Cooking: The Books

Recently in a café I had some splendid spicy lentil soup. I make a lot of soup. I have not made spicy lentil soup though. So I went to my cookery books and discovered lentil soup recipes do not abound. although, to be fair, The New Soup Bible did have 5 with lentils. I also found a pasta and lentil soup in Nigellissima. It would, of course, have been much easier just to go on line and choose one of the hundreds that will come up with a Google search. It made me wonder why, despite culling the cookery books several times in recent years, I still have two shelves of them: one in the main bookshelves and one in the kitchen. Apart from the simple fact that I like books the thing I love about cookery books is that you can browse and get ideas. That’s not so easy on the internet.

Whimsy

A Wee Trip

A week or so ago I decided that I would take a wee trip on Wednesday to Glasgow to see a friend for a few days. That involved an 0500 start. Why is it that for the previous two mornings I had been up well before 0600 but on the morning that I had to get up I didn't really want to? That's a rhetorical question (complete with ?) but it is always thus. Mind you the second I'm up I'm good and raring to go. I decided that I would go on deck for the leaving of the ferry, MV Loch Seaforth, from Stornoway's No 3 Pier. It was a cold but pleasant morning.

A few people have suggested that they would like to see more of the Island upon which I live so this summer I shall try and do more posts of the Islands. This is a start showing the town of Stornoway as we sail out of the harbour.

A few of the landmarks

MV Isle of Lewis berthed at No 1 Pier
We have three ferries here at the moment. I'l post about why on another occasion. 

Part of the South Beach Quay with the Lews Castle Grounds as a backdrop.
No 2 Pier is used for the fuel delivery ships and 40 years ago was covered, in season, with barrels being filled with salt herring.

The long-closed Caledonian Hotel where, back in the 70s, friends and I gathered on a Friday evening.
The first night I ever stayed on the Island was spent in the bedroom with the window second from the left on the top floor.

The old Harbour Master's Watchroom. The door behind the white van also led decades ago to the chair of John the Barber.

The Stornoway Town Hall. No longer used as a proper town hall but still a civic building.
The Stornoway Town Council met in the Council Chamber on the right of the building on the first floor.
It was in a committee room on the first floor to the right of the main entrance that I was offered the job that brought me to the Island.

MV Isle of Lewis with the recently renovated and restored Lews Castle. 

Lews Castle. At the top right of the picture can be seen the top of the Stornoway War Memorial

The Harris Hills

On my way into town (Stornoway) I have to cross the peninsula on which I live. 

At the highest point of the road across the moor one has a clear view of the hills of the Isle of Harris. I should, of course, have said that one sometimes has a clear view of the hills of the Isle of Harris. It has been know to rain on occasion obscuring them or at least interfering with the 33km or thereby between me and the hills you can see in the photo (somewhere round the end of the yellow line).

One day I shall do a post on peat cutting. In the foreground is one of the very few, perhaps the only, peat bank being cut on the Lower Bayble Common Grazings this year. When I arrived here four decades ago there would have been many dozens: most active crofts in the townships would have had a bank. 

This was the view a week or so ago: