tai if you know how to make the generic fish based sauce.

Tai is always easy to do. Fish Mint Chili peppers ect.

Da I swear to god i was thinking the same exact thing earlier. So weirdish.

And Lipps is right,do not invite me over for mussels.

And I am making Jacob Lanterns,leftover chick salad tomorrow,but with ranch.

Since you want idea and not recipes:

Quiche Lorraine
Moroccan Hamin
Shakshuka
Fish Temperade

If you really want to go all out, try this:
http://www.africa.upenn.edu/Cookbook/Ethiopia.html

 it's alright with ranch but the whole ranch vs. bluecheese thing is really more a personal taste although if you do go with ranch, i'd reccommend getting the dip style ranch over the salad dressing ranch. it's thicker.

as far as exotic.....how about a nice crawdaddy gumbo, with some fried aligator tail on the side and some jalapeno hush puppies......

you can get most of the ingredients, including batter for the hush puppies at the grocery store. some places also carry aligator tail dunno about up in ohio though. you may have to look around for it up there.

but trust me, it is so good! lol i managed upon a nice little pub in georgia that used to fry it up as a house special everytime there was a georgia vs. florida game on and it is so good it might make ya do something crazy like hop into  a bayou with a fork and knife lookin for the rest of the gator the tail belonged to lol

as for the gumbo...well, you can pretty much sub any kind of meat for the craw daddy meat if they don't carry it up there. gumbo's a fairly easy dish to make and if you don't like ochra (cus that's part of a gumbo) there's even some recipes out there that you can make it withuot the ochra.

it also goes great poured over a bowl of rice. there's alot of rice involved with cajun food.