A wee bit o' culture... Burns Night

In an effort to relieve the long, dark, January days, I decided to liven things up by inviting some peeps round for a Burns Night.  Now, there was only one Scot in attendance (not me, despite the occasional accent drift when speaking to colleagues from glesca), and we totally failed read any Rabbie Burns, but that wasn't really the point.  It was a chance to introduce a few people to the Chieftain of the Pudding Race - the Haggis.

The thought of Haggis can be off-putting for many (one of the guests is still refusing to be told what's in it...) and some Haggis can be very bad...  but good haggis is fantastic - there's something visceral and rich about it, bloody goergeous.  So i took no chances and ordered it down from north of the border.   Found a great and really helpful online butchers - McLays of Glasgow - who shipped me down a couple of their finest.  It was served traditionally with neaps (usally turnip, but couldn't get any, so had to improv with parsnip and swede mashed together), tatties - creamy mashed potato - and an onion gravy helped along with some herbs and wee nip of Single Malt.

The main course was very simple to do - prepped in advance so i could be a bit more sociable when my guests arrived, and the Haggis simmered in it's 'cook-in bag' for an hour or so. Of the two i ordered, the general consensus, even among the Haggis virgins, was that the Warrior (apparently a more traditional, but smaller one) was the more flavoursome one - more highly peppered and richer, though the Sma' Chief was also rather good.

Aftermath...  note the mostly

empty bottle of Jura...

For starter i served a potato and smoked (scots) salmon on a slice of (scots) black pudding, with a white wine, dill and cream sauce. The rosti was baked slowly in the oven for about an hour, with some cheese grated over the top, then i cut rounds out to the same size as the black pudding and served it as a stack with the sauce over the top.  Wasn't a huge starter, but went down rather well - a prelude to the main event.

Dessert, was also relatively light.  At christmas I nabbed a Richard Corrigan Great British Menu recipe for an Irish Whisky vanilla ice cream (that time served with his Christmas Pud souffle). This time I Ben and Jerry-ised it, stirring in some crumbled up shortbread just before it went in the freezer.  This was served in a sandwich of two pancakes and topped with another nob of icecream, and a citrus and whisky syrup with some grated chocolate over the top.  Which took precisely two minutes for everyone to scoff down!