Friday, November 25, 2005

A Scottish supper

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had another Estonian friend visiting and I treated Margit, her colleague and another MacEstonian to a Scottish meal. The Estonian visitors had heard rumours of haggis, the Scottish national dish of lamb bits and other things, so I decided to make some exactly a week ago. My choice of haggis is MacSween of Edinburgh, and I bought both a vegetarian and traditional version. These were served with neeps (alias mashed turnip, seasoned with butter, salt, pepper, and nutmeg) and tatties (potato mash, seasoned with salt, pepper, milk and butter).



We drank my current favourite whisky and Whisky Mac cocktails. For the latter you mix 1.5 oz Scotch whisky and 1 oz green ginger wine. I suspect my ginger wine (not easy to find!) wasn't the green one, as the cocktail was way too sweet compared to the one I usually get served in pubs (which I love).

And for the dessert, I made cranachan again, this time adding mascarpone cheese for the mixture.



Apart from mishaps with the whisky cocktail, the meal was lovely. My visiting friend was surprised that mashed turnip tastes so sweet and nice, and both of them bought some haggis to take home with. And they know where to find a recipe for cranachan..

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Haggis isn't that bad actually. Tried it a few times when I lived in Dundee and it was far better than I thought it would be. I haven't tried the brand you mentioned but I will see if I can find it down here in the south.

Anonymous said...

ooh yummy :) i love the macsween haggisses (haggi?), especially the vegetarian one. your neeps sound great with the nutmeg too!

(my sister insists on putting heinz ketchup on her haggis... hmmm)

Anonymous said...

McSween's haggis is fantastic, I love it! We even got my mother hooked on it when she was here - and she's a vegetarian most of the time!

I still have never tried cranachan though. I'd love to give it a try with mascarpone - that sounds so delicious.

chili&vanilia said...

Pille,
I've never had any of these but it sounds very exciting. Especially that cranachan, it looks really guszta (yummy in Hungarian:)
Zsofi

Joycelyn said...

hi pille, cranachan made with mascarpone sounds like a pure stroke of genius - i love mascarpone in just about anything, so i am sure i will love this!

Anonymous said...

Have never tried haggis, although my dad has and he likes it...you make it sound really good :)

Pille said...

Tanja - you're right, haggis is lovely, especially a well-seasoned one. Though I still tend to eat a bit more of the vegetarian one, I'm afraid.

Shauna - macsween ones are the best! Neeps&nutmeg mash tip is from Sue Lawrence, the Scottish cooking guru. Read it ages ago somewhere and it was lovely. Mmmh. Ketchup and haggis? Not sure about that combo..

Melissa - my parents enjoyed haggis back in June as well, as have most of my visitors - even if they sound a bit suspicious to start with:)
Do you want me to email you the mascarpone cranachan recipe?

Zsofi - cranachan was guszta indeed - highly recommended!

J - mascarpone is so creamy and rich, pretty much any dessert is nice with it!

Joey - MacSween of Edinburgh does mail order across the world - maybe it's time for you to try some:)

Anonymous said...

Yes, thank you!