Lunch by bonnie banks of Loch Lomond, Scotland

Well , we had lovely and big dinner at Sarti a night before and since we had a day off the following day, we decided to go for a lovely lunch at Duck Bay Marina by Loch Lomond (www.duckbay.co.uk) with younger daughter Maria.

We sat by the window looking out lovely Loch Lomond.  Because it was during the week (Tuesday), the place was not too busy and we could relax, watching boats going by.

My husband ordered scampi and chips with vegetable coleslaw.

Maria had Malaysian Chicken Crepe with chips and salad.

I had vegetable fajita, mmmmm.

We all had a lovely lunch, enjoyed the lovely scenery of Loch Lomond. We do take it for granted and forget how lovely Scotland is!

Sarti's Birthday Dinner

Monday, 20th August 2012 was our favourite Italian restaurant, Sarti's 20th Birthday, so my husband and I went to the restaurant for their special dinner.  The place was packed with regulars.

As aperitif, we were served a glass of rose procecco, a basket of focaccia and a bowl of olives.

We then ordered my favourite Sicilian white wine to start with our course, and half way through we ordered another one!!!  Just as well we took a day off the next day!

The first course would have been a meat platter however as we don't eat meat, the chef gave us a big plateful of grilled vegetables with mozzerella, crostini with pesto and tomatoes with basils etc.

For main course I had grilled sea bream with garlic roasted potatoes, courgetts and some greens (the name of this escaped me...).  The fish was grilled to the perfection!

My husband had mushroom risotto, which was very creamy and tasty.

For dessert, we were served tiramisu.

At this point it was getting late and we were so full (and a bit tipsy???) we could hardly walk, so we ordered a taxi to go home. The taxi came in 5 minutes so we had to leave right away. Just as we were walking toward the door, they were about to serve Birthday cake so we missed this. I wish we stayed a bit longer for this but maybe just as well as we could not possibly eat anything further at that point.
Anyway, we had a lovely meal.

Craig's food adventure in Korea

My older daughter, Emily's boyfriend Craig is in South Korea for business at the moment. I think he is somewhere near Pusan, where big shipyard is and he will be posted there for a month!

He has just sent his first photograph of the proper Korean food he has eaten.  It's Korean BBQ cooked on the table and looks very interesting.  Lots of meat so I am sure he loved it.

Looking forward to see more food photos from Korea, Craig!

That's a wrap!

What's in your lunch box?  I usually take salad, pasta salad or left over from a previous night but hardly a sandwich. If I must, because I run out of things to put, I may make sandwich but always cut the crusts off. I just don't like sandwich crusts. They taste so boring. In fact I am not that keen on sandwich breads all together.

When I was in elementary school, we were all served with lunch at school (and no option of packed lunches from home).  We had to finish eating everything served on the tray otherwise we could not go out and play during lunch hours. Usually we were served with 3 slices of white sandwich bread.  I just could not eat them unless they were properly toasted and of course there was no such thing like a toaster available for children at my school then.  I was always one of the last to finish eating my lunch, but occasionally I used to hide some of slices, stuffing them to the back of my desk drawers so that I could go out and join my friends on the play ground, and took them home for disposal later.
One day I completely forgot about them and our teacher noticed collection of dried sandwich breads inside of my desk drawers, some with mould on them (yuk!) during their weekly desk check.  I don't remember at all having been reprimanded for this, in fact I remember the teacher was telling my mother about this incident in front of me when she came to school for one of usual parent's meetings and they were both laughing about it as they thought it was so amusing.

Anyway, back to lunch box.  Today, I have taken a tortilla wrap with prawns, salad with sweet chill sauce for lunch to work.  You basically spread mayonaise thinly over the tortilla, top with mixed salad leaves, either king prawns or small prawns (already cooked), few strips of red and yellow (or green) peppers as garnish, drizzle sweet chill sauce over them and peppers to taste.  You just then roll it up, wrap them with kitchen foil (not cling film) to keep the shape and ready to go! Sooooo easy and tasty. 

Yeah, that's a wrap!

Where to eat in Sorrento, Italy

First of all, my sincere apology if you are reading this.  I have been so engrossed watching Olympics and I have not got around to update my blog.  I especially liked watching swimming - how wonderful Missy Franklyn and Michael Phelps were and there were so many good Japanese swimmers but unfortunately just could not get gold!!!
Now it's over (I mean swimming), I am having withdraw symptoms ....

Anyhow, the day my younger daughter and her boyfriend are going to Sorrento, Italy is now tomorrow!  Even it it's not me going, I feel really excited!  The company director of the Italian restaurant we often go has given them advice where to eat in Sorrento. He is Italian and from Sorrento, and he has always in catering business so he knows so many people. He has sent us email to advise where they should go while in Sorrento and 'just mention my name', he says....

Here are his recommendations:

• The Fauno Bar in the main square Piazza Tasso for aperitif
• La Favorita for a nice and fancy atmosphere (and his father works there too!)
• Lanterna in the historic centre (one of his favourite)
• Leone Rosso Pizzaria, near the train station - not fancy but the best pizza in the town and not too expensive.
• The Delfino, seafood restaurant in the Marina (We went there, yeah, see my earlier blog!)
• Praiano for nice and unique evening and eat at the pirata (....? don't know what this means but perhaps he means 'on the shore'...?) - it's somewhere on Amalfi coast so you need a taxi to get there...
• Caruso (his favourite, and yeah we went there too, please also see my earlier blog!)
• Have fun at the Chaplin pub on Corso Italia
• Il Verginiello in Capri Island

Wow, I wish I could go all these places, eat lovely food and take lots of photos.......

I can only hope that my daughter and her boyfriend will manage to get to some of these places  whilst they are there, and I definitely want to see photos of food they eat.  I am sure my daughter would take photos - I have well trained my daughters to do that, ha ha ha. 

Well, whilst they are going to Sorrento, my husband and I are going back to Sicily next month.  I have already bought some books of Sicilian dishes and have marked all the food I definitely wish to try with bright yellow marker like a school kid. You can tell how much I am really looking forward to this trip.

One of my favourite Sicilian dishes which I just can't get it right (and many other dishes...) is Caponata.

So I have made an attempt to create my version of Caponata - well it ended up more like cross between Peperonata and Caponata, and did not taste like the ones I had in Taormina or at our favourite Italian restaurant here.  Perhaps, I might have put a bit too much vinegar in it and I should have put more aubergenes however it still tasted nice and even better the next day!  I added slices of mozzarella, basil and drizzle of 'Sicilian' olive oil!!!  Can't wait to go back to Sicily and eat the real stuff.

What you can eat in Sorrento, Italy

In just over 2 weeks time, my younger daughter Maria and her boyfriend are going to Sorrento, Italy for summer holiday. It was June 2005 when my husband and I went to Sorrento for holiday and have so many lovely memories - and of course the food!!!

(All photos are from our trip in June 2005 - I have no idea what they are all like if we go back these places now....)

In Sorrento, there are many good restaurants as you can imagine and off the main street, shops are selling lovely fresh fruits.  According to an internet information, hugh lemons growing in Sorrento, a size of American football, are called sfusato sorrentino and is good for making limoncello (lemon liquor).

Lemons are also painted ceramics vase, bottles and tiles ubiquitously and you see then when you are in Amalfi coast.

A shop in Positano, Amalfi coast.

One night, I had Spaghetti with clams - there were so many big clams in my spaghetti and you could taste the sea!  My husband had pizza (see the photo behind my spaghetti). I can't remember what were toppings but he really enjoyed it.

... and his pizza was made by this chef who kindly posed in front of camera for me!

Food was so delicious, we went back to the same restaurant again and I ordered another spaghetti clams and my husband had another big plate of pizza!

Obviously there are many pizzeria in Sorrento.  One evening we went to Pizzeria Aurora ( www.pizzeriaaurora.com) which is in the the main square, Piazza Tasso. 

We also tried other restaurants in Sorrento and also had Capri salad (mozzarella cheese, tomato and basils).  Well the mozzarella was nice and really creamy, tomatoes had so much flavour that they were no comparison to tomatoes you get in supermarket in UK.

During the day, you can also go to a small cafe or some patisserie off the main street for a nice cappuccino (although Italians do not drink this in the afternoon) or biscotti or both!

Being right by the coast, seafood is obviously excellent.  We loved the restaurant called Ristorante Bagni Delfino in Marina Grande (www.ristorantebagnidelfino.com). It is by the sea with sun-deck extending over the water. We had lovely lunch, away from the main town centre of Sorrento but still within walking distance, with wonderful views of the peninsula and mount Vesuvio.

My husband had Fritto Misto di Mare (mixed fried seafood).

and I had grilled king prawns or were they langoustine...? Anyway they were huge and really delicious!  I love to go back there and have these again!!!

During our holiday in Sorrento, we also had day trips to explore Amalfi coast.  We took public bus to get to Amalfi, took a boat back from Amalfi to Sorrento via Positano. 

In Amalfi, we found a lovely restaurant off the main square. We had clams and musseles with hand-made pasta. It was absolutely delicious.

On the way back to the centre of Amalfi from the restaurant, we found a snack bar. They were selling so much variety of cakes and they all looked really delicious.

We had an expresso and eclair with chocolate cream filling for dessert! 

We also went to island of Capri. We went to a restaurant called Ristorante Sollievo - just checking on internet, this is now Ristorante D'Amore. I have no idea if it's still owned by the same people or not...
Anyway I remember they had a photo of Keanu Reeves on the wall so guessed he must have dined there long time ago.

I had spaghetti with clams again!

The restaurant is a bit away from the town centre of Capri where many trendy and probably expensive restaurants are. I remember there was also a very good ice-cream / cake shop nearby.

Back to Sorrento again.  On our last night in Sorrento, we went to a restaurant called Ristorante Caruso (www.ristorantemuseocaruso.com) just off the main square.

It was a very lovely, romantic place, with full of pictures of the great tenor, Enrico Caruso, his friends and family and his life on the wall.  When we went there in 2005, they had tasting menu that came with many courses (can't remember how many) which was what we had then.

Risotto with mussels.

Langoustine ravioli

White fish (can't remember what type?) with bed of fennels

Dessert - sponge cake with liquor and fruits.

I love to go back there but I don't think they are still doing the tasting menu. Well, it was a lovely place to go for a finale of our lovely time spent in Sorrento.

Anyway, if none of these interests you, you can always have Italian ice cream. They are just tasty!
A local tour guide took us to this ice cream parlour on our first day and we kept going back to the same place every day for a treat.  We ate too much but there was always room for ice cream!!!

I hope my daughter and her boyfriend will have a lovely time in Sorrento.

Quick Afternoon Tea

My mother in law came to visit us last weekend. My daughters and I decided to arrange 'Afternoon Tea' at our house last Saturday. We had a very good intension to bake variety of cakes and scones to go with finger sandwiches but come Saturday morning, things did not go as planned. So we went to M&S and got some lovely cakes and other bits and pieces such as salmon quiche, salmon terrine, potato salad and pasta pasta etc. At least we made finger sandwiches by ourselves.

Well, everything was very delicious. My mother in law enjoyed herself and asked if we made those lovely cakes and cream scones by ourselves. We replied, yes they are home-made but not at this home!!

We really enjoyed the quick afternoon tea at home.  We would definitely do this again!