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It's 25 January, the birthday (in 1759) of the Scottish poet Robert Burns . All over the world, people of Scottish descent and others who get drawn in to Burns Night celebrations, will this evening be eating haggis. Ours will be a low key celebration for just 2 people, but we have haggis. What else could we eat on Burns Night? It will be a traditional Scottish haggis and comes from a manufacturer based in an area of Scotland where some of my forbearers were farmers of sheep and growers of oats, 'neeps' and 'tatties'. The basic haggis recipe is the minced heart, lungs and liver of a sheep, seasoned and mixed with oatmeal, stuffed into a sheep's stomach lining and boiled. It is traditionally served with mashed root vegetables like potatoes and swedes/turnips. Haggis is one of those foods that tastes much better than it looks. However elaborately it is sometimes presented, a stuffed sheep's stomach just looks revolting to my mind. It does seem strange t...

Fireworks have become an expected part of celebration at the end of the old year and start of the new. The cynic in me says that's good for winter tourism in cities like London or Edinburgh. I don't know when New Year fireworks became popular in the UK. I don't remember this from childhood. I just know that now the start of each New Year seems to be noisier than the year before. For my Scottish grandparents 31 December was the day to complete a thorough house-cleaning, especially fireplaces, in preparation for the big celebration tonight of clearing out the old year and welcoming the new. At the same time it was important to ensure all debts were cleared before midnight. The origin of Hogmanay is very ancient, but today's Scottish tradition probably owes most to Viking invaders and their Yule winter festival traditions.  I come from a long line of Scottish Presbyterians, who frowned on the celebration of Christmas as a 'Popish' or Roman Catholic feast. From...

It's Burns night and in an hour I expect friends to arrive for a celebration of the birthday of the famous Scottish poet Robert Burns. This is the day when my Scottish genes start asserting themselves.  We will of course be eating haggis. Haggis actually tastes much better than it looks. Earlier today I went out on a successful haggis hunt and the beast is prepared and getting hot, knife is sharpened, 'neeps' prepared to boil and mash, whisky and Burns poetry lined up ready. We may just manage the 1st stanza of Burns' 'Address to a Haggis'. Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,  Great chieftain o' the pudding race!  Aboon them a' yet tak your place,  Painch, tripe or thairm:  Weel are ye' wordy o'a grace  As lang's my arm. Just for fun and if you want to know more about haggis take a look at this post (with a pinch of salt). 10 things your never knew about haggis If you are celebrating the Conversion of St Paul today, her...

Today is the birthday in 1759 of Robert Burns . To celebrate Robert Burns' birthday I shall follow a tradition said to have begun a few year after his death. We shall eat a haggis tonight or some time this week. That's if I can find one. You may believe that a haggis is just a sheep's stomach stuffed with sheep's offal and oatmeal. Others may think differently as evidenced by this photo created by Wikimedia Commons User Starablazkova showing a wild haggis, apparently roaming near Loch Lomond. There's not much time left to bag your haggis. The haggis hunting season ends today at 15.00 hours Greenwich Mean Time. Or so it does if you believe the Scotsman newspaper that promotes its annual haggis hunt  and also debunks several widely believed myths about the haggis including the story that it is a sheep's stomach stuffed with sheep's offal and oatmeal. I like haggis. It tastes much better than it looks. So, while I am out haggis hunting, you might like...