Phone Photo Friday: The Last Days of Summer

We’ve had a four week streak of warm temperatures and sunny days here in Aberdeen. But over the past week, there has been an underlying chill in the morning air. When walking Jon to work in the mornings, I’m forced to grab my fleece before heading out the door, and leaving our bedroom windows open all night leads to a lot of hitting the snooze button in order to stay warm and cozy beneath the blankets.

 It’s still pleasantly in the low 60s and high 50s, but I think our 70 degree days have probably ended until next summer. Knowing that winter usually sets in as early as October has us taking full advantage of these last mild days.

 Last Saturday was the warmest we’ve had so far, so we started off with a long run with Bailey girl and then headed to the river for some one on one time with Samson.

We decided to let him off leash as an experiment, and he ran straight to the water.

He has this quirk that he likes to burrow into the bank of rivers and streams and therefore cover himself from head to toe in mud and grass.

Needless to say, the off leash experiment didn’t last long, but with his extendable leash, he still managed to have a good time, and even got in for a swim.

After our walk, we headed over to our friends’ Ryan and Jillian’s country house for some Texas bar-b-que. Going to Ryan and Jill’s house is always bittersweet. It’s just so lovely and spacious that it makes me regret choosing to live closer to the city. Scotland sure is a beautiful country, and the view from their backyard is one of the loveliest I’ve seen.

I’m kind of jealous that they get to enjoy that view every single day. Luckily, Jillian is a good friend of mine, so I can rudely invite myself over to enjoy it whenever I wantJ.

It was such a perfect day on Saturday that we actually got to have margaritas. On a patio. With chips and salsa. Overlooking the Scottish countryside. With a clear view all the way to the Cairngorm mountain range. Looking at this sunset.

Can you say: best of both worlds? It was such an awesome day! Thanks for the invite Ryan and Jill!.

The nice weather has encouraged me to get out and explore some additional walking paths. Our neighborhood has some really incredible gardeners so I love looking at everyone’s front yard. Purple Hydrangeas are my absolute favorite flower.

I also love this yellow door.

If ours wasn’t a rental, the door would be getting a fresh coat of paint, pronto.

Sam and I also went to walk along the Dee Railroad Line that runs all the way from Duthie park in Aberdeen to Banchory 19 miles away.

Since we started at Duthie Park, all we really saw was city scenery, but I think today we’re going to meet up with the trail inCults and walk through the countryside a bit.

Last night we were finally able throw Pam a Hen Party after her lost passport fiasco.

It was so nice to see her after about a month of incongruent schedules. One of the downsides of living in Aberdeen is that everyone travels so much that it’s hard to find a time when we can all get together. We had a good showing for her dinner though, and ended up having the entire downstairs of Ciao Napoli to ourselves. Kristin even baked a cookie cake from scratch. It was adorably delicious.

We then headed out for girly champagne cocktails before heading back home for some much needed beauty sleep.

And now it's time to go take some more phone photos for next Friday's edition. I hope you all have a great weekend planned. See you Monday!

 

An American Version of British High Tea

Since this month’s book club featured The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley, I decided to whip up some food and beverages to honor the Scottish setting of the book. Since the Brits are big fans of High Tea, I took that idea and ran with it. A traditional High Tea generally consists of tea, finger sandwiches, cake, and biscuits (cookies and/or scones).

And by finger sandwiches we aren’t talking peanut butter and jelly or ham and swiss. Nope, we are talking real fancy fillings such as cucumbers and watercress. Because the UK is classy, y’all, and everybody knows that classy people eat their cucumbers sandwiched between two pieces of bread. So like most of my adventures in the kitchen so far, I had to completely relearn how to make sandwiches.

I started by googling high tea recipes and narrowed the bajillion fancy filler choices down to three. Since Egg Mayo seemed to be on every website’s sandwich list, I got to thinking it might be some sort of British Law to serve this particular variation at all high tea functions. Not wanting to have my UK visa revoked, I chose this as one of my three, despite the fact that I absolutely. hate. egg. mayo. sandwiches. Shhh…Please don’t tell the Queen!

I also chose a roast beef and watercress option, mainly because I didn’t know what the heck watercress was, and these days I’m all about learning new things. And because everybody knows that classy people eat watercress on their roast beef sandwiches, y’all.

After narrowing down the first two choices, I was down to one more selection. When I saw this recipe for a goat’s cheese and roasted red pepper spread, I knew it would round off my starting lineup of finger sandwiches. You had me at Goat’s cheese. Spoiler alert- it was delicious!

As for the desserts, I’ve already told you all about my rough go at making Millionaire Shortbread.

Other than that I served store bought Borders biscuits, and, as a healthy option, I put out some fruit, and some handmade cream-cheese based fruit dip. You know, healthy.

And just for fun, these were offered as well:

 Yep, you read that right. Haggis flavored crisps. A true Scottish delicacy.

I got lazy on the beverage portion of the spread. I was going to attempt to make a whiskey spiked tea, but all we had in the house was fancy whisky and I didn’t have Jon’s permission to use waste it on a cooking experiment. So instead I bought wine and copious amounts of cider.

I felt guilty for not buying British cider, but this Swedish stuff is just so good. And pretty. And I totally judge a cider by its bottle.

So if you’re interested in hosting your own high tea, here are the three sandwich recipes I used:

Egg Mayo Sandwich (**Mandatory by order of the Queen**)

Ingredients: 4 hard boiled eggs, 6-8 tablespoons of mayonnaise, butter spread, 4-6 slices of white bread, 1 large bunch of watercress

Directions (Yes, directions on how to make a sandwich. Pay attention.):

1. Peel the boiled eggs and put in a small bowl. Use the back of a fork to smash the eggs into small pieces, and then add mayonnaise for taste and desired consistency.

2. Butter white bread before spreading egg mayo mixture on one half and top with watercress before sandwiching with second piece of bread.

3. **This is a very important step** Cut off the crusts and cut into triangles. Everybody knows that classy people do not eat their crusts, and cannot be asked to eat a sandwich that is cut into squares. If you are living in the UK and it’s discovered that you do not cut the crusts off of your tea sandwiches and do not cut them into triangles, you will be sent home immediately.  

British Bunting = classy!

Roast Beef and Watercress Sandwiches 

Ingredients: 8 slices multigrain bread, butter spread, 2 tablespoons of horseradish, 2 tablespoons of chutney, About 12 slices of roast beef, 1 large bunch of watercress sprigs.

Directions:

1. Butter bread and then spread 1 half with horseradish and the other with chutney.

2. Then layer roast beef with watercress on top and sandwich together using bread. 

3. **This is a very important step** Cut off the crusts and cut into triangles. Everybody knows that classy people do not eat their crusts, and cannot be asked to eat a sandwich that is cut into squares. If you are living in the UK and it’s discovered that you do not cut the crusts off of your tea sandwiches and do not cut them into triangles, you will be sent home immediately.

Goat Cheese and Roasted Pepper Sandwich

Ingredients: 200 grams of soft goat cheese, 100 grams of cream cheese (I used Philadelphia’s Roasted Pepper variety. Delish!) 10 slices of white bread, 2 roasted red bellpeppers, 25 grams of walnuts

Directions:

1. Mix the goat cheese and cream cheese together and spread the mixture over 5 slices of white bread.

2. Slice the 2 roasted red bell peppers into strips and divide between the bread.  

3. **This is a very important step** Cut off the crusts and cut into triangles. Everybody knows that classy people do not eat their crusts, and cannot be asked to eat a sandwich that is cut into squares. If you are living in the UK and it’s discovered that you do not cut the crusts off of your tea sandwiches and do not cut them into triangles, you will be sent home immediately.

4. Whizz 25 grams of walnuts until fine (we’ve been through this. I don’t have a food processor and I have no idea what the verb ‘to whizz’ even means. So I just crushed them really really small. Please, please, please don’t tell the Queen.) Once the walnuts are whizzed, spread the edge of the triangles with the remaining cheese spread and dip into chopped walnuts.

Well that’s all of my new sandwich recipes, folks. But even though fruit dip isn’t necessarily part of a traditional High Tea spread (don’t tell the Queen!), I thought I’d share my delicious concoction with you anyway. 

Now I just made this up willy nilly off the top of my head so I don’t have precise measurements, but basically you just take a small package of cream cheese and mix it together with about 2 tablespoons of condensed milk, one teaspoon of brown sugar, and one teaspoon of vanilla extract.

I used low fat cream cheese and condensed milk, because I wanted to deceive myself (and my guests) into thinking it was healthy. Healthy smealthy; it was worth the calories either way.

In the end, I think my Americanized version of British High Tea was a success. Okay, maybe terming it a 'success' is taking it a bit far. Maybe instead I should say: My Americanized bastardization of British High Tea wasn't a complete and utter failure. At least I haven't been asked by Border Control to kindly hand back my visa....yet.  

Planning an Austrian Itinerary

Our trip to Austria is closing in on us and until now, I haven’t given it too much thought. We’ll be in Salzburg for 2 nights and then we have 2 1/2 extra days in which we can take a side trip if we choose. Jonathan put the planning in my hands, and at first I felt dizzy with power, but now I just feel stumped.

First things first, I gotta find out what there is to do in Austria. Alpine skiing? Not in September. Sound of Music tour? Already on the itinerary…and I’m out. What else does Austria have to offer? When I politely asked Jon for some input and what he’d like to see, he spurted out ‘Vienna’, but I feel like Vienna is just a knee jerk reaction. When I politely followed up with the question of, “and what do you want to do in Vienna, exactly?”, he was stunned into silence. Neither of us had a clue as to what Vienna, or Austria as a whole, had in store for us.


After some scatter brained research, I came up with the following four options, all of which are readily accessible by train.
1. Vienna (so cliché!)

(source)

We’re in Salzburg Wednesday through Friday for Jonathan to attend a work conference. He’ll be let out at noon on Friday, at which point we can wrap up Salzburg and take the train to Vienna. We don’t have to be at the airport until 2 pm on Sunday, so that should give us a full day Saturday and a full Sunday morning to explore. But what would we be exploring exactly?

My friend Nary pointed me towards CN Traveller’s City Guides for an in depth orientation. It seems like the main attractions are similar to most large European cities: museums, cafes, beautiful cityscapes, large parks and promenades, and some quirky parts of town as well.  Oh, and of course, Mozart! If you go to Vienna you just have to go to a Mozart dinner concert! Apparently.

Mozart Statue (source)

Please don’t tell anyone this but I have absolutely zero interest in classical music. I took a fine arts survey class in high school where we had to identify different composers by listening to music clips and I flat out failed at this assignment. Within 5 seconds of playing, I can identify any alternative rock song released between 1995-2002, but I still can’t distinguish between Mozart and Beethoven. When I had to choose songs for my harpist play at our wedding, it was all I could do not to fall asleep while she played samples. I ended up just telling her: “Why don’t you just surprise me?” What can I say, it’s just not my thing.

2. Innsbruck.

Oh Innsbruck, I don’t know anything about you, but you sure are photogenic. I’m a sucker for mountain scenery, so it makes sense that I’m drawn to this capital of the Alps. Similar, to Vienna, I don’t know much about this city other than it is so purdy!  

I’d love to do some alpine hiking and just soak in the scenery and fresh air in this heavenly setting. It’s more of a winter destination, but so is Colorado; doesn’t mean it isn’t worth visiting in summertime.

3. Bad Gastien.

(source)

This valley town is located just south of Salzburg. Part of the land is private property belonging to a massive resort, and is a good starting point for several mountainous hikes. Plus, being a resort, it’s also up to par on the little luxuries like a full spa, heated pool, etc. It could be the relaxing and romantic honeymoon that we never had. So do we want to ditch the cities for this vacation and bask in the quiet nature of a resort so spectacular that Jude Law himself has spent holidays here?

4. Staying in Salzburg. 

Another option for our extra two days is just to stay in Salzburg. We arrive in Salzburg late Wednesday afternoon, and Jonathan will be in a conference all day Thursday and half a day Friday. So while I’m out participating in Sound of Music bicycle tours, he’ll be improving his professional knowledge. Is it fair to whisk him away to another locale as soon as his conference is over, so that he doesn’t get ample time to explore Salzburg? I mean, is it fair that he should have to miss out on the Sound of Music bicycle tour? Can I really live with myself if I'm responsible for him missing out on a photo op in the gazebo where  Maria and Leisle sang "16 going on 17"? 

(source)

If we stayed in Salzburg for the full 5 nights, we’d probably do a day trip on Saturday. For this we’d have several options: a very long day trip to Vienna, the Austrian wine country, taking a cable car up a mountain and hiking down, ice caves, etc. Salzburg is a pretty good base camp for several fun day trips, which means we'd never have to pack up our bags and change hotels.

I guess it all comes down to what we want to see and do while we’re there. All I can think about is mountains, which is probably why I’m shying away from the whole mandatory Vienna stopover itinerary. Have any of you been to the land of doe, a deer, a female deer? If so, I’d loooooooove your insight! Is Vienna really worth the hype?

Today was a Fairytale...and a Historical Novel

It was my turn to host book club last week, and The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley was the featured book of the month. During my first week in Aberdeen, I couldn’t put this book down. I absolutely love historical novels, and since this one mostly takes place in Cruden Bay, just 30 miles north of Aberdeen, it was a double page turner. Other than a world famous golf course, Cruden Bay’s main attraction is Slains Castle, which is the primary setting of The Winter Sea (and also the inspiration for Bram Stroker’s Dracula. It’s a very inspiring place, apparently.)   

I thought it would be a fun outing for a few of the girls from book club to get together and hike to the castle and the Bullers of Buchan along the coast. The weather forecast for Monday was very promising, so we decided to start with a morning hike and end with afternoon sticky toffee pudding at St. Olaf Hotel, which is both mentioned in the book and also where Susanna Kearsley stayed while she did her research for the novel.

When we set out at 10 AM, the weather in Aberdeen was picture perfect. However, the closer we got to our destination, the thicker the haar (fog) got. At one point our visibility was pretty much non-existent.

But in some ways, I find that the fog adds an air of mystique to the Scottish landscape so I didn’t mind too much. What I did mind was the dew on the tall grass which soaked my jeans. The temperature also dropped about 10 degrees while we were out which made me wish I’d grabbed both my fleece and waterproof hiking pants. That darn weather forecast; fools me every single time.

Other than the mild physical discomfort and moderate visual impairment, I still had a blast exploring the ruins and coastline with my girls.

You may remember that Jon and I did this same hike for our anniversary back in May. Well, on that day the weather forecast didn’t blatantly lie and we got some sunny shots of Slains and the Bullers of Buchan. Here’s an example of the difference.
First Trip:

Second Trip:

I swear, Scotland looks entirely different from one day to the next. After hiking a few miles and working up an appetite, we decided to head into town for some lunch and Sticky Toffee Pudding at St. Olaf and ask around to see if the owner had any insights into Kearsley’s stay there.

Not only did she have some stories, she also let us tour the room she stayed in.

You can see the outline of Slains in upper left hand horizon.

While we were busy imagining her working on her novel and gazing out of her window at her stellar view of Slain’s Castle (by this time the haar had burned off and we had the sunny day we were originally promised), the owner was scouring through old guest books to try to find Kearsley’s entry.  She hadn’t found it by the time we needed to leave, so we told her thank you for her efforts and headed to the car. After I put on some Taylor Swift for the car ride home (my car, my music!) and put the car in reverse, we saw the owner come speeding through the parking lot, guest book in her hand. She had found it!

We all passed it around and took snapshots of Susanna’s signature. It truly made our trip so much more than we bargained for. You’ve got 5 stellar TripAdvisor reports coming your way, St. Olaf Hotel! Thanks for going out of your way to make our Cruden Bay experience so special!