hungryscotsman's Profile
Desperately Seeking Sausage Suppliers - Cotechino Sausage Suppliers!
I am trying to source a UK mail order supplier of cotechino - I am hankering after some seasoned fatty pig jowl and rind on a bed of lentils and cannot locate a supplier. Can anyone help someone in such sausage distress?
Fish and Chips - the best?
scraps are a thing of great beauty.......my father used to take me to a small chippie in Leith where we had scraps and peas in vinegar.....sublime. Heart attack material mayhaps. But still sublime.....
Edinburgh recommendations please
Check out our local magazine, The List, listing the places to go in Edinburgh and Glasgow at http://www.list.co.uk/food-and-drink/
Can browse area or cuisine and get a view - usually pretty reliable and the Hitlisted features best in each category.
Having said all that, great Indian food at Mother India's Cafe ( an export from Glasgow), Oloroso for food and a great view, The Dogs for a different type of lunch, Cafe Royal (bar) for some traditional ale in a fantastic bar and the adjoining Oyster Bar for OKish food), David Bann for great veggie, The Kitchin for Michelin hot and finally L'Aquila Bianca for fish and chips to carry out , always with salt and sauce.....
Something different in Central London
Thanks for your thoughts - am imagining somewhere up to £25 - £30 per head tops - for food - alcohol extra but always prefer somewhere with a reasonable wine list...
Street Eats
Greetings from a cold and rainy Scotland. Am coming across to a hopefully much warmer and sunnier San Francisco in April with the specific intention of researching (and eating!) the best street food which for these purposes I am defining as all the usual carts, wagons or holes in wall. Anything which is purchased and consumed from the side walk.
Now I know that this has been a topic before but am unsure how many of these develop into fixtures or come and go over time.
Ladies. Gentlemen. What are your thoughts, recommendations, must visits?
Appreciate any help that can be given. Must go now an put some more peat on my fire......
Something different in Central London
Greetings fellow masticators! A motley crew of about 10 will be hitting London this July for my (naturally) gifted and attractive daughter's graduation. Now I cant afford to hit the very high spots with ten in tow. Recommendations along the eclectic/seafood/brasserie lines would be massively appreciated to ensure that this is night to remember - or not, depending on how much the wine costs........
Street Eats
Greetings from a rainy Scotland. Am coming across to NY in April with the specific intention of researching (and eating!) the best street food which for these purposes I am defining as all the usual carts, wagons or holes in wall. Anything which is purchased and consumed from the side walk.
Now I know that this has been a topic before but am unsure how many of these develop into fixtures or come and go over time. Not necessarily just Manhattan. Happy to head out into the other boroughs.
Ladies. Gentlemen. What are your thoughts, recommendations, must visits?
Appreciate any help that can be given
Glasgow recommendations solicited
Hey Carrie
Seen the various posts. Crabshakk absolutely great for us Glaswegians, but having spent a few days in your hometown this summmer chowing down on your stunning seafood, you may be less overwhelmed than us. But still a great recommendation.
Roganos absolutely trading on its past glories. Great interior as people say, stunning bloody mary at the bar, but food poor.
Cafe Gandolfi has been mentioned. Gandolfi Fish, it's newer sister restaurant also in the Merchant City also good. More expensive tho!
And before going to the Chip would much rather head to Stravaigin for some distinctly eclectic but still very Scottish fare. Arisaig always great.
And I know you said you dont want ethnic, but if youre feeling peckish in the afternoon, why not head to the Banana Leaf for the uber snack that is the 3 foot long dosa. Brilliant and stunningly better than much of the tasteless pap which passes for IndoPak food in Glasgow.
Also why not have a pint at Oran Mhor at the top of Byres Road, or a cocktail at Booly Mardys and then pop round the corner to Cail Bruich ( Gaelic for 'eat well') for a well hung ribeye steal with triple cooked chips and a biting pepper sauce.
And if you want to enjoy a great Scottish pub, stay in Edinburgh, he concluded controversially
Have a great time. By the way, it's raining.........
Embarcadero bound and looking for seafood
Hey, everyone - thanks to all who contributed to this thread - much appreciated and more than one idea that we'll be taking up when we get to SF. Cheers
Edinburgh/Grassmarket Dinner Options
Excellent timing! Hitting Edinburgh in May gets you there before the hordes arrive and before the midges start biting.General suggestion is to log on to the following url: list.co.uk - does a fairly comprehensive listing of whats on in Edinburgh ( and Glasgow) and a great eating and drinking section, with fairly reliable views on where to chow down and where to avoid. The Dogs in Hanover St is great fun, Bells Diner in Stockbridge great for decent value meat. But as someone has already said, this IS a tourist city so no avoiding this - less likelihood of finding that secret place that only the locals go to. Having said that, remember the pubs - brilliant real Victorian hostelries, the Guildford Arms, Cafe Royal ( with oyster bar), Bennet's Bar, Mathers,.....the list is endless. If you like crime novels, buy a couple of Ian Rankin's great crime thrillers starring the grumpy, whisky quaffing Inspector Rebus which will give you a grainier view of Edinburgh - and then go to the Oxford bar where Rebus does his drinking for a pint or two and where virtually every local has appeared as someone in a Rankin/Rebus novel. Go to the Alba D'Oro for seriously good fish and chips, and some quaint vegetable fritters if you're feeling healthy(!!?) Remember this is NOT the land of tartare sauce but salt and sauce. Just ask for it. A unique Edinburgh phenomenon - altho only revered by Edinburgh residents, it has to be said. Valvona and Crolla I also second. And get down to Leith for some brilliant seafood restaurrants, or deeply posh Michelin food at Wisharts or Kitchins, or a great pub meal at the Kings Wark. Have fun. Hope the sun shines.
Embarcadero bound and looking for seafood
Will be staying down near the Embarcadero in the summer and during our time there will be celebrating my daughter's 19th birhtday. She is a seafood fiend. Given the exceptionally dubious reputation of Fisherman's Wharf, where would you recommend within walking distance/nearby? Not necessarily looking for upscale/fine dining - although interested in that too.Cuisine also up for grabs. I am however looking for spankingly fresh fish, and if I can get value for money ( seeing the current exchange rate for the poor old British Pound) then that would be a bonus! Thanks in advance for any thoughts you have.
Defining Manhattan Meals!
Youre right - I'm being vague again - blame the malt whisky and the endless rain. What I'm loooking for is not necesarily the self evident high end eating experinece - nice as that can be - but can get a lot of that stuff all over the globe if you have the cash - what I'm looking for are those meals/snacks/whatever that are essentail NY - something which might be either hard to find or inferior elsewhere in Obamaland. Like Calvin Trillin's sausage and roast pepper sandwich - I am going to hunt one of these bad boys down for sure. Does this make things clearer?
Defining Manhattan Meals!
Gretings fellow chowhounds! For a special celebration, my wife and I are coming across from the cold gray drizzle of Scotland to Manhattan at the start of July! Having only partailly succeeeded in eating well the last few times I/we were there ( admittedly in my pre chowhound existence!), and fallen for the emptly lures of such places as Bleeker St, I am setting you a challenge. If we have 12 meals (4 x breakfast, lunch and dinner) before we move on to West Coast hedonism, what would be the defining Manhattan meals? Not necessarily expensive, not necessarily mainstream, but just sublimely, supremely, quintessentailly New York. Any contributions for one or all twelve would be massively appreciated. Get me salivating......
Fish and Chips - the best?
Despite much bollocks written regarding Chicken Tikka Masala or Macdonalds pap or greasy painted Domino/Pizza Hut discuses being the most popular carry out meal in the UK, it remains the case that Fish and Chips remains our number one fast food. BUT, and here in Scotland it's a big but, the number of fish friers who still do it properly dwindles by the day. Fresh fish, not frozen. Single fillet, not butterfly. Haddock for me ( cod, I acknowledge, for my English cousins). A batter made from scratch, not from a giant sack of premix. Chips from the right kind of potatoes, peeled and sliced on the premises, soaked to remove the starch and (ideally) double fried - the second fry completed when your fish goes in to cook - ie after you've ordered, not two hours previously and then left to congeal warmly until the batter is like old chicken skin. For me salt and sauce - yes, an Edinburgh boy by birth. Opened straight outside the chip shop, hot and crispy straight from the paper - not steamed in its wrappings while you drive home to eat it tepidly with a glass of chardonnay - the vinegary vapours prickling your nostrils, the salt adding a bit of traction to help the batter and chunks of gleaming white fish slide deliriously down your throat.
All too often however, you dont get this and instead all you get is a calorie laden pile of flaccid cooked frozen fish past its sell by lying on top of soggy wet chips - a waste of all those precious fat calories. If youre going to indulge, then please God let it be worthwhile. So there's the usual suspects. Harry Ramsdens in Guisely, Bryans Modern Fisheries in Leeds, The Anstruther Fish Bar, The Bridgend Cafe in Inverbervie, what used to be the Little Chef in Tyndrum, The Ashvale in Aberdeen - but where are the others? Recommendations warmly received - and not alcohol fuelled memories of two in the morning suppers, where frankly a deep fried toilet roll doused in salt and vinegar would taste fantastic. And please, no jokes about the preposterously mythic deep fried Mars bar.
Should I really give gin another try?
Puritans, Plymouth and the Perfect Gin
You may wonder why a Scotsman is responding to a post on London Dry Gin? Well, despite it's generic name, most of the gin in the UK is made in Scotland. I know, you're amazed. Although the gin I think you'll like is made at the other end of Britain. So. getting to the heart of the matter, I suspect that it is most likely that you just dont like heavy botanicals in your drink - not liking the taste, however faint, of juniper, is a wee bit of a problem. But before you give up altogether, let's have one last try. Forget Hendricks - all brand, fancy old bottles and a strange insistence on using cucumber garnish. And don't even think about Bombay Sapphire. No, track down Plymouth English Gin. A fruitier, coriander, rooty dryness dominate - not juniper as is the case with most if not all London gins. If you're a real man, try Plymouth Navy Strength at 57 degrees. And yes, it IS ironic that this gin is distilled in the place where those epitomes of unbridled happiness, the Puritans, set out in the Mayflower in 1620. You will recall they escaped to America as the Founding Fathers (much to the surprise of the actual founding aboriginals) for the religious freedom to whine and nag everyone who looked even remotely happy. They would never have tolerated Chowhounds. And they would have burned anyone found sipping a good pink gin at the end of a long day killing the locals. Enjoy this devil's brew. And when you grow up completely, stick to Scottish single malts! God's own tipple!
