Tag: food

  • Desmond’s mince pies

    Desmond’s mince pies

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    Kate Davies Designs
    in ,

    For many years, I’ve had a quiet obsession with riciarelli, which I first came across, flavoured with orange flower water, in Betty’s tea rooms in York. Betty’s only seem to sell these wee macaroon-y treats in Spring for some reason, so I had to persuade Tom (who does not need much persuading where baking is…

  • Garden beginnings

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    One of the things that drew us to this house was the fact that it had a garden. Or rather, it came with a nice big blank expanse of lawn that might one day become a garden. I’m not too keen on lawn, but I’ve always liked growing vegetables, and was excited by the prospect…

  • you say “potato” . . .

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Hiya! It is I, Bruce. Today I am here to tell you about a delicious and intriguing object: the POTATO. Also known as “tattie” or “spud”, and, often (for some mystifying reason) prefixed with the adjective “humble”, the POTATO is one of my all-time favourite foods. Together with other wondrous food-objects (for example, CHICKEN, SAUSAGES…

  • thyme and taleggio scones

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    Kate Davies Designs
    in

    Neither Tom or I are fond of food shopping, yet for some unknown reason we have never ordered our supplies online using one of the many delivery services now available. I finally tried this the other day, and of course made the mistake of failing to adjust the default units under which some items are…

  • a few days in Cartmel

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    Kate Davies Designs
    in

    A pretty Cumbrian village . . . . . . festive windows . . . . . . and doors. Ben, the friendly cat . . . A fine local food market . . . And a wonderful birthday meal. In case you are wondering, the food at L’Enclume was just as amazing as you…

  • nutz

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    Kate Davies Designs
    in

    There is no getting away from the fact that I’ve had a rough few days. Please try not to have a stroke, people: the long term health implications of it are really bloody annoying. Sometimes the process of recovery itself can add further problems to the myriad medical issues that follow a brain injury, and…

  • thought for the day

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    Kate Davies Designs
    in

    I was after a needlecase, and found a nice old one on ebay. I always like it when these things contain their original threads and notions. But what really drew me to this particular case was its prim little maxim: These lines are conventional, and may appear elsewhere, but I know them from William King’s…

  • kvikk lunsj

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    When Martha Joy left a comment comparing Tantallon‘s colour scheme to the wrapping of a Norweigan chocolate bar, I was intrigued. I just had to see it for myself. We agreed to a little exchange, and she kindly sent me a couple of kvikk lunsj in return for a taste of one of Scotland’s finest…

  • happy tortoise and hare day!

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    The tortoise and the hare is finished! I am pleased with it! I am not ashamed to admit that I had foolish ideas about an appropriate photo location, for which I blame a poster I saw a while ago advertising the LMS railway. The poster was from the 1920s, and like many of this era,…

  • Gie her a haggis

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    I’ve been marking Burns-themed exam scripts today, so this evening’s supper feels quite timely. This particularly sonsie incarnation comes from Crombies. May I heartily recommend the ‘great chieftan o the puddin race’ to those of you on the other side of the Atlantic who have been denied the pleasures of Scottish offal for the past…

  • twenty two

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Cake time! Well, not quite yet: time, rather to apply the marzipan . . . then icing. The smell when we unwrapped the greaseproof paper was utterly delicious.

  • help me to win an egg cup

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Clearly I have gone blog-post-crazy today, but I just noticed from my all-seeing ‘blog stats’ page that some lovely person (who? who are you?) has nominated me for a Dorset Cereals blog award. Now, generally, I don’t pay much attention to such things, but I like Dorset Cereals and this award involves some homely merchandise…

  • mead magic

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    Last summer, when we were walking on Jura, we buried some home-brewed mead above the gulf of corryvreckan. Yesterday we retraced our steps, and returned to find it. I heart Jura. Seven miles and a very enjoyable walk later, we climbed up a cliffside on the remote and empty north-west of the island and wondered…

  • York Craft Tour

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    (Felix in Duttons). I am busy. I do not find long working days particularly good for either body or soul. During periods of insane activity, one must always find a little time to spend in the restorative presence of friends, and it was great to meet up with Felix the other day. We spent a…

  • eggsacting

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    We were excited. My Ma had given us a basket of treats, chief among which were some KAKE BRAND moulds, exactly the same as those we had when I was a kid. She found them on ebay (where she finds everything), complete with their original foil wrappings and instructions. I cleaned the moulds. Tom was…

  • piccalilli

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    Kate Davies Designs
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    While Tom made piccalilli, I thought about pickles in Rushdie and Arundhati Roy, and then spent a happy couple of hours investigating the condiment’s eighteenth-century origins. The earliest instance I could find of a recipe resembling what we now know as piccalilli, was in the 1768 edition of Hannah Glasse’s Art of Cookery, where it…