Andiamo in Milngavie, Glasgow

Having bought a MOB (mother of bride) dress for Emily and Craig's wedding, I now have to find a matching hat, a pair of shoes and a little clutch bag.  Emily found a shop called Mad Hatter in Milngavie and since we were there we also decided to try a local restaurant there for lunch.

We tried Andiamo (http://www.andiamo-restaurants.com/Milngavie/Home.html).  We didn't book and the place looked busy for lunch but the restaurant accommodated us without any problem.

Whilst our table was being getting ready, we sat in the bar area.

Emily checking cocktail menu already ....

We did not have to wait too long and were shown to a table in a light and relaxing conservatory area.  We also found that they were serving set lunch menu in addition to a la carte menu.

I love ravioli and found that they had lobster and crab meat ravioli in their a la carte menu so I decided to try this.  Emily opted for lunch menu. Maria and Craig also ordered off a la carte menu.

For starter, Craig had Minestrone soup whilst Emily had Crostino con Gamberoni (crunchy slice of garlic bread topped with prawns and pineapples marinated with chilli, lime juice, chopped parsley and olive oil).  I tried Emily's crostini and liked the refreshing combination of prawns and pineapples.

For main course,  Maria had Pollo Valdostana (supreme of chicken bread crumbed and pan-fried, topped with tomato sauce, salami and mozzarella served with penne in a tomato and cream sauce). She really loved this as everything she loves are in it and on it - chicken, cheese, salami, pasta and it was a huge chicken, almost like a love heart shape.  It's like a breaded chicken pizza. Oh, Maria loves pizza too, so this was like her heavenly combination!

Craig had Pollo Mediterraneo (supreme of chicken pan fried with Mediterranean vegetables, black olives, tarragon and tomato sauce served with rice).

Emily had Spaghetti Puttanesca (with anchovies, capers, garlic, chilli, tomato sauce and herbs).  I was expecting a few small strips of anchovies in the spaghetti but instead there were lots of good sized anchovy chunks along with lots of olives, capers and chopped tomatoes, so I was rather impressed by the way they did with their Puttanesca - with lots of ingredients and this is a lunch menu dish too.

I had Ravioli Astice Gamberoni e Granchio di Mare (Freshly handmade lobster, crab meat and king prawns ravioli served with a light tomato, dill and cream sauce).

There were lots of big ravioli, each one with lobster, cram and prawns mixtures filled to the rims. I think it was only just under £14!

See what I mean.... there were big chunks of lobster meat in ravioli!  Impressive!

After having managed main courses, we decided to try their desserts too.  We ordered Strawberry cheese cake, meringue with ice cream and I wanted to try their cafe affogato (ice cream with espresso coffee poured over it).

I asked them to bring ice cream with espresso on the side rather already poured over it as I wanted to do this by myself.

Soon I realised that it was not an easy thing to pour coffee over ice cream without making any mess as espresso came in espresso cup. I did not think. I managed it though and it was tasty. I enjoyed it very much (...however I must confess I still like Cafe Coia's Cafe Affogato the best - see my earlier blog about Cafe Coia's). 

The restaurant is decorated very stylishly throughout with consistent colour scheme of black, white, silver and purple.  What I liked was that the same theme is carried through to the toilet too. Often restaurant does not pay much attention to their toilet but not here.  And that big purplish pink chair  - you got to try sitting on it, which I did of course.  The restaurant definitely passed my toilet check, it was very clean. 

Overall we have a very lovely lunch. I thought it has a very good menu with lots of choices, both lunch menu and a la carte menu, food comes in good portion size and price is reasonable too. Maria is already thinking about going back there for her birthday.... We checked cocktail menu at the beginning and they don't seem to be too expensive neither.  I would not mind going back there and have their ravioli again. I love ravioli!

I have just checked the meaning of Andiamo in English - it means 'Let's Go' according to on-line dictionary.  Yes, let's go back there again and I would try their lunch menu or another lobster, crab meat ravioli, or even start off with one of their cocktails at the bar whilst sitting on a comfy chair.

That's all forks!

Pan fried garlic prawns

Emily has just been to a newly opened tapas place in Glasgow the other night and mentioned about the king prawn dish she had. I have then remembered about the king prawn dish I made this summer which turned out very well.

Many many years ago, my husband and I went to Paris. We went to Basilica of Scre-Coeur (the big white church) sitting on the crest of the hill in Montmartre, Paris  to 'command the fine view' of the city of Paris.  (Well, this is an expression you learn from a text book in Japan during English class, ha ha ha...).

To be honest I remembered more about having been hassled by street vendors trying to sell us sunglasses, fake designer watches and bags than commanding fine view of Paris. Anyhow, we then strode through Place du Tertre as many tourists do and I got a portrait of mine sketched by by an art ist there.

My apology, you are wondering where I am going with this... I have totally forgotten about this sketch till this June when my husband took that sketch to a picture frame shop in Milngavie and that's where we found this fishmonger named Fantoosh Fish (3 Station Road, Milngavie, East Dunbartonshire, G62 8PG). It's a great fishmonger - they have everything. They also had lots of langoustines, really beautiful fillets of tuna etc.

We did not plan to buy any fish or seafood that day. We only went to Milngavie to pick up a picture that had just been framed, but having looked at what the fishmonger had in their shop,  I could not resist not to buy anything. So we bought 10 juicy looking large prawns which costed just under £10 without thinking that much far ahead as to how I was going to cook these....

So, I just decided to simply pan fry them and that's what I did.

Here is my fail-proof easy recipe for lazy cook.

You need:

25 g butter
3 garlic cloves chopped
1 red chlli
1/2 tsp sweet paprika
10 large prawns (such as tiger prawns)
Olive oil
1 juic lemon
chopped parsley

In a large frying pan, heat the olive oil and the butter over a medium heat until the butter is foaming. Add the garlic, paprika and chilli to stair through and cook. Add the prawns to cook until they start turning nicely pink and turn them over to cook evenly. Once prawns are ready, which did not take that long, squeeze lemon juice and toss in the parsley, and it's ready!

We had these with some courgettes that came from my mother-in-law Mary's best friend's garden.

I simply chopped them randomly into bite size chunks, quickly pan fried them with olive oil, rock salt and chilli flakes.

We enjoyed these with a lovely and nicely chilled bottle of Gavi, and of course, I also enjoyed sucking those prawns' heads!!

This could be a very nice tapas dish that you can simply cook at home. Next time when you go to a good fishmonger, buy some large prawns and do try this at home.

That's all forks.