West Coast Birthday

We went west coast for the weekend to celebrate my birthday. There were snow flurries on the way but the sun came out and shone all weekend. Although it was chilly Scotland was looking particularly gorgeous in the sunshine. Especially with lovely blue water views, distant islands and bright yellow broom in bloom. Here's Castle Stalker from the cafe viewpoint with views down the west coast and over to Mull:

And here are the views from near Benderloch to Mull with a tiny speck of a Cal Mac Ferry heading over from Oban (you'll have to take my word for it!):

The Road To Inverness

We hired a van on the weekend and in a break in the weather drove to Glasgow and back to retrieve a bunch of my possessions from my parents house, my sister's loft, my friend's basement, another's shed. I'd only left things for 12 months and four years later I was struggling to remember just exactly what I had left where.

Anyhoo. We left Glasgow mid snow storm and had an uneventful drive back to Inverness. And here are a few photies He took with my phone.

Farmers Market, Loch Lomond Shores, Balloch

Why is the first sentence always the hardest part? It seems to take ages and many deletions until I find my way and get going.
Maybe I shall have to write more first sentences and it will come easier?
Or maybe I'll distract myself with irrelevancies and the rest can sneak in behind. Worth a try.

It was a grey day at Loch Lomond today. My niece Olivia was Scottish country dancing in her little red kilt, white blouse and black lace up dancing shoes. Five years old and she's already dancing quite the thing over crossed swords. The Japanese tourists were suitably impressed. She was less impressed with the smoke from the smokehouse stand at the food market that was on. Stalls of square sausage, scotch pies, steak pies, venison burgers, blue cheese (Scottish!), pate and baking. Above you can see the mackerel smoking in a half barrel, then drying on a rack with the Maid of the Loch, Britain's last built paddle steamer, in the background.

Presumably the fish are then used in the smoked mackerel pate that they were also selling. We came away with one pot of said pate and one family sized steak pie which came with a bonus pot of gravy. Just in case it is not quite juicy enough. The pate will be fine on the oatcakes I got yesterday and the steak pie is in the freezer for eating next week. I shall report back - and maybe there will need to be a Scottish recipe bog or two to go with - all these rich, smokey foods are fine with the clouds reaching to ground level and the nights drawing rapidly in.

I wish I was Andrew Greig

First off he sent his poems to Norman MacCaig (wonderful Scottish poet) in his teens and was then invited to tea to discuss and thereafter he kind of had Norman MaCaig (Norman MacCaig!) for something of a mentor. And then he wrote about it all in a book Kaizer Suzy gave to me as a welcome home present. Perfect welcome home present. And now after a few day road trip with Wayno (I shall refer here to friends henceforth only by their nicknames) which included a round of golf on the nine hole course on the island of Gigha I find that the man has also written a book about playing some regular and some obscure (in terms of geography) rounds of golf. Just as I had decided that my settling back in to the UK adventures might be to take all of the scottish ferries, visit all of the islands and where possible play all of the remote golf courses along the way.

I was toying with changing the name of my blog to capture my new adventures on new - old soil, but instead I shall set off on my adventures with the inauguration of three new labels. Specifically Scottish islands, Cal Mac (Caledonian MacBrayne ferries and Golf. Consider them inaugurated.

I'll be back soon with more about the island of Gigha.

The exception that proves the rule.

I take it all back.
On Saturday I had the perfect coffee in Artisan Roast in Glasgow.
SO perfect I even broke my one coffee rule and had two!
AND it didn't even count as breaking the rule as it was small enough that two really counted as one.
Which surely means that next time I can have three?

Flat White No. 1


Wayno's latte looked just as lovely, Erica was positively zingy after her hard as nails double espresso and the muesli with cinnamon apples, berries and yoghurt transported me to Batch on Carlisle Street.



Perhaps I shall have to move back to Glasgow permanently after all?

Hanging out for a Carlisle Street latte.

It isn't possible to live in two places at once and more's the pity. I'd like to have the best of two worlds, because sometimes the grass is greener, the toilet paper softer and Heinz CREAM OF tomato soup the only thing to make you feel better when you are poorly. Glasgow is miles better and Scotland pure dead brilliant and for making comparisons, highlighting differences and specifying a preference I have, in the past and on more than one occasion been called whatever the Scottish version of a whinging pom is. Oh yes, a whinging pom.

The shoe is now on the other foot and I run the risk of being a cut above the rest, too big for my boots and fancying for not being happy with a cup of nescafe, indeed a cup of tea.

But I am hanging hanging hanging out for a carlisle street latte and there's precious little round these parts that comes close.

For starters a latte here simply isn't a latte. It is a long hot milk in a tall hot chocolate glass with what seems like a hot milky coffee pored in. And when I say hot I mean far too hot. There's no enjoying your coffee any time soon because it is scalding. In fact all the coffee here is too hot and I can't work out if that is because the milk is heated to a much higher temperature, or the coffee itself and to be fair it isn't that the coffee is burnt or scalded, but your mouth most certainly will be if you aren't patient. As for the cappuccinos, they aren't so unfamiliar, but on return i find what was once my favourite coffee is too strong and too short and there's simply not enough drinking to pleasure in it. At the other extreme I could have a coffee from Starbucks, but they only seem to come in pint, litre and gallon sized.

The only option now, when I can find it, is to order a flat white. Now I have to confess that I never had a Melbourne flat white - one regular latte and I had found my drink of choice. Medium strength, rich roast, at perfect drinking temperature and with a rich creamy foam that goes from top to bottom. On working days I would often postpone the pleasure of my single morning coffee till almost lunchtime and the coffee was no less enjoyed for being in a take away cup. I'd drink it half down and then remove the lid and give it a swirl to make sure I caught all the foam. On the weekends the pleasure would be all the more for sitting at a cafe table with the coffee glass resting on a pretty vintage saucer. I'd idly stir the teaspoon once around the top of the coffee before I drank it in sips and once or twice after to make sure I caught all the foam around the edges. The odd day when I was tired or feeling extravagant I would order a second, but I never enjoyed it as much as the first and often as not It would leave me with a bit too much caffeine buzzing about.

Maybe I should bugger off back to Melbourne if I like the coffee there so much. I can read it on people's faces. See it in their eyes. I am a coffee snob. An elitist. A bore. Actually I feel like an addict cut off from a dependable source. Forget five months of no nicotine, it's the coffee I miss. I'm preoccupied. I can't get that first sip out of my mind. It's beginning to interfere with my life, my daily routine, my friendships. It would interfere with my job, if I had one. I can't stop talking about it. I've been looking up photos of old coffees on my computer. I'm even driving the long way round in the hope I'll come across a new coffee outlet I didn't know about.





Until I find a dependable source a Costa flat white it will have to be. It's bigger than it should be, but not so much. Hotter than is drinkable but if you wait five minutes it is alright. And it is a little too strong, but that helps see me through until the next Costa which could be days, weeks, away.

Like so many good things, I didn't know how much I would miss it till I was gone.
Good times, good times.