Writing and thoughts from NE Scotland
A chicken magically appeared in our fridge on Saturday which gave me the opportunity to try what Nick Nairn calls his perfect roast chicken dinner. A bold claim. Normally if I’m doing a roast I stick to pork and beef so it was good to try a decent sized bird for a change and see if I could avoid the common pitfalls of dried out meat and lack of flavour.
Continue reading “Sun… er… Saturday Roast Chicken”
While we were in Pitlochry we visited a little whisky shop on the high street. If you happen to visit this shop DO NOT ask the guy with a beard if he’s got any good bargains! At least not if you want to leave quickly. Christ that guy can haver on.
Anyway I resisted the excellent selection of whisky they had but did get drawn to a display of wine bottles. I’d heard of Cairn O Mohr’s range of fruit wine and seen the van driving around occasionally but never had the opportunity to try any. Well as it’s made locally this place obviously decided it deserved some attention, they had a large display with the full range of fruit wine from Cairn O Mohr. We had a good browse and chose 3 bottles to try. Continue reading “Cairn O Mohr – Autumn Oak”
Last weekend was the second year of the Stonehaven Real Ale Festival. We went along to the first event a year ago and had a fantastic night with a lot of excellent beer on tap. This year happened to coincide with my (and my brother’s) 30th birthday, it would be rude not to pay a visit really. Continue reading “Stonehaven Real Ale Festival 2010”
My twin brother and I turned 30 on Wednesday. Don’t think that’s quite sunk in yet. Putting aside our grief for lost youth we’d arranged a family meal at Atlantis, the restaurant attached to the Mariner Hotel on Great Western Road, Aberdeen. I used to live near this restaurant and had been eyeing it up for a few years, waiting for an excuse to give it a go. A fully booked first choice (The Tolbooth) was the excuse we needed.
Continue reading “Atlantis at The Mariner – leaving my twenties behind”
To kick off my birthday week we headed over to Kinloch Rannoch for a few days amongst the lochs and hills of highland Perthshire. We were staying at the MacDonald Loch Rannoch Hotel, just outside the village and while the hotel was a little bit stuffy and dated it doesn’t matter when you have views like this from your bedroom window.
Continue reading “A weekend at Loch Rannoch”
Mince and Skirlie 