food and drink from the highlands & islands
Welcome
Mick Whitworth, Editor
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Brands like Great Glen Game and Stag Bakeries are adding urban appeal to products from the wildest region of the British Isles
Great Glem Game
A supplement to Fine Food Digest
the far north-east to Argyll and the isles of Arran and Islay in the southwest, the Highlands & Islands region doesn’t just encompass some of the most beautiful landscapes in Britain. Despite a population of under half a million – less than Greater Manchester – it generates more than £1bn in food and drink sales. And while that turnover is skewed by the economically dominant whisky sector, Highlands & Islands Enterprise (HIE), the Scottish Government’s economic and social development agency for the region, estimates there are around 1,900 food & drink operations here of one kind or another, employing
around 35,000 people. Great Scottish brands like Walkers Shortbread and Baxters of Speyside are giant landmarks in Briggs Shetland Lamb
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hen it comes to ranging, the words ‘local’ and ‘regional’ still dominate the thinking of many deli and farm shop buyers. Result: it’s hard for producers at one end of the UK to break into stores at the other end. If you’re in Kent, why buy chutney from Cheshire when there are plenty of options on your doorstep? But some regions are so laden with positive connotations that they have pulling power well outside their locality – especially if they have something unique to offer. Scotland’s name has always been synonymous with quality when it comes to primary produce like beef and shellfish,and the rugged and remote Highlands & Islands offer maximum appeal to buyers who like to mix business with foodie romance. Stretching west of a line drawn roughly from the Shetland Isles in
the Highlands & Islands scenery. But there are many hundreds of small businesses too, often providing vital employment in parts of a region whose beauty is a byproduct of its inaccessibility. “The seafood industry and agriculture have big economic and social significance,” says Iain Sutherland, HIE senior development manager for food & drink. “They’re operating primarily in very remote communities, offering perhaps two, three or four jobs, and they’re very important in maintaining the population in these areas.” It may look like a backwater, but the fine food sector here is far from backward. Added-value, speciality producers have emerged to cover nearly every core category of the deli, farm shop and food hall market, from fine chocolates (Olive Tree in Elgin; the Oban Chocolate Company; Caithness Chocolate in Wick) to cheese (Isle of Mull Cheese, Shetland Cheese, Connage Highland Dairy); from smoked salmon (Uig Lodge and Hebridean Smokehouse both on the Isle of Lewis) to charcuterie (Great Glen Game); from fine biscuits →
Oliver Taylor/Dreamstime.com
Taming the wilderness
t has been quite a year for speciality producers in Scotland’s Highlands & Islands. In Great Taste 2013, Stag Bakeries on the Isle of Lewis saw its traditional-yet-novel Hebridean seaweed water biscuit grab both the Best Scottish Speciality title and the new Nigel Barden Heritage Award, which rewards producers keeping old-fashioned ingredients alive. On the mainland, Great Glen Game grabbed the Great Taste Charcuterie Product of the Year title for its venison salami with green peppercorns, a Highlands icon given a contemporary twist. This year has also seen Isle of Lewis-based Natalie Crayton step up from pilot level to full production of her fledgling Hebridean Sea Salt brand – a product I tipped as a winner a year ago and which has already stormed into 150 stores, including Perthshire’s House of Bruar. Together with the likes of Uig Lodge (smoked salmon), Benromach Distillery (single malts), Saladworx (salads, edible flowers and dressings) and Oban Chocolate Co, these award winners and emerging brands show the sheer variety of products available from a region whose remoteness is both a challenge and, when it comes to sourcing natural, quality ingredients, a real asset. That’s why we have teamed up with Highlands & Islands Enterprise to bring you our first guide to food & drink from the Highlands & Islands. Inside you’ll find interviews with several of those big award winners and a guide to around two dozen more producers, ready and able to supply the speciality sector UK-wide with products that have provenance in spades.
A S UPPL EMENT TO
EDITORIAL editorial@finefoodworld.co.uk Editor: Mick Whitworth Assistant editor: Michael Lane Art director: Mark Windsor
ADVERTISING advertise@finefoodworld.co.uk Sales manager: Sally Coley Advertisement sales: Ruth Debnam, Becky Stacey Published by Great Taste Publications Ltd and the Guild of Fine Food Ltd GENERAL ENQUIRIES Tel: 01747 825200 Fax: 01747 824065 info@finefoodworld.co.uk www.finefoodworld.co.uk Guild of Fine Food, Guild House, 23b Kingsmead Business Park, Shaftesbury Rd, Gillingham, SP8 5FB UK Fine Food Digest is published 11 times a year and is available on subscription for £45pa inclusive of post and packing. Printed by: Blackmore, Shaftesbury, UK © Great Taste Publications Ltd and The Guild of Fine Food Ltd 2013. Reproduction of whole or part of this magazine without the publisher’s prior permission is prohibited. The opinions expressed in articles and advertisements are not necessarily those of the editor or publisher. The publisher cannot accept responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs or illustrations
2013-14 Edition
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