having cappuchinos in St. Andrews

This photo was taken after our lunch in St. Andrews in May.  The terrace bar is rather chic, all mod cons with electric heaters which are hung from the roof to keep you warm. No smoking, another recent trend in Scotland where we wicked smokers can't even smoke outside. It only seemed to heat up later on in the day the week I went back.
Had a really nice meal in the Doll's House.  One piece of advice, if you go for their two course lunch, don't order a full bottle of wine.  You won't have time to drink it before your plates are whisked away.  We had a sort of minestrone soup/kedgeree (hard to find the fish!!!) followed by a salmon risotto.  The helping of salmon was bigger than the portion of risotto.
Starters were quite curious too.  A slice of bread to dunk in an oil based vinagrette.
As I said before, we ordered a bottle of wine, so we had to keep re-ordering bread to slow down our meal.  Since we still hadn't managed to down our wine after our two courses and extra helping of bread we ordered dessert....sticky toffee pudding and the cheese board (where we again ran out of bread).  After we went outside to finish our wine and have our cappuchino's. Which gives the lie to that myth that people in Britain drink crap coffee. Coffee in Scotland is made with expresso machines and is all Italian.  And you can have small, medium or large coffees. It was delicious. Following this we went down to the harbour to watch the gulls.  A fantastic day.

Fancy getting your hair cut here?

Me in May outside a barber's shop in Pitlochry on a great day out with my brother.  Next door was the butcher's where they sell the best black pudding in Scotland.  Didn't try any on my last trip back.

Dundee spring fair

This is me in the centre of Dundee, in front of the stalls in the spring fair, on a rather dreich day in May.      We had a great day looking round but didn't stop to eat because it was too cold and damp.  There was lots of food from all over the world being sold on stalls i.e. "paella", kebabs etc., wine, cider etc.  and typically (because this is Scotland) the food and boozing area was cordoned off so drinkers couldn't get out.  If you are drinking in Scotland you are not supposed to mingle with anyone else!!!

This was some of the stuff on sale and it looked quite good.  In fact, we had a really nice stroll round and thought it was a great idea.

According to my brother

and he should know, this is the best black pudding in Scotland.  This butcher's can be found in Pitlochry beside a really crazy gent's hairdresser's.  Of course, when I was small I used to love fried black pudding for breakfast or tea with fried bread, fried eggs and potato scones.

Scottish ice cream

Our two dogs, Walter (the doberman) and Simon (King Charles spaniel) used to go wild everytime the ice cream van went past our house in Downfield when we were small.  My mum had to run out of the door and buy us and the dogs an ice cream each.  Walter got the top part with most of the cone and most of the ice cream and Simon was given the bottom part with a smidgen of ice cream.  And their treats were gone in no time at all.
But have a look at the picture (not me!!) and here we have one of my all time favourite summer treats, a ninety niner i.e. an ice cream cone with a Cadbury's flake on top.  I don't know what was better the ice cream or the chocolate flake.

Dundee cake

Well this photo was taken in Fisher & Donaldson's bakery just off the High Street in Dundee in May.  More on its history in the following link
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dundee_Cake

Other uses of Irn Bru

Yes, these are cupcakes with Irn Bru icing.  Didn't try them on my trip back to Scotland in May, but they look quite nice.  And if you don't know what Irn Bru is have a look at this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irn-Bru..