Scottish Haggis and more!

Don't worry, there are recipes below that do not involve internal organ meats...

I was wrong! For years I've been saying “there's no such thing as Scottish cuisine, there's just sheep guts and oatmeal (referring to haggis)”. Boy was I wrong!! Contemporary Scottish cuisine is right up there with the best of the best!

Traditional Scottish Breakfast -- eggs, toast, slice of haggis, bacon, beans and a Scottish pancake.  This is what Scottish cuisine used to be -- stick to your ribs and last all day, but not very fancy.

We had fabulous meals everywhere we went, from simple steak & mushroom pie and bangers & mash in a chain pub, through lots of local seafood, to potted rabbit (which I'd only heard of). Lanark White cheese, Heather Honey, Aberdeen Butteries, Tiffin Cake, and Rhubarb Fool, oh my!

Classic Pub Grub -- Steak & Mushroom Pie with Chips

Classic Pub Grub -- Bangers & Mash

A village "deli" serving local cheeses, meats, drinks, and a variety of sandwiches and sweets made with local ingredients 

Our first night in-country, in the Glasgow suburb of Paisley, we went to dinner at a local Italian restaurant with our friends Fiona and Toby, who'd driven North from England to spend a couple days with us. For a tiny restaurant that probably didn't seat forty people, the food was outstanding! Not at all like the Italian-American food we've come to expect in America. Because it was “odd dish out” on an Italian menu and it was our first meal in Scotland, I just had to have the Haggis appetizer – served with gravy and a sunny-side egg on toast:

Haggis and an egg on toast as an appetizer!

Sally had this beautiful and very tasty Salmon with shrimp and mixed vegetables

The next day we drove across the country to Edinburgh (175 miles). From our AirBnb we could see the Royal Yacht Britannia, now a tourist attraction. That night we ate at King's Wark, a highly rated pub-restaurant where I sampled Potted Rabbit and mixed seafood cakes while Sally had the Salmon plate.

 Potted Rabbit with pickled beetroot and cornichons

 Mixed Seafood Cakes with micro greens and a small salad

Sally's Salmon entree

While Fiona and Toby went back south to go to work, Sally's other girlhood friend Tracey and her husband Ian picked us up in Edinburgh and took us for a whirlwind tour of The Borders – the long (175 mile) narrow (20-40mile) strip of 17^th century no man's land between England and Scotland, where both Sally's and my ancestors hailed from. This rolling landscape, punctuated by higher, sharper hills is the 'breadbasket' of modern Scotland, source of meat, vegetables and grains.

Then Ian and Tracey took us up through the highlands to the northeast coast on the North Sea where we stayed for a few days and traipsed among the fishing villages along the coast there.

Although we didn't have any, we drove through the village of Cullen, home of Cullen Skink, a quintessential thick Scottish soup of smoked haddock, potatoes, onions and milk. The Cullen Bay Hotel hosts the annual Cullen Skink Championship cook-off every November. I was very tempted to enter, but would have had to come back in November for the cook-off!

Last night in Scotland, again in Glasgow, we had dinner at a small but eclectic restaurant called Fanny Trollope's. I had their seared pork fillet, with an apple, leek & Stornoway black pudding filled sausage roll, buttery mash potatoes, a Parma ham crisp, and a calvados lyonnaise coule.  Sally had an outstanding squash soup and salmon.  We finished the evening by sharing a Rhubarb Fool!

Lots of other adventures that aren't really germane here. We had a fabulous holiday! Lots of wonderful food, too, but enough for now. Let's cook!

Mustard Crusted Salmon

Inspired by the wonderful salmon we experienced on our trip. In case you didn't catch it, Sally really likes salmon... While farmed salmon is the sustainable choice, nothing really beats the texture and flavor of wild caught fish which has had to struggle its whole life to survive. Farmed fish, by comparison is soft and insipid...

Preheat your oven to 300F.

1/4 cup Mayonnaise or Skyr yogurt

3 Tbsp stone ground or other strong Mustard, to taste

1 Tbsp Lemon juice

optional - Panko

Stir the ingredients together. Line a baking sheet with baking paper or parchment, and place your fillets on the paper, skin side down. Spoon or brush the mustard mixture on the fillets and spread it out roughly 1/4” thick. Bake the fish for 15 minutes. For more of a crust, switch over to Broil and cook another 5 minutes or so. I topped the mustard mixture with sprinkle of Panko, thinking it would crisp up; but no luck. Tasty though. 

Next time I'll mix the panko in with the skyr-mustard mixture.

Avocado & Sardine Toast

We've been reading about Avocado Toast, one of the current “in” foods. Sally found a recipe for avocado toast topped with sardines. No, sardines aren't my cuppa tea, so I had something else for dinner that night, but she thought the meal was splendid – simple, inexpensive and filling. She had the leftovers for her lunch the next day.

2 cans Sardines in oil

2 Hass Avocados, ripe, not hard, mashed

1/4 cup EVOO

2 Tbsp minced Flat Leaf Parsley

2 Tbsp White Wine Vinegar

Red Pepper flakes to taste

4 slices multigrain bread

Mix the oil, vinegar, parsley and pepper flakes together and marinate the sardines in the mixture for at least 2 hours.

Toast the bread and spread it with mashed avocado. Top with marinated sardines and dive right in!

Raspberry Fool

You're nobody's Fool if you make this for dessert!

8oz box of fresh Raspberries (or blackberries, blueberries, strawberries, etc.)

1 pint of warm Custard

You can use that Jell-O stuff, but we prefer Bird's brand Custard, an English staple that you can find in the international aisle at your local mega-mart. Tastes much better. Less hassle to make.

Follow the package instructions (2 Tbsp custard powder, 2 cups of milk, heat, combine, simmer and stir, etc.) to make a 1 pint batch of custard. Before it sets up, fold in the raspberries, and let it cool. Mostly. Warm is good too. That's it.

Faux Haggis

I've made this for a number of years, for those who want the flavors of traditional Scottish haggis (lamb, oats, onion and a hint of nutmeg) but not the organ meats of the original... Think “poached meatloaf”. If you like lamb, you'll love this!

1 lb ground Lamb (lamb mince as they say across the pond)

1-1/2 cup steel cut Oatmeal (not that flat stuff)

1 White Onion, diced

2 tsp ground Nutmeg

1 Egg, beaten

Smoosh (a highly technical cooking term) the ingredients together in a large bowl, as if you are making meatloaf, being sure to get everything evenly distributed. Roll into a large log shape, and roll the log up in a couple layers of cheesecloth. Tie off the ends of the cloth, and you have a sort of giant sausage about 8” long and 4” in diameter. 

Not my faux haggis, but you get the idea...

Put a loaf pan on your largest stove burner turned to medium high and place the sausage in the pan. Add broth (chicken or vegetable if you can't find lamb broth), enough to come half way up the side of the log. Bring to a simmer, and cook – turning every 15 minutes or so – until the internal temperature reaches 145F. Allow it to cool a bit, then unwrap, slice and serve with HP Brown Sauce or Lizano (a similar sauce from Costa Rica of all places).

There are several Scottish and Icelandic recipes that I'll be working up and sharing with you over the next few weeks. Sláinte!