Robert Burns is the national poet of Scotland. He has a heritage trail in his memory, many a place named after him, and every year people celebrate him on his birthday, January 25th, by having a 'Burns Supper.' I think that traditionally its a men's only event, but have not been able to find anything that supports this other than a radio talk show. But either way its steeped in tradition with bag pipe players, poetry readings, whisky drinking, and as haggis was Burns' favorite dish (he even wrote a poem about haggis), the meal of the night is haggis, neeps and tatties. (Neeps = mashed turnips, tatties = mashed potatoes)
We bought eveything we could need for a Burns Supper, but had ours last night since we went to see Showcase Scotland on Thursday. Although we did stop at Wetherspoons and have haggis on Thursday before our night out. So last night we had a Scottish night. We started with Highland Oatcakes and Mike made a wonderful smoked mackeral pate to put on it. Then we cooked our haggis (it takes 2 hours!!), mashed our potatoes, but at the time we bought everything we thought neeps were parsnips (no idea why) and we didn't want to buy turnips too. So we had a tasty mashed potato, parsnip, and carrot concoction we found on all recipes. It was actually quite tasty. Mike had a glass of whisky and I passed. But he did make an whisky sauce to go on top of the haggis that was divine.
Now haggis is an interesting food. It sounds horrid when you read the ingredients, but its actually not all that bad. The one we bought did not come in a sheep's stomach (thank God for that) at all, butit was fairly large. Mike didn't know that when you cook the haggis, it expands quite a bit and when you cut it open the haggis "grows" even more. Needless to say, we didn't end up with a small haggis. We will probably have haggis all week long!
1 comment:
So glad you guys had a fun Burns night...(slightly worried about the amount of haggis you have consumed since you've been in Scotland..you'll out do us soon!)not that I do much for it at home but I really missed the organization and celebration that takes place in our village, espacially among the older people. The old primary school in my village have been having a burn's night since I can remember, with poems read, dinner served with the famous To A Haggis poem read and the haggis stabbed at the last line...'Gie her a haggis!' and then some homebaking followed by dancing and general merryment. Being in mount pleasant myself and Stewart wished each other happy burns night and we tried a frantic search for a haggis the day before (really just to see if one exists in any stores here...there was one on e-bay believe it or not!) but that was as far as we got..very pitiful, but no one hear had even heard of Burns :(they have recently been enlightened...
Jenni
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