West End Festival 2013

by Roz

The West End Festival kicks off today and runs until 30th June.  I'm always amazed at the sheer number of events that are scheduled literally on my doorstep.  This is the 18th year of the festival and according to the official programme there are over 400 events!  Here's a few of the events that take my fancy for this year.

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Mardi Gras Parade - Sunday 9th June

The parade returns this year, starting at The Botanic Gardens at 3pm, the whole of Byres Road is closed and the street turns into party central!  There are food and drink stalls, entertainment and the parade complete with samba bands.  Awesome, fingers crossed the sun shines :)

Walk with me

There are over 20 different walks, most of them are free and so many of them sound interesting.  Erm does that make me officially old??  Most of them are linked to the architecture or history of a certain part of the West End, I'm sure that the Greek Thomson walk on Wednesday 12 June will be very popular given the beautiful buildings Glasgow has thanks to Alexander Thomson and of course the Greek Steps.

Red Raw at The Stand

Every Tuesday is newbies night at The Stand comedy club and £2 buys you a good few hours of entertainment from around 6-8 comedians.  Brilliant.  Although not unique to the festival, we only discovered how good this night can be at last year's West End festival so newbies night always reminds me of the festival.

Bard in the Botanics

I cannot recommend these events strongly enough.  We went to see The Merchant of Venice a number of years ago and it was excellent and then last year we went to see Romeo and Juliet which was so fantastic.  I love live theatre and have been to a number of plays but our experience of Romeo and Juliet will forever be one of my favourites, the cast were fantastic, the modern music set to the age old story and being literally in the middle of the action.  Go see this, you will not regret it!  This year's performances are Othello which runs from 19th - 29th June (during the festival) Much Ado about Nothing 12th - 27th July and Julius Caesar 11th - 27th July.

Outdoor cinema

The Grosvenor cinema is hosting two special 'Bring Your Own Seat Cinema' nights on Friday 21st and Friday 28th of June.  The venue has not yet been revealed but the idea, as the name suggests, is for the audience to bring their own seats to watch a classic movie.  Tickets cost just £1 with all proceeds going to Yorkhill Children's Hospital, a fantastic local charity.  The movies have not yet been selected, so get over to the Grosvenor's Facebook page to vote for the one's you want to see!

Okay I'm going to stop there as I could add many more items to this list, there are so many brilliant events on, I can't wait for it to kick off :)

Roz xx

Film Geek

by Roz

Last week I found out that my local Blockbuster was closing down and it made me sad.  I posted on twitter about the store closing and a number of people seemed bemused that I still used the store.  I love films.  I don't really watch much tv, I'd rather read a book or listen to music, and I've never had Sky / Virgin Media* in any of the houses I've lived in but I do love a good film.

Source: notebooksandbrokenstrings.tumblr.com via rozzystar on Pinterest

Our local Blockbuster is pretty much at the bottom of our street and we've always used it, never switching to dvd rental by post.  I guess I've always enjoyed browsing for the film that best suits my mood and liking the instant gratification of taking it home to watch straight away.  We also went through a phase of using our Tesco vouchers to buy tokens for dvd rentals, which meant that it was free to rent movies, bliss.

I really would be at a loss to try and work out how many films I've watched over the years.  Bex has listed the ones she has watched on IMDB but I started and realised that it would take forever and I would never truly remember what I would rate the film if I had actually watched it years ago.  Writing this I'm trying to decide what my favourite film is.....and I'm struggling!  It's almost as hard as the AOW #Bookswap questionnaire!  I'm going to give it some thought but may be a while...

As a result of Blockbuster closing they are selling ALL of their stock.  All pre-owned DVDs are 68p, it's crazy!  I've bought Horrible Bosses - Jennifer Aniston's character reminds me of Bex!!!!  Hahahaha joking ;) - One Day, Ps I Love You (even though the book is much better than the film), Entourage Series 1...and who knows what else before the store closes next week.  B is not quite as enthusiastic as me at all the new dvds I'm bringing home but please tell me some of your must watch films and I will go and get them whilst they are such a bargain.

We do now also have Netflix in our flat, originally getting it over a year ago just to use the free trial!  At £6 a month we have found it really good value and in addition to the movies we have watched (it's not all totally out of date films, I watched Drive with the gorgeous Mr Gosling for the first time on Netflix and I have also recently watched The Hunger Games) I love the tv series'.  Now I know that's contradicting my statement above, but when you have a whole series at your fingertips it makes tv viewing more appealing.  I have watched and loved Modern Family, Gossip Girl, Breaking Bad, The Killing, Damages, Prison Break and more recently have started watching Dawson's Creek and have realised how bad the dress sense was in that show!

Source: weheartit.com via rozzystar on Pinterest

Will anyone else out there miss Blockbuster?

Roz xx 

* if we had Sky I would literally lose my husband to the world of televised sport!  It's bad enough as it is, he watches golf, football, snooker, darts....

[Bex here, just a wee note to let you all know I'm guest posting today over on my lovely friend Sarah's blog, Glasgow Mummy!  Read all about my (unfortunately rather disappointing) experience at the Marriott spa day I reviewed for her... Olive Dragonfly hits the spa!]

#PinItDoIt challenge: Cheese, zucchini and buttermilk herb bread

This #PinitDoit was sent in by one of our lovely readers Amanda and it looks so good I think I might have to give it a go myself!  Thanks for sending it in :)  And please keep your submissions coming we really love reading them and sharing them with everyone.

Cheese, zucchini and buttermilk herb bread

As soon as I saw this cheese-buttermilk-herb bread on pinterest I knew I was going to give it a try. I pin a lot of things, but more often than not the ones that I manage to actually turn into reality are recipes.  Can you tell I love to be in the kitchen?  

Last week I made a chocolate cake that required buttermilk, but the supermarket was out of the 0.5L cartons that I normally get so I ended up with one full liter of buttermilk and I have been wondering what I was going to do with all of it. The Dutch love to drink buttermilk as it is, and we all try things for the sake of cultural immersion, but that’s just something I just haven’t been able to pull. So I saw this as a perfect opportunity to get myself to the kitchen and give a try to the cheese, olive and buttermilk herb bread I had pinned a few days ago.

I have to say I did not have some of the ingredients that the recipe called for. I replaced the Parmesan + Cheddar with Gouda, spring onions with finely chopped shallots, and parsley with Provençal herbs mix. I also left the olives out and used zucchini instead. I simply grated a zucchini, let it sit in a strainer with a little bit of salt for about 20 minutes and then “pushed” the water out of it with a fork. I didn’t have dry mustard powder (nor have I ever seen it so I just omitted it).

Source: sugareverythingnice.blogspot.com via Poppies on Pinterest

Recipe at : http://sugareverythingnice.blogspot.nl/2011/03/cheese-olive-and-buttermilk-herbbread.html

The recipe is quite easy and straightforward: it’s one of those where you sift together the dry, mix the wet, then put both together, pour it in a pan, toss it in the oven and wait for the magic to happen. I was a just a tiny bit afraid my experiment *might* not work out as I substituted quite a few ingredients with what I found in the fridge, but the results were amazing.

This bread is moist, tender and full of flavour. I can imagine enjoying it with healthy spreads like hummus or toasted and eaten with a delicious veggie soup, like Bex’s carrot and cumin cream, which is scrumptious (and one of our favourites, so thanks for that).

To send in your own #PinItDoIt, just click on the badge below for details...

Young and Beautiful

by Roz

A few weeks ago Lauren and I went to see Lana Del Rey in concert at the SECC.  I was pretty excited about going as I'd only booked the tickets a few weeks before the gig when the venue was changed from the O2 Academy due to the demand for the tickets.  As I previously mentioned I've wanted to hear Lana sing live for a while and was pretty excited to see her support act Kassidy too.

The weather had been so bizarre that week but it was sunny (yet freezing!) on the night of the concert, so we popped some colourful dresses on and had a few bottles of Rekorderlig Mango and Raspberry cider at mine whilst munching on homemade mac 'n cheese :)  If you haven't tried the cider I highly recommend it, it's very gluggable and not too sweet like so many of the flavoured ciders.  Here we are posing in the hall, apologies for the quality of the photos through out, I just had my iphone with me.

We may have also enjoyed a cider at the gig!  But only one as our spot in the crowd was close to the front and not worth risking a trip to the bar to lose it.

Kassidy came on at 8pm and played 5 or 6 songs and had some great banter with the crowd!  You could tell they were really happy to be back in Glasgow and I really enjoyed their set, they were honestly even better than I remembered and I have got back into their music and have since downloaded their mini album People Like Me.  If you've never heard of them then click the link and have a listen, especially Gambler does the Gambler which is one of my faves.

Lana came on about 15 mins after Kassidy left the stage and was on stage for about an hour and a half - set list below.  I liked her voice live and thought that the simple stage set up helped ensure it was her vocals that remained the focus of the gig.  Whilst she wasn't overly chatty with the crowd, she did thank her fans a number of times and express her love for Glasgow and her man!  I have also decided that Lana is very gorgeous in real life :)

Lana came down off the stage a number of times during the gig and spent a good 10-15mins at the end of her set to sign autographs and chat to the crowd, which I thought was really nice.  She didn't do an encore though or really say goodbye properly which was a bit disappointing.

The crowd kept moving forward at different points in the night, so by the end of the gig we were very close to the front.  Lauren managed to get a copy of the set list from one of Lana's band (Bryon Thomas the pianist) who was happily chatting away to the crowd as they were clearing up the set.

And here is a close up of the set list.  I really like her song on the Great Gatsby soundtrack, Young and Beautiful, so was happy to hear her sing it live.  One thing we did find funny was how young the crowd was.  I'm not sure many of them knew that Blue Velvet wasn't one of Lana's originals and at the concert after Blue Velvet she sang some of Knockin on Heaven's Door...none of the crowd joined in!  Except Lauren and me :)

I do love going to gigs, I just wish I had the money and time to go see live music every week!  This gig was definitely worth the ticket price.  Thanks for coming with me Lauren it was fun :)

Roz xx

Still Alive ;)

So it seems a few weekends away (3 out of the last 4!) have taken their toll and as much as I'm dying to write about what I've been up to, I just don't feel like writing at the moment so I haven't (in case you didn't notice!)  I thought I would use this long weekend to get back into it as I have some new outfits I want to share, some recipes and I'm excited to fill you in on the shenanigan's at Amy's fabulous wedding!!  I have been actually been up to lots of other things instead, oops!

On Friday I headed through to Edinburgh after work with Diana to meet up with Roz and Claire for an evening at Edinburgh Zoo!  We had SO much fun (baby monkeys!!) but Roz will be filling you all in on that soon!  ;)

On Saturday, I baked lemon, blueberry & poppyseed muffins and Nik and I enjoyed the sunshine at a restaurant in the west end with outside seating (until it got too chilly and we went inside to eat).  It's been lovely to have a weekend at home together with both of us being off and with no specific plans so we could just relax and go with the flow for a change.  We had thought we'd go to see The Great Gatsby but since the weather was so nice we thought it was a shame to be cooped up inside a dark cinema.

Sunday wasn't as sunny so we had a nice long lie and a relaxing day in getting a few little jobs done and I finally got a lot further on a project I started waaaay back in 2009 as Mahj can attest to.  I love food magazines and decided to cut out all my favourite recipes and organise them to save space and make it easier to find my favourite recipes rather than have a huge bundle of torn out pages or piles of magazines to search through.  The problem is, I love tearing out the pages, trimming the recipes and organising them into categories (yes I am a huge geek!), but I'm not so keen on the sticking and gluing.  It's always going to be an ongoing process as I've bought 2 big files to put them all into and will always be picking up more supermarket magazines, etc with recipes in.  I just need to get this big pile I already have sorted out.

Today, I am baking again for bake club tonight!  The theme this time is Scottish and I'm making Gypsy Creams from my book, Great Scot.  It's back to raining again so it's a day for being cosy inside and watching a couple of films while carrying on with some of the crafts I've been meaning to get on with as well.  I've finally got time to make the prizes for Katy W who won our 500th post giveaway!

I've also been making lots more smoothies which I will blog about soon and am doing pretty good at keeping up the healthy eating, although not so good at the exercise!  I haven't read a book for a while now either, much like the writing, I haven't been in the mood and am finding it difficult to concentrate. I'm hoping my new book by Harlen Coben (one of my favourite authors) will grab me and get me back into reading again.

In love with an appliquéd dress

I wasn't even looking for a dress.  I walked past Coast and this dress actually caught my eye from the back of the shop!  I doubled back to have a closer look and immediately wanted to try it on.

I wasn't convinced the nude colour would work with my pasty skin but I actually think it looks quite good on!  I tweeted a picture and it was my most liked instagram ever so you obviously agree!  It also goes pretty perfectly with my vintage pearl and marcasite earrings (which I just happened to be wearing) I bought in Portobello when I was down in London for the very first Any Other Party!

Source: coast-stores.com via Bex @OliveDragonfly on Pinterest

I love the gorgeous appliqué detail in ombre pink against the nude dress with the cinched in waist.  Absolutely love it!  I think it's so different to anything I own, I'd find it strange to not wear a necklace as you know I love my accessories!  I don't think I own any nude clothing, I usually go for dark or bright colours so this is totally justifiable, yes?

Unfortunately it's a pricey £150 and I have no reason to buy it at the moment (although it could be very lovely for a July wedding reception in the Royal Opera House!)  I was in two minds whether to blog about it in case you all rush out to buy it as I'm waiting to see if a discount code comes up soon.  I hope it doesn't sell out!!  ;)

Don't stop me now!

by Roz

This blog post was originally going to be called 'It's all about the music' but I decided that was a bit naff, so thought I would name it after one of my favourite songs.  Music is such a massive part of my life, sadly I don't actually play any musical instruments, but for as long as I can remember songs are intertwined with my memories.

I love so many different types of music and I'm not ashamed of any of the bands or songs I like!  I thought I'd share a few with you all for a laugh and please let me know if these songs remind you of anything :)

Seal - Kiss from a Rose (are you all singing it in your head or is that just me??).  This song instantly transports me back to being 13 and 'camping out' in our back garden. This simply involved sleeping in a tent with friends instead of sleeping in the house! 

R Kelly - Bump n' Grind.  From a similar time as Kiss from a Rose, I can't listen to this and not cringe at the silver lycra mini dress I used to wear to the unders' disco!

ODB - Got Your Money. I've not heard this in forever, but writing this post made me think of my music memories and this song is all about student nights with my wonderful flatmates in the Garage nightclub.

Queen - Don't stop me now.

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Please someone buy me this comic / artwork, it's amazing! 



This song brings so many memories, countless nights out dancing with friends and singing at the top of my lungs.  We also had this song to walk back up the aisle after we got married (and as our second dance song).  I find it impossible not to smile when I hear this song.  Oh to have seen Freddie live.

Kylie - Spinning Around.  Bam I'm on holiday with B in Tenerife (wishing my ass could rock a pair of gold hotpants like that!!).

The Killers - Somebody Told Me.  I remember exactly where I was when I heard this song for the first time on the radio.  I was doing a stock count by myself for the first time in a massive warehouse full of blokes and everything was going wrong.  I wrote in my notes that I needed to google The Killers when I got home....they are now one of my favourite bands and I've seen them / Brandon live so many times.

T-Rex - I Love to Boogie.  I'm a little kid dancing on my dad's feet round the kitchen :)

When I get home from a stressful day at work, the first thing I do when I get home is put on our Sonos and pick an artist or album that I want to listen to and nine times out of ten the music will cheer me up.  It's amazing.  If you tried to make me pick between music and books I honestly don't know what I would do!  But you can take my tv any day of the week.

Lauren and I are off to see Lana Del Rey at the SECC tonight (anyone else going?).  I just missed her gig in the Oran Mor in November 2011 which I was disappointed about and although her Born to Die album has been out for a long time, I am still looking forward to hearing what she sounds like live.  As a very welcome bonus, Kassidy are her support act (Lana is dating one of the lead singers Barrie-James O'Neill).  I saw Kassidy play live at a small charity gig in December 2011, having never heard of them before, and have followed their music with interest.  I'm not sure I would buy a ticket just to see them but I'm happy to hear them live again and this gig might just change my mind for the future!

The main dilemma for the concert is what to wear...not in the usual 'urgh I have nothing to wear' way but the concert is standing only and in my experience the hall gets very hot.  Thanks to the lovely spring weather we currently have in Glasgow, we will need our winter coats to get to the gig!  B never let's me live down the fact that I fainted at a Killers concert in the SECC (as a result of said sweltering conditions!).  We were about 5 rows from the front, right in the middle of the stage and I properly fell to the ground fainted.  Two security guards actually climbed over the barriers to lift me up, towards the stage, as the Killers walked on.  I'd love to say this story has a brilliant ending, like me getting to meet Brandon and the guys backstage, but in reality I got to miss the first 3 songs as they wouldn't let me out of the first aid tent!!  Lauren I promise not to faint tonight...

I'll leave you with a song from an artist that I would love to see live, I am Foxes and their single Youth.  You can check them out at a small gig in the Hoxton in London on 30th July, I would love to go but can't justify the expense of a trip to London.  This song is actually the first song I ever Shazam-ed, it's from a rather fabulous tv series set in New York, any guesses peeps??




Roz xx

What Bex is wearing to the wedding in the woods!! ;)

I had planned on making my dress out of the dragonfly fabric I printed by now but sadly life has intervened and I haven't had the time, courage (I'm scared I'll mess it up!) or inclination to do it yet!

What's a stressed out girl to do?  Go shopping!  A bit of retail therapy was in order this week and I found a couple of dresses I like.  I think my mind is pretty much made up but feel free to give me your opinions below!  (I'll see if you all pick the same one as me!)  Nothing like leaving it to the last minute, eh?!

Option 1 - red flared wrap dress, black wedges/wellies, leopard print belt, beige & red clutch, gold accessories.  (Also the dress is called Bella so the lovely Bella shall be even more there in spirit!  Oh and I wish I had that gorgeous Astley Clarke dragonfly pendant!)

Red dress by olivedragonfly featuring shiny boots

Hunter shiny boots / Faith colorblock handbag / leopard belt / Phase Eight - Bella Fit And Flare Dress

Option 2 - olive green maxi dress, black wedges/wellies, gold necklace (long to dress it down a bit and make it more festivally - does it all look too bridesmaidy?  Any other ideas to make it more casual?), peridot ring, black clutch, possibly cute crystal headband I bought last week to hippy it up a bit since this is Amy's wedding! :)

Green Maxi outfit by olivedragonfly featuring platform sandals

Alexon evening dress / Hunter knee length boots  / Accessorize gold pendant / Accessorize heart drop earrings / Anthropologie headband

Option 3 - Black & white stripe dress (I haven't received this yet and actually don't think the skirt shape will suit me but I LOVE IT so want to try it on and none of the stores here have it in stock!), black wedges/wellies, silver accessories, red clutch (don't have this either and the one I've chosen on polyvore is just me dreaming!).  I think this one might be a bit too smart for a woodland wedding?

Stripe wedding outfit by olivedragonfly featuring pendant jewelry

Phase Eight wrap dress / Hunter fitness shoes / Oscar de la Renta , £1,040 / Tiffany & Co. pendant jewelry / 

Incidentally I haven't got black wellies yet either so if anyone can lend me a size 7 or 8 please let me know!  I will probably be hunting down a pair in town tonight as I am actually working this Thursday for once, typical.  (And they're not my wedges, mine were Topshop ones I got for £5 off ebay when I was a student but they're similar-ish!)

So, what do you think?  Which option do you like best??

Buttermilk & Blueberry Smoothie (Pin It Do It)

We don't have a Pin It Do It for today but this is one you might like to Pin and do yourself!?  I highly recommend it!

I'm trying to be healthier again.  It's been over a year since I started trying to lose weight and get healthier with a new lifestyle of more exercise and a better diet.  I kept up the exercise for 6 months and lost over a stone but I soon lost my momentum after returning from Italy as we came into winter.  I've tried to keep up the better diet but have been naughty on a few too many occasions and my weight has crept back up to what it was!  I don't feel as sluggish as I had been when I started though and don't think I look as overweight as I did before I started, probably because I did do a lot of exercise for so long.

Unfortunately winter doesn't seem to be over yet with multiple hail showers on Monday (the instagram photos below were all taken on the same day)!

11am - hail storm, 12pm - glorious sunshine

2.30pm - hail again, 4pm - bit of both!

I've been finding it difficult to motivate myself to walk to work, not knowing when I might get drenched!  I have been trying to be a bit more conscious of my diet again though as I've been guilty of becoming lazy again.  All too easy when life gets stressful and busy!  I really enjoyed my diet last year and found if I was organised it was very easy to stick to.  It wasn't a 'diet', just healthy, sensible eating with plenty of salads, fresh fruit and healthy home cooked meals.  I love salads and never got bored or cut anything out, cake was still on the menu!  It was just a case of having the time to get to the shops regularly and making the effort to prepare things so I wasn't eating fatty convenience foods and snacking on naughty things all the time.

Anyway, I am determined to get there and have recently found a few delicious sounding, healthy recipes when sorting old food magazines.  Below is one for a smoothie I made the other day which is lovely and very low fat!  It was in an old Waitrose LOVE life magazine.

I know smoothies aren't always the best option due to the high natural sugar content but I feel I need a boost at the moment as I've been suffering from a terrible cough and cold for over a week now and the above mentioned stress and busy lifestyle are definitely causing me to become a bit rundown.

Ingredients:
2 small bananas
190g blueberries (I used frozen as they were cheaper as not in season yet)
284ml carton buttermilk
handful of ice (I used 4 cubes)

Method:
Place everything in a blender and whizz until smooth.

Apparently this serves 2 but I split it into 3 portions of around 250ml (one shown in glass)
so the nutritional information works out per serving as:
105 calories
4.1g protein
20.6g carbohydrate
18.3g sugars
0.7g fat
0.3g saturated fat
1.3g fibre
0.1g salt

Street Food Tour - Seoul, South Korea

We booked a walking food tour on our third day in Seoul as we had visited a food market ourselves and been a little apprehensive to try many things as we found it difficult to know what was what.  (The trotters and pig's heads were obvious!)

We started the day with breakfast in a bakery just next to our hotel, Paris Baguette.  They have this chain all over Seoul and as much as we loved trying the Korean food, it was nice to have a change once in a while.  We really liked this bakery and I fell in love with the coffee cups!!  They're SO cute, I wish packaging was that good here, I'm a total sucker for it.

There is a huge range of delicious looking breads, cakes and pastries.  I would have loved to try more things but we only ate here twice.  Their breakfast items were rather interesting. The first time I tried this eggy concoction wrapped in eggy bread and a slice of bacon which they heated up for me.  Nik was boring and had a croissant ;)

The tour started at the O'ngo Culinary School with a demonstration in how to make a Korean seafood pancake (which I will detail in another blog post as this one's gotten a bit long!).  Had we been in Seoul for longer we would have definitely been interested in some of their Korean cooking classes!  The place seemed very organised and their kitchen classroom set up was great!

Bibimbap being made by a class

After our demonstration and taster of the pancake, we headed out to our first stop at a market.  We NEVER would have found this market used by locals.  It was down a ramp and underground...

It sells pretty much everything, food - groceries and ready to eat, shoes, crockery, all sorts of things you'd usually find in a department store.

Bowls galore!  They need them all for all the sides they serve!

Soy bean paste, chilli paste, various other things which I have no idea what they are!

Raw cabbages used to make Kimchi

Various types of Kimchi

Making Kimchi

More pig heads

Korean man eating breakfast/lunch

Grinding dried chillies to make chilli powder, you could smell the spiciness!

Various pulses and seeds

We stopped for some Gimbap (or Kimbap - Gs and Ks seems to be interchangeable in Korea, Gangnam is actually pronounced Kangnam) while we were down in the market and the woman who made it was so quick!  Gimbap is very similar to sushi and has various fillings.  This one had a bit of everything, pickled radish, crab stick, burdock root, fishcake (the thing that looks like a pancake), spinach and omelette.

Gimbap

Served with Kimchi of course!

Our lovely tour guide, Soung Jin

When we left the underground market we went to a rice cake shop which had SO many kinds of rice cakes (kyong dong) in different flavours and stuffed with various fillings.

Pumpkin rice cake

Our tasters

My favourite, stuffed with sweet red bean paste

We then went along to see some street vendors making Kkultarae which is made from a solid block of honey and cornflour, stretched into 16,000 strands which is then used to wrap a mix of nuts and cocoa which sadly meant we couldn't taste it as we're both allergic to nuts :(  It's very entertaining to watch though - check out a video!

And here's our video...

We then took a wander along Insadong gil where we discovered loads of places we wanted to return to after the tour.  We saw spice shops, more street food and lots and lots of souvenir and crafty shops.

Our next stop on the tour was to try dumplings.  The place we were taken to was down a side street and had a massive queue of locals which was a good sign!  The seating area was also full but we just got one each to take away.  Places to eat are difficult to find in Korea even if you have a recommendation as most of them only have Korean signs.  We found tripadvisor very helpful as there were pictures of the restaurants so we knew when we'd found the right one!

I honestly have no idea what was in my fried dumpling, I could identify the glass noodles and some vegetables and what I think was pork...

Turns out I preferred Nik's so we swapped :)

These were obviously prawn!

Continuing round the alley we ended up in Ssamzigil which is a fabulous sort of artist's mall with food stalls and lots of little shops run by designers and crafters.  We went back there in the afternoon and did a lot of shopping there!

While there on our tour everyone sampled the rather off-putting looking treats below but they also contained nuts so our guide offered to buy us a drink of rice punch instead (as the tasters were included in the tour price).

We then went to see a traditional Hanok and found a little art exhibition which we had a quick look round before our tour ended at lunchtime.  I would highly recommend O'ngo food tours!  They were well organised, knowledgeable and friendly.  It was easy to book online and we're so glad we did.

Little Korean musicians

Gorgeous paper butterflies

The rest of our day in Insadong gil will be in another post as this one's already over-Bexed with photos!  :-/