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Highland Recipes

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Duke of URL

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Jan 12, 2004, 10:37:26 AM1/12/04
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I can't remember who I got these from.
=-=
These recipes below are eaten today all over Scotland, including the
Hebrides and Western Highlands but rarely seen elsewhere. For the
Central Belt townie they may seem somewhat rugged, but they're what
people eat when they don't live near a supermarket.
The last recipe is from Shetland - a deliciously light shortbread!
---------------------------------------
Brochan Air Sgarbh (Cormorant Porridge)
INGREDIENTS:
One Cormorant
Barley meal or oatmeal
METHOD:
1. Clean the cormorant.
2. Cook in a pan of water for two hours, adding barley meal or oatmeal
to the water to make a brochan (porridge) with the stock.
3. Eat with potatoes.
Note: Puffins can be cooked in the same way!
---------------------------
Carrageen (Seaweed pudding)
INGREDIENTS:
Half ounce carrageen moss
One and a half pints milk
Two dessertspoons sugar
METHOD:
1. Wash the moss and soak in cold water for ten minutes - then drain.
2. Boil the milk and sugar and add the moss.
3. Boil for twenty minutes, then strain into a mould and allow to set.
4. Serve with milk.
---------------------------------
Ceann Cropic (Stuffed fish heads)
INGREDIENTS:
1 Fish liver (preferably cod)
Half cupful of oatmeal
1 Grated Onion
Salt and pepper to taste
METHOD:
1. Steep the heads in cold, salty water and wash thoroughly.
2. Mix the remaining ingredients and stuff into the fish heads.
3. Cover with a layer of plain flour and boil fairly rapidly.
4. Serve hot with boiled fish.
--------------------------
Deoch bhan (Oatmeal drink)
INGREDIENTS:
2 tablespoons oatmeal
Pinch of salt
Half ounce butter
METHOD:
1. Mix the oatmeal and salt with cold water.
2. Add butter.
3. Pour 2 pints of hot water over it.
4. Leave it beside the fire covered with a plate or saucer to keep it
hot. This is good for you if you have a cold, but it is to be
recommended, whether you are ill or healthy, on a cold winter's day.
Must always be drunk hot!
------
Fuarag
INGREDIENTS:
1 Tablespoon oatmeal
One cupful of fresh cream
METHOD:
1. Add the oatmeal to the cream and stir well.
2. Sugar may also be added to taste.
2. Eat at once. This makes an appetising breakfast but there are some
who would take it at any time of day.
(I have eaten a version all my adult life which is part Fuarag and
part Athol Brose.)
INGREDIENTS:
1/2 cup otmeal
some milk
a lot of cream
a good splash of runny honey
whisky if available.
METHOD:
1. Stir everything together and eat.
There are also variations of porridge oats with different names
depending on how prepared.
===
Brochan - hot porridge made as usually eaten by non-Gaels.
Lite - same as above. (I think this is a Small Isles name).
Brochan reumhar - thick (fat) porridge
Brochan tana - gruel.
Easach or dramach - oats with cold water.
Soumins - a floury paste made by boiling used oat husks to extract the
last of the flour left in them.
Another couple of names I've forgotten.
Oats in Gaelic is Corc and oatcakes are Aran Coirce - bread of oats -
an Irish island and an Irish town joined together!
===
Let me say too that Chinese porridge is absolutely delicious. Cooked
by simmering rice in water, the local equivalent of oats, it becomes a
delicious porridge called Jook in Cantonese and Congee in English, and
like Scottish porridge, it is usually eaten at breakfast time.
What makes jook fabulous is all that can be added.
http://www.recipezaar.com/54711?path=00F07B
http://chinesefood.about.com/library/blrecipe300.htm
-----------
Fried trout
INGREDIENTS:
Trout
Flour
Salt and pepper
METHODS:
1. Wash and dry trout.
2. Coat with flour and season.
3. Fry gently until golden brown on both sides.
4. Delicious served with brown or soda scones.
------
Haggis
INGREDIENTS:
Sheep's insides
Quarter pound suet
One pound oatmeal
2 small blanched onions
Half teaspoon mixed herbs
Salt and pepper
METHOD:
1. Wash intestines in cold water, bring to boil, scrape and clean.
Leave overnight in clean water.
2. Wash stomach and put in pan of boiling water. Boil for two hours
with windpipe draining into a jar.
3. Cut off windpipe, mince best part of lungs and heart, remove
gristle and greate best parts of liver.
4. Add toasted oatmeal, minced suet and onions, 2 teaspoons of salt, 1
teaspoon of pepper, herbs and enough of the liquid into which stomach
has been boiled to moisten.
5. Almost fill the stomach bag, keeping fat or smooth side inside. Sew
then prick well.
6. Place on plate in pot of boiling water. Boil gently for three
hours.
---------------------
Marag (Black Pudding)
INGREDIENTS:
1lb suet (finely chopped)
1lb oatmeal
2 onions
Fresh blood (may be watered down)
Salt and pepper
METHOD:
1. Place all dry ingredients in a bowl. Mix and blend with fresh
sheep's blood.
2. Stuff mixture into casing and tie well.
3. Place in large pan, cover with boiling water, and boil gently for
three hours.
4. Remove black puddings and allow to cool.
5. Cut into slices as required and fry in hot fat.
------------------
Sheep's Head Broth
INGREDIENTS:
Sheep's Head
Barley
Carrots
Turnip
Onions
Cabbage
Salt and Pepper
METHOD:
1. Prepare the head the day before cooking. Using a red hot poker, rub
over the sheep's head until a nice brown colour, remove ears and horns
and burn remaining wool. Split head longways with an axe. Remove
brains and rub well into skin of head. Put head into a bowl of cold
water with a handful of washing soda and soak overnight.
2. Wash well in clean water and place in a pan full of salted boiling
water and cook for 90 minutes.
3. Add barley (which has been soaking), and all of the chopped
vegetables. Boil for a further 90 minutes.
4. Remove the remains of the skull and serve hot
-------------
White Pudding
INGREDIENTS:
Intestines
Salt and pepper
Fat
Onion
Oatmeal
METHOD:
1. Wash the intestines well first with cold water. Leave them soaking
in cold water and pepper for one night.
2. Next day wash them well with warm water and washing soda. (This
will clean the slime off them). When you do this, wash them again in
cold water.
3. Chop the fat and onion together, then mix with oatmeal. you don't
need to use too much meal. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Put this then into the intestines. Sew each end of the intestines
and put them in boiling watr. Cook for 90 minutes at a gentle boil.
5. Remember to prick them with a needle occasionally, to release air,
and to keep the puddings from breaking.
-----------------------------------------------
CROWDIE AND CREAM - Traditional Highland cheese
Note: The milk MUST be unpasteurized or it will not sour but simply
rot. Unpasteurized milk is hard to find these days - you must buy it
directly from a farmer who is prepared to sell it to you. In my
childhood the milk used on our farms was unpasteurized, but the cows
were Tuberculin Tested. I've drunk it unpasteurized in Canada,
reassured by noting that the farmer, who usually drinks it the same
way, was still alive and well.
HOWEVER, it should be noted that people who drink unpasteurized milk
regularly (like the dairy farmer) are often immune to the bacteria
that may be present.
Why do people drink it unpasteurized? The taste reminds them of their
childhood. Pateurizing milk consists of raising its temperature to 62
C for half an hour, or rapidly to 80 C for 20 seconds and then
chilling it. (US law demands 140 degrees Farenheit for at least 30
minutes.) The procedure kills bacteria from the cow or the milker or
milking machine. Because the resident bacteria are killed by the
process, the milk will not sour.
Cheeses like Swiss Gruyere, Camembert, Parmigiano-Reggiano and English
Stilton are made with unpasteurized milk. "We know for a fact that the
streets of Europe would be littered with bodies and European hospitals
would be filled to capacity if there were problems with unpasteurized
products," says David Grotenstein, ACS board member and CEO of Food
and Image, a NY-based food industry consultancy. "Europeans have eaten
unpasteurized cheeses of all milk types from local, national and
regional farms with little, or no greater, health risk than the
pasteurized product."
Now I've done my duty, here's how it's made:
*******
METHOD:
In making crowdie and cream unpasteurized sour milk is left in a basin
until curds form. The cream is then skimmed off and the remainder
heated slowly but not boiled. Once soft lumps of crowdie begin to
appear, a colander is used to strain and separate this from the whey.
When the crowdie cools, salt is added and the soft cheese broken down
by hand into a fine consistency. The cream is added before serving.
I usually make this cheese by creating a yoghurt from pasteurized milk
and then straining it until it is dry and soft. I usually flavour it
with salt and dill weed. Although pleasantly reminscent of
Pennsylvania cream cheese, it is not crowdie. Crowdie has a specific
taste and forms itself into small balls from the curds.
--------------
Griddle Scones
INGREDIENTS:
2 cupfuls plain flour
Pinch of Salt
½ tspn Baking Soda
½ tspn Cream of Tartar
2 tspns sugar
Buttermilk
METHOD:
1. Mix the dry ingredients.
2. Add enough buttermilk to mix into an elastic dough.
3. Roll out on floured surface to form a circular shape ¼" thick.
4. Cut into four.
5. Cook on pre-heated hot griddle for about 5 minutes per side
6. Serve with butter, jam, cream cheese or crowdie and cream!
--------
Oatcakes
INGREDIENTS:
2 cupfuls oatmeal
¼ tspn sugar
½ tspn salt
½ tspn baking soda
1 tspn Cream of Tartar
2 tbspns melted butter
Cold water
METHOD:
1. Mix the dry ingredients.
2. Add melted butter.
3. Add enough cold water to make a stiff consistency.
4. Roll out thinly in a circular shape.
5. Cut into four.
6. Cook slowly on preheated griddle for 10 mins per side.
Serve with butterm, cheese, crowdie and cream.
------------------
Herring in Oatmeal
INGREDIENTS:
Fresh herring
Oatmeal
Salt
Vegetable oil
METHOD:
1. Gut herring and discard the head.
2. Cut open the fish and remove the bone.
3. Wash then pat dry.
4. Lay herring skin side down and sprinkle with salt.
5. Dip into place of dry oatmeal to coat.
6. Repeat on other side.
7. Shallow fry in hot oil for approximately five minutes on each side.
8. Serve with boiled potatoes and fresh milk.
9. Traditionally no cutlery is required - eat with your fingers!
----------------
Clootie Dumpling
INGREDIENTS:
1 ½ Ibs plain flour
4 oz sugar
1 ½ tspns
Baking Soda
1 tspn mixed spice
1 Ib mixed fruit
1 egg
6 oz shredded suet or margarine
2 tbspns treacle
Fresh milk
Square cotton cloth
METHOD:
1. Mix all the dry ingredients.
2. Rub in suet or margarine.
3. Add dried fruit.
4. Add beaten egg and treacle.
5. Add sufficient milk to absorb all dry ingredients.
6. Place the mixture on the well floured, dampened cloth.
7. Sprinkle lightly with flour.
8. Gather the cloth and secure with a piece of string, allowing some
room for expansion in the cooking.
9, Place on a small plate in a pan of boiling water which covers only
half the dumpling.
10. Boil for approximately three hours.
11. Remove from cloth and transfer to a plate to cool.
-------------------
Shetland Shortbread
(See Cook's Notes at bottom)
INGREDIENTS:
8 oz Plain (all-purpose) flour
3 oz Castor (superfine) sugar
2 oz Self raising flour
8 oz Butter or margarine, or a half/half mixture
3 oz Cornflour (cornstarch)
METHOD:
1. Melt butter.
2. Mix dry ingredients.
3. Add and knead all together.
4. Pat or roll into baking sheet (to about 1/2" deep).
5. Prick over with fork.
6. Sprinkle with sugar.
7. Bake at 350F/160C/Gas Mark 4 on bottom shelf of oven until a pale
beige colour (15-25 minutes).
8. Cut into 1" by 2-3" strips when taken from oven.
Cook's Notes
I use castor sugar not granulated and a half butter/half margarine mix
to get the best results. I usually make double quantities since it
keeps well in an air-tight tin.
Note that this does have a lighter feel than shortbreads from other
parts of Scotland.
This recipe has been in my family for generations (my grandmother
remembers her mother saying that it had been in the family for
generations!).
On the other hand, it is a Shetland recipe, and lighter than many
other "real" shortbreads. It is my favourite one, anyway.


Warren Okuma

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Jan 12, 2004, 8:10:20 PM1/12/04
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"Duke of URL" <macbenahATkdsiDOTnet> wrote in message
news:1005fq2...@corp.supernews.com...
Hey thanks.


Duke of URL

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Jan 12, 2004, 8:28:19 PM1/12/04
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In news:1006hc1...@corp.supernews.com,
Warren Okuma <wok...@lava.net> radiated into the WorldWideWait:

> "Duke of URL" <macbenahATkdsiDOTnet> wrote in message
> news:1005fq2...@corp.supernews.com...

>> These recipes below are eaten today all over Scotland, including

> Hey thanks.

You're ferpeckly welcome.


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