Family, fresh caught trout, wild mushrooms, free range eggs, courgettes, haggis and other delights.

Scotland, October 19, 2011

I finally got my suitcase packed and headed off to visit my darling daughter Kathy.

Like her dad she loves to garden and cook and has the advantage of getting free range eggs from her own chickens.
Now I know nothing of the art of chicken (other than Kathy and Petra seem to spend a great deal of time rounding them up and putting them to bed in the evening) but it appears that her brood is omnivorous and consumes the parts of birds and rodents that her cat Ripley leaves scattered about the garden, she swears that, given enough mouse heads in their diet, they produce double yolkers.
Not going to argue the toss on that one, suffice to say the eggs are delicious.

Since I missed a great deal of daughters’ life and see her infrequently we packed in as much in the way of activities and food that we possibly could.

Trout Fishing
Bloody airlines have placed so many restrictions on baggage that I was unable to take my rods without handing over vast wads of cash and so, having promised to teach Kathy the art of fly casting, we rented a rod and got down to the business of doing just that.
I managed to annoy a nice rainbow trout into taking my fly and so was able to teach Kathy my simple method for cleaning and cooking trout.

Rainbow Trout ready for Preperation

Once the trout was cleaned and scaled the cavity was liberally treated with butter, salt and pepper.
Placed a strip of bacon on top of the fish and wrapped the whole shooting match in greaseproof paper.
Into the oven at about 350 F for 15 minutes and that is it.

The Falls of Bruar.

A lovely walk up the Bruar Water on the river Tilt.

Not too strenuous for the old legs and the weather was what the Irish would call “a soft wee day”.
Fall colors abound in the firs, ash, beech and rowan that were planted by the Duke of Atholl at the request of Robert Burns.

The Lower Falls of Bruar

 On the hike back down Kathy picked some nice Mutton Foot Fungi (Pieds de Mouton), we supplemented these with Winter Chanterelles from the market at the House of Bruar.
The wild mushrooms met up with some dried Porcini and were married into a delightful Risotto which I cooked up for dinner.
Lunch at the House of Bruar was a very nice green pea soup with chunky freshly baked bread and the shop there stocked a goodly variety of meats and cheeses.

I was not the only one cooking, Kathy contributed a lovely Tomato Tarte Tatin made with tomatoes from her garden, a Smoked Haddock Pate and a very interesting sausage made with a mixture of pork, herbs and black pudding.

Tomato Tarte Tatin fresh from the oven

We ate out at The Blue Marlin in Dundee with Petra and the highlight of that repast was a Scallop and Haggis appetizer, a seemingly odd combination that worked exceeding well.
A lovely Piedmontese Barbera wine accompanied our meal.

Culinary delight for the last night in Scotland was my Penne Pasta Carbonara with Courgettes fresh picked from the garden.

Penne Rigata Rarbonara with Courgettes

This recipe is fast becoming a favorite amongst family and friends.