Traditional Scottish Cookery Cookbook

Traditional Scottish Cookery

Traditional Scottish Cookery by Margaret Fairlie is a very small Scottish cookbook. It measures about 3 ½ inches x 5 inches. If the measurement had been quoted in the description, it might not have been purchased. Being on a Scottish Cookbook buying spree, though, it, without a doubt, would have been. It includes over one hundred interesting, unusual recipes for wannabee Scottish cooks.

Table of Contents

On the contents page, handwritten and underlined in pencil, is the very brief note: ’85 trip. Somebody, somewhere, had visited Scotland in 1985 and purchased this little Scottish cookbook as a souvenir. Did they try any of the recipes? The book is not worn, like it might have been if it had been used. There are no splashes or smears from a recipe being prepared close by. Except for the note on the contents page, it is remarkably clean.

The copyright for the mini book is 1972. It was published by Robert Hale Limited, Clerkenwell House in London, England, and it was printed by Everbest Printing Co. in Hong Kong.

Introduction

On the introduction page to the book, it is stated that many Scottish recipes are of French origin. Could haggis be a French inspired recipe? or Cock-A-Leekie? or Cullen Skink? or Tipsy Laird? or Rumbledethumps? This will require some thorough culinary sleuthing.

The relationship between France and Scotland is an old one, going back many centuries to the late 1200s. James I is said to have employed a French cook. Scotland’s most famous monarch, Mary Queen of Scots, spent her early years in France and married French King Francis II. Having spent most of her childhood in that country, she would have dined on French food and become accustomed that style of cooking.