Simple Sundays - Halloween and Bikes.

A very non spooky Halloween indeed.

I absolutely love the holidays. I'm a huge sucker for decorating and dressing up. I love buying presents at Christmas and decorating the tree; it's a tradition my mum saves for me coming home. I like to buy pretty easter eggs at easter and I love to dress up at Halloween.
This year I didn't dress up. Not even the tiniest of halloween extras. Fair to say I was pretty gloomy about that. I considered hosting a little party in the flat, but trying to get people to come up to Dundee has always been a bit of an issue. Unfortunately I didn't know anyone who was having a party either.

I wasn't alone though! A late night text to my friend on Thursday turned into a lovely little spontaneous trip to visit me on Friday night. I've found since living here that not a lot of people come to visit, it's usually me going to them, so it was a nice change to have someone up here.
In true Fiona and Cassie fashion we made some dinner, chatted about a lot of nothing and after playing some terrible game on the Playstation made a Skype call to our third musketeer in Australia.
The next morning Fiona helped me buy my 'first adult bike'. Now that the nights are getting darker I feel less safe walking home from work. I haven't had a bike since I was back in primary school, and I honestly can't remember the last time I rode one. Must be about the same time!
What they say is true, you really never forget.
My next step is to buy a helmet. I've had this weird fear of helmets since I was very little. My mum bought me this excellent Winnie the Pooh helmet, but one of the first times I tried it on she managed to catch the skin under my chin in the clip. She did it a few times actually, and every time there was a lot of crying and panicking. To this day I put my hand under the clip and keep it loose before I pull it secure. I'd like to point out that it was always an accident! My mum didn't have some weird mission to make me fear helmets for the rest of my childhood!

Today I'm looking over all these odd random little videos I've managed to accumulate over the past few weeks and am considering what to do with them…

Hope Everyone is having a nice weekend.

I seem to be getting exceedingly more excited with every holiday we have. Halloween last year I was a little bit enthusiastic and this year that grew and I was even worse!

(This is not taking into account christmas, which I adore at home and look forward to every year.)

I got to celebrate Halloween twice this year. Once in my hometown on Glasgow and the other in my house in Dundee. 

Halloween in Glasgow was amazing. It was really fun to see my friends from back home, we had such a blast catching up and dancing. I usually don't like dancing at clubs, it's not really my type of night out, but it's always fun when you decide to just let loose and not care that you can't dance. Which I can't, however hard I may try. 

In Dundee we decided to have a party at our flat to celebrate instead of going out, simply because it's less hassle and we get to remain warm and stress free! 

It was incredibly fun this year, our party was really busy and lively. The costumes really were fabulous, some had gone above and beyond to impress! 

I decided to dress up as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz as a sort of last resort idea. I ordered it in plenty of time, which is quite unusual for me, and bought all of the little bits and pieces I needed. It was nice to avoid the last minute panic trying to find a costume! I might try to do this in future! 

This is a picture of me at the party this year versus the costume I had last year when I decided to go as a mouse. I thought it would be fun to compare the two nights! 

I really liked my costume this year. 

In an attempt to make our flat spooky we put up a few decorations around the place.

We have a downstairs den that is already quite spooky and dark, so we decided the main party should be held down there. Louisa and I put a trail of bats and some cobwebs leading down the stairs. 

There was also the obligatory craved pumpkin! We carved 3 this year but I only have a picture of the one I did, which I then made into a bowl for the sweets.

Hope you all had a fantastic Halloween! 

xcx

Hey guys! Today it's been raining pretty hard in Scotland (when is it never?) so most of my afternoon has been spent cooking and being cosy. 

As halloween is nearing I thought it would be fun to decorate my room a little bit to try and get myself in the Halloween mood. I cut out little bats and stuck them on my wall and I think they turned out really nice! I saw the idea here! 

I also bought some super comfy socks yesterday in preparation for the cold. They are so comfortable that I even wear them over my jeans! 

This is what I made on my rainy day. 

What you need: 

450g/1lb pork OR 350g/.7lb of lamb

3 tbsp of soy sauce

1 tbsp cornflour

250ml/9fl oz of hot chicken stock

2 leeks

2 cloves of garlic

2.5cm/1inch of root ginger

100g/4oz of unsalted cashew nuts

salt and black pepper

I got the recipe from one of my mums old cook books that I technically stole from her and took to university with me. Don't worry, she doesn't use it much anymore! The book is called 'Warming Winter Favourites' and I think it was part of a collection. The recipe adds in 100g of button mushrooms for those who are a fan, however, I am not so I chose to leave them out.

For the stock I used a stock cube in boiling water and although the original recipe suggests pork I decided to use lamb. I like lamb better.

Note to self:

As much as I liked this I think the sauce could have done with an extra something. I personally would have added a little bit of chilli or something to give that little extra bite. In saying that, I still enjoyed it.

Step 1.
Cut the lamb up and set it aside for later. I chose to cut the lamb into cubes for this, but I was given stewing lamb on my online shop instead of pre-diced lamb. The choice is yours!
In a bowl mix together the soy sauce, cornflour and stir in the stock.

Step 2. 

Cut up the leek into thin slices. Peel, crush and chop up the garlic. Peel and grate the ginger.

Heat oil in a large pan until it is medium high (hot but not smoking)

Step 3. 

Add cashew nuts to the pan and stir-fry until golden. Remove them from pan and set aside on some kitchen paper to drain.

Step 4.

Add a little more oil to the pan and start to cook your lamb (or pork). Stir-fry for 3-4 minutes, or until it is no longer pink. Remove from the pan and set aside. 

Step 5.
Add the leeks to the pan and stir-fry for 1 minute, then add the garlic and ginger. stir-fry for a further 2-3 minutes.

Step 6. 
Return the lamb(or pork) to the pan and add in the soy sauce and cornflour mixture. Bring it all to the boil and then simmer for about 2-3 minutes, whilst stirring, until the lamb is super hot. Add cashews and season!

xcx