Food, glorious food!

Morning everyone,
Happy 4th July to everyone across the pond.  Enjoy your celebrations.

We have our national day here on the Isle of Man tomorrow - Tynwald Day.  Not having been on the island that long, I don't really know that much about it.  Apparently the members of the Manx Parliment (Tynwald) gather for an open air ceremony which dates back over 1000 years.  During the ceremony all the laws enacted by parliment over the last year are read out in English, and Gaelic, to have them confirmed.  This all takes place on Tynwald Hill  in St. John's.  There's also a fair with stalls and entertainment going on all day.  It's a huge event.  There is a Wikki page here if anyone would like to know more, or you can go to the official Tynwald page here.  Let's hope the weather is kind, last year it rained on everything.
It's actually a  bank holiday for us too, and together with our Jubilee bank holiday, which the IOM are taking on Friday, we have a lovely long weekend to look forward to.

There always seems to be something going on somewhere on the island.  I mentioned that it was the Queenie Festival last weekend.  We bobbed down there for a while on Sunday afternoon.
It was held down on the quayside in Port St Mary and there was loads of stuff going on.  Live music, art and crafts stalls, touch tanks full of marine life, lots of local produce, boat trips and of course lots of queenies.  We had lunch down there .....

This was mine - queenies deep fried in batter on a fresh green salad with a huge dollop of tartare sauce - yum!!
As always we spent most of our time around the food stalls, we love seafood.  Spent far too much on fresh fish, then we went in to watch one of the Chef demonstrations.  What this guy couldn't do with a queenie, well!  We saw local chef Steve Quirke, from the Ticket Hall down in Douglas http://www.ticket-hall.com/,
put together a Bento box filled with different queenie dishes.  Here it is all finished and ready to eat ....

looks good doesn't it .......  we were on the front row, so we got to taste it.  Now I don't normally eat a lot of queenies but this was delicious, and the recipes were so simple.  The hardest thing to make would be the sushi, everything else was done in minutes.  Might just have to give this a go.

Anyway, enough about the island, although ...... there's a European Food and Craft Fair starts today, and goes through until Saturday, down on the seafront prom in Douglas.  I shall be paying them a visit later on.
I know - Food again!! I'm going to be the size of a small house soon!

I do need to find some time to spend in the craft room though.  Look what my wonderful hubby just got for me .... THE book!  The die is one of my little ebay purchases that also arrived this morning - bonus!

I'm so excited.  I've waited so long for this book.  It's my own fault, I ordered it from QVC back in January/February when it was the TSV.  But because of all the who-ha that went with it, I ended up cancelling the order.  Well, they took orders for the item when it wasn't even in stock, telling people they would be the first in the UK to get a copy, as it was 'on it's way'.  Weeks later, it still hadn't arrived, by which time the book had started appearing in craft shops all over, (and it was cheaper!).  Still QVC were doing nothing about it.  I was not a happy bunny, and I wasn't the only one.  I believe quite a few people cancelled orders.  Anyway, I just never got around to ordering another copy.  But I have it now.  So guess what I'm doing for the rest of today. Housework is going to have to wait!

Have a lovely Wednesday everyone,

Linda

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