Great Recipes for Steak Pie, Clootie Dumpling,A Grand Day Out and Life

A visit to Glasgow and Ayrshire yesterday brought insights into all of the above. A local butcher revealed that he was being asked questions about how to make a good steak pie from a young butcher - and the answer? Just do it and learn from the experience. It takes time. The meat, the gravy and the pastry are all key that is what makes it a winning combination. Talk to a master by all means but you have to work at it yourself was his answer to the young butcher.

Dumpling and a Grand Day Out? It was my mother's birthday and previous years have seen us enjoying wonderful sunny and warm weather in September in lovely locations as a birthday treat. Yesterday was grey with incessant rain and we began with a cup of tea to sample my less than perfect looking clootie dumpling -burnt on the bottom - it tasted fine to my relief. Further lessons needed from the master dumpling maker on amount of milk, gas setting and on both the type and tieing of the cloth or cloot! We had an errand to do at Croy Shore a beautiful location with views out to Arran. Leaving Glasgow we decided to 'just imagine sunshine' and yes, the rain stopped and there was some brightness in the sky in Ayrshire.

The Grand Day Out? An outline plan with no set times, relaxed, low key, doing things we love in places we love with people we love. After Croy, the fishing village of Dunure appeared through the mist and we sampled a coffee at the refurbished Dunure Inn, watching a wee boat arrive back in harbour. A lovely location, lovingly looked after by the Harbour Committee who have done a lot of great work there. Back home , completing a couple of errands on the way for a simple meal of things we love - yes steak pie did feature and yet another piece of dumpling!

Things in common in the recipes? Find a msster, listen, watch but most of all 'do' and learn. Do things that bring you joy,with people you love in a combination that you know works. Whatever the weather or the environment, somewhere there is a glimmer of light and if not 'just imagine it' Have a purpose or focusand take time to listen and be with a master and to appreciate them but do, do, do and be. be. be. Create your own recipes.