Writing and thoughts from NE Scotland
I’ve mentioned Tui beer in another post, well this is the bird it gets the name from. The first time we saw one of these, or should I say heard one, we stopped dead in the street to just listen to the amazingly musical wild song that was coming out of one little bird. The Tui has two voice boxes enabling great feats of mimicry and elaborate song.
Aside from its vocals the Tui is a beautiful bird which we quickly discovered was found all over the country.
This was one dish out of about eleven that I ate on Sunday night during the tasting session for my forthcoming wedding. This was roast loin of pork with mustard and sage stuffing. Don’t worry, I’m not giving anything away. While I loved this dish my fiance wasn’t a fan of the mustard stuffing so this one won’t be appearing on the final menu.
The new chef at Banchory Lodge Hotel really did a great job though and it’s going to be tough to decide on the final menu. Maybe I’ll just have to ask for another tasting session…
I think the reason I don’t post about wine, despite drinking quite a lot of it, is that I don’t know if what I’m buying is worth telling you about and I don’t know how to describe the stuff properly. As much as I enjoy it I can’t get excited about it like I can about good beer or whisky. Part of the reason for that is that I find wine pretty predictable. The labels are almost all the same or follow similar themes and as long as you follow a few rules (don’t buy discounted wine, pay more than £6, avoid blossom hill, look for d.o.c or similar designation) you generally will get something drinkable.
It all gets a bit samey.
Then I saw this bottle on a shelf.
Passion Has Red Lips. With a label straight out of a movie poster from the 50s or a pulp comic. Aussie wine makers Some Young Punks are responsible for this. It grabbed my attention immediately and reading the label made me actually feel excited about wine in the same way I get excited about a new beer. Like the label the wine is bold and… er… busty. Big flavour of dark berries (the word brambles is jumping about it my head) without much of a bitter, tannic finish (does that make sense? do I sound like I know what I’m talking about?). This is a really great wine with a bit of attitude. A wine a guy can get excited about.
I picked up a couple if these great Icelandic beers this weekend. The doppelbock is very malty and strong but the star is the white ale. Brewed with coriander and orange peel it’s refreshing and very light. Just the thing after I ran my first half marathon today!
I finally accepted that winter is unlikely to return suddenly so I drove down to Stonehaven to get my winter tyres taken off. Seeing as I had an hour to kill and the sun was out I wandered across to the beach to get an ice cream from Aunty Betty’s. Their idea of a single scoop cone is pretty ridiculous!
Mince and Skirlie 