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Haggis Day

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Many years ago I spent extended stays in Scotland, mainly Inverness, and ate Haggis and had Neeps & Tatties too. But it was over 30 years ago and I really don’t remember how they tasted. Had Kippered Herring for breakfast too.
Kippered herring with some cheese on a Waverly cracker and a wee dram of whisky --nothing better. Except maybe the whisky by itself...
 
I'll eat earthworms long before I eat fermented guts.
It's the proper "letting it rot" part that turns me from Haggis
I’ve never made one but ate a few. I’ve never seen a recipe calling for anything rotted, or on high.
Dry sausage, like salami are fermented
And for the joke about guts, it’s not, except to use the stomach as cooking bag. It’s organ meat, and that only about half. Lungs, liver, heart, sweetbreads and kidneys
 
I will be celebrating Burns tomorrow with family and friends. I will make my famous venison haggis. Meanwhile, thought I might share this… a fur trade inspired haggis.
 
January 25th is Robert Burns Day. You toast some oats, mix with "Lamb Innards" and chopped onion and stuff in a lamb/sheep stomach. "Chief of the Pudd'n Clan" . Those thirty Scots. In any event not easy these days to find all the ingredients.
I was lucky enough to go to Scotland in high school. The haggis I had was delicious! Anyone who is afraid to try it is a yellow belly, and is missing out in my opinion! I wish it was something you could find more in the states. I also had some of their red grouse that was shot on a moor the day before and that was to die for.
 
Ate what most would consider strange a lot while working with the Rhade in the highlands of Nam. Corba freshly skinned and offered the heart in their fermented drink . Had Haggis once, never again it being like scrapple, I'm no longer allowed organ meat
 
Glad I asked- a lot more interest than I ever imagined. I've used a pig's stomach since they show up in a local market but that's about it. The "lamb" flavor sort of soaks through all the meats and that's the taste- to a degree, lamb, blanched onion, toasted oats- actually pretty good. In any event there are a few Burn's dinners in my area but they get $50 or more. I should probably stop being cheap and show up. We have clan days where there is a haggis toss, all that sort of thing. The cable toss, 99% of the guys never get it going enough to turn over.
I think at Fort Vancouver they did such celebrations.
 
Potted meat is another delicacy, chocked full of anything not fit for a hotdog. It's said even the dangles, lips, and innards go in the can.
 
For a number of year, a bunch of us always celebrated Burns night at a restaurant run by a husband and wife team who had worked on the Queen's Scottish estate at Balmoral castle. They were very proud of the letter she sent them on their retirement and it hung, framed, on the wall.
They were very Scottish but had chosen to settle in the kinder climate of Cornwall. The Burns evenings featured a small glass of whiskey with the Haggis, neaps and tatties, the usual eulogy and of course, a piper.

Scottish pipers were thin on the ground in Cornwall but they solved the problem of attracting one by offering all the Scotch he could drink in the course of the evening. When we arrived, he was sitting on the pavement outside with a bottle in his hand and a pool of vomit in the gutter.
When the time came to pipe in the haggis, he marched in upright as a guardsman but unfortunately, the scent of the haggis was drowned by his personal aroma, which he had not been able to leave outside on the pavement.

A splendid evening, never the less.
 
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