cities

The outside world (including most of England, I'm led to believe) imagines Scotland as a mystical wilderness full of beautiful serene glens and quietly grazing sheep.  Perhaps there's a highlander afar off playing the bagpipes?

To be fair, Scotland plc, is happy to promote this image and why not?  It sells a lot of shortbread.  However, for most people living in Scotland, this is not reality.  Twenty-first century Scots (as well as twentieth and nineteenth century ones) are mostly city dwellers.  The glens are lovely, but if you do venture out, you'll be more likely to see a German tourist or a middle-aged English hill walkers than an 'average' Scot.

So, what of these cities?

Well, as a Canadian, there are certain qualities possessed by all Scottish cities have that I find desirable.  Firstly, they are typically pedestrian/public transport friendly.  Despite having a very strong car culture, you are still able to get in and out of every city in Scotland quickest by train.  No worries about getting lost or stuck in traffic, once you get off the train you can relax and start enjoying the place.

Also, unlike Canada, Scotland has held on to its low-rise city scape.  There are tall buildings, but the distinctive nature of a city's architecture here is best appreciated up close rather than far away. 

So, these things being equal, I nominate Glasgow as my favourite city!

Aside from being the largest metropolitan area in the country by far, Glasgow is easily the friendliest and most vibrant of Scottish cities.  Yes, Edinburgh is charming, but beyond the looks it lacks something that Glasgow has.  As a post-industrial city, one can see how the great engineering works drew people to Glasgow from across Scotland and the world.  Coming out of a period of decline in the late 20th century, the city has kept apace through it's own merits and people.  If you were looking for a good restaurant in Scotland, it would be in Glasgow.  Music gig - Glasgow; specialist shop - Glasgow; rare car part - Glasgow; subway system - Glasgow; intraurban rail network - Glasgow; great airport - Glasgow... the list goes on.


I should end this post by saying that this could easily turn into an ugly game of Edinburgh-trashing.  It is also a fine city and a certain destination for tourists (for good reason).  I have worked in Edinburgh and seeing the view as I walk out of the Waverley train station does brighten my day and make me think - THIS is town planning at its finest.  But, if I were to choose a city to live in, it would be Glasgow.

the best of scotland

I've been thinking that it might be fun to do a little series of blog entries over the holidays and perhaps beyond (while I still have free time) about my experience living here in Scotland.



One of the challenges of blogging is trying to keep your posts (relatively) interesting.  Since starting this blog, I've taken a fairly relaxed approach since I understand I have a relatively limited audience.  An audience who, more than likely, knows me personally and will tolerate a less engaging read.  However, that's no reason to be dull.

With that sentiment in mind, I've decided to do a few 'best of Scotland' entries that will expose my own tastes and reflect a few of my (mostly positive) opinions on my life here.  

Irish Oatmeal

To continue the breakfast theme around here... I've had a request for the slow cooker steel cut oats that are a feature in our breakfast rotation. As it's getting colder around here, it's perfect timing. The recipe comes from one of my favourite cookbooks of late Slow Cooker Revolution, from my heroes at ATK/Cook's Illustrated.

As a very oaty household, we typically have a few types of oats about - jumbo rolled oat (our standard porridge oat), quick rolled oats (for mixing in raw to yoghurt) and pinhead, also called steel cut (for a different type of porridge).

I need to preface this with the fact that in my mind, oatmeal porridge ought to be a mostly savoury dish. I don't normally like anything sweet in mine, bar dried fruit. Although I do like cold evaporated milk. So this recipe is a bit off the norm for me.

Steel cut oats are delicious and have a great texture, but are a bit of a pain to prepare, compared to rolled oats. This slow-cooker method makes it a snap and the leftovers are easily reheated. Since we have a very basic slow cooker (sans timer) I just plug ours into one of those timer socket thingies to get the right cooking time for it to be ready at breakfast. If you leave it cook too long, it's all ballooned out.

Irish Oatmeal

2 tablespoons unsalted butter (I've used salted and just back on the salt)
2 cups steel-cut oats
8 cups water
1 teaspoon salt

Method
Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat, add the oats in and toast. You need to make sure to stir this well as they can get dark quickly. You want them to be a golden colour and smell quite nice. Transfer over to the slow cooker and add the water and salt, cook on LOW setting for 4-6 hours. Our slow cooker tends to run hot, so they're done in 4, easily. Stir the porridge well and let it sit for about 10 min before serving, it just evens out a bit and is less hot.

The book provides a few options to this recipe - Cinnamon & Raisins, Bananas & Walnuts and Apples & Raisins. We've tried the first option, in which you simply add 1/2 cup of brown sugar, 1 tsp of cinnamon and 1 cup of raisins. I love it! I'm hoping to try the banana one soon... For it you reduce the water to 7.5 cups and add 4 mashed bananas, 1 cup of toasted walnuts, 1/2 cup of brown sugar and 1/4 tsp of cinnamon.

The real efficiency from this recipe is the leftover factor. It makes quite a lot and reheats as new. Just need to add a bit of water to get the right texture, although I prefer it solid.

Pikelets

This last recipe is fantastic. In some ways it is more than just a variation on a theme, which so many pancake recipes are. Although the ingredient list is similar to normal pancakes, it has different DNA, so to speak. The secret ingredient - yeast! Don't worry though, it's not nearly as finicky as bread. In fact it's the easiest yeast-raised thing you'll ever make.

This recipe comes from "The Classic 1000 Cake & Bake Recipes", by Wendy Hobson. This is a very unassuming book, unfortunate graphic design. I was given this book with a pile of other cookbooks that a friend was wanting rid of, either they went to me or to a charity shop. I must admit that I nearly passed this one along to the charity shop when we did a book clear out. I'm glad I didn't, even if it were for this one recipe (truth be told it's full of good ones).

One of the quirks of this book is it's metric/imperial/US measurement layout. It's a pain to read, but it does allow me to present it in both systems here. I'm told pikelets are an Aussie thing, but as far as I can tell, it's really just their word for a raised pancake. This recipe appears to have rather ancient origins, what with the yeast and all.

Pikelets

1 teaspoon dry yeast
1 tsp sugar
1-1/4 cups milk (300 ml)
1 egg
2 cups flour (225 g)
1 teaspoon salt

Warm the milk in the microwave so it is lukewarm and add the sugar and yeast. Allow the yeast to proof (it will float to the top and be bubbly)*. In larger bowl (I use a pitcher) add the flour and salt. Now add the egg to the milk mixture and beat, finally adding it to the dry ingredients; mix well into a thin batter (I use a hand blender or just do the whole thing in a regular blender). Unlike regular pancake batter, this stuff has to be lump-free. Cover and leave somewhere warm until double in size (no more than 30 min usually). Fry as you would normal pancakes, but be warned the mixture tends to pour gloppy.

*The original recipe tells you to make a paste with the dry yeast, sugar and some of the milk, then mix it into everything else. This does work, but it makes the rise time a lot slower - it will take 30 - 40 min at least depending on where you leave it to rise.

This recipe makes the most wonderful, doughy and fragrant pancakes. I eat them with just butter. If you have really active yeast, or a longer rise time, you will have very, very light thick pancakes, shorter rise times or less exuberant yeast yield shorter more bread like pancakes. I once made this with some very perky yeast and the batter kept growing to fill my pitcher, like a bottomless cup!

This is such a wonder, easy and unique recipe that you MUST try it at least once (but if you do, I promise it won't be a one-time-only thing).

Cornmeal Griddlecakes

In case I get accused of pancake nationalism, I shall now introduce the pancake we eat the most often, which is an American recipe (that is not, as MBC would point out, overly large or tasteless). The best way to describe these is in terms of cornbread: Hot out of the oven with butter, yum! But just a few hours later, meh. The next day, yuck. This recipe is like eating hot-out-of-the-oven cornbread, except small, flat and in series (the better to soak up butter).

This recipe comes from the "The Cornbread Book" by Jeremy Jackson, which I urge you to buy if you like cornmeal in any of its forms - it's witty, charming and full of great recipes. Actually just buy it for the read even if you don't like cornmeal.

Griddlecakes

2/3 cup cornmeal
1/3 cup flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1 egg, slightly beaten
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, slightly cooled

Add the dry ingredients into a bowl, add the milk, egg and butter then stir it all until everything is just combined.

I make this in a plastic pitcher for easy pouring. It is delightfully easy and is delicious with a variety of toppings like honey. For UK readers, you can get cornmeal easily at any Indian, Afro-Carribean grocery or health food store where they will call it maize meal (get course ground).

Oatmeal Pancakes

This is one of my grandmother's recipes, of which I am very fond. Like most of Grammie's recipes I can never get these to turn out as good as hers. This is likely due to the fact that my grandmother NEVER used recipes so every recipe we do have from her is sort of like a jotted-down transcript. Similarly, when we did copy a recipe out of her book, we got the original inspiration for what she actually made (never as good).

So in memory of Grammie (the late Kaye Smith), here it is:

Oatmeal Pancakes

3/4 cup rolled oats
1 cup buttermilk (or sour regular milk with some vinegar)
1/4 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg (separated)

Put the oats in the buttermilk and let soak at least 15 minutes (if you are using the large flake oats, go a bit longer). Beat egg yolk and stir into mushy oats then add sugar, baking soda and flour; mix together. Beat egg whites until stiff and fold into mixture. Fry as smallish pancakes on a lower heat than normal as they'll be pretty thick.

As much as I love this recipe, it doesn't get made as often because I always have a problem getting the the egg white beaten stiff (I don't have electric beaters). This recipe makes enough for two people and no more. It easily doubles and in fact the egg whites are easier to beat with twice as much.

Riverside Pancakes

This is an old family standby, which makes a traditional Nova Scotian pancake - it is not a big, fluffy, syrup-absorbing sponge that falls apart on your plate (ie: a mix pancake). MBC and I have this discussion now and then about what I think an American pancake is. I have always thought of them as being massive and really fluffy, I suppose mostly based on restaurant fare in my travels down there. She rightly points out that you would get this sort of pancake at any restaurant in Canada as well. At any rate, these pancakes are not thus. They are, however, just like what is referred to as a 'scotch pancake' here in the UK, but minus the fruit.

The recipe comes from the North Cumberland Memorial Hospital Lady's Auxiliary Cookbook, Pugwash, NS (1970s vintage), which tells us that it was submitted by Barb MacKay.

Riverside Pancakes

2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1/4 cup white vinegar*
2 cups milk

Measure out the milk and pour vinegar in to sour. Add eggs and beat. Mix dry ingredients separately and add the wet in with a whisk. (My mother does the whole thing in a blender, also works well for pouring that way) Cook on a well greased griddle or frying pan until most of the bubbles burst, then flip (if it's too hot you'll know because it'll be burnt when you flip over).

*If you have it or feel so inclined you may just use 2-1/4 cups of buttermilk or milk that's gone sour in the fridge rather than the vinegar/milk combo. Important note here for those of you in the UK. White vinegar in Canada is a spirit vinegar, completely distilled. If you try to use UK-style vinegar it will taste awful. Just use buttermilk or, if you know where to get it, Polish white vinegar.

These are our all-around everyday pancake, be warned though, it makes a lot. The recipe does halve perfectly though.