Scottish Vegan Chef's Recipe / Vegan Food in Scotland

Scottish Vegan Chef’s Recipe / Vegan Food in Scotland

Watch video above for the recipe!

This video is kindly sponsored by VisitScotland, the tourism board of Scotland. All opinions are my own!

If you follow my Instagram page, you probably already know that I was recently on a week long trip to Scotland, UK. I was contacted by VisitScotland to spend a week in the country, exploring the vegan food scene and unsurprisingly, I was more than happy to do so.

Some people might be surprised to hear that Edinburgh and Glasgow are both incredibly vegan friendly cities. In fact, Glasgow was once voted the most vegan friendly city in the UK Unexpected, right?

When I was living in London, UK, I got the chance to visit both Edinburgh and Glasgow so I was more than happy to go back since I got a little taste of the vegan scene already.

I spent almost a week in Glasgow and I filmed pretty much everything I ate so that will be coming up in a “What I Ate in a Week in Scotland” video so make sure you stay tuned for that video (and blogpost).

But first – VisitScotland matched me with a NATIVE SCOT, Marc, who is also a vegan chef at a popular vegan cafe in Glasgow called Mono Cafe Bar. Marc was kind enough to show us how to make a delicious dish with a traditional Scottish twist (but made in his own special way). I was the lucky one who got to taste test it, and it was very, very good (you’ll see by my reaction in the video).

He made us his own homemade vegan haggis (recipe below) wrapped in a filo pastry (basically a haggis spring roll!) on top of a bed of mashed potatoes & turnips and some sautéed kale. Then he poured a nice creamy whisky sauce on top of everything to make everything come together nicely. What I loved was that he used many components of traditional Scottish cuisine but also created something different and unique – making this somewhat of a fusion style dish!

He not only cooked for me but also showed us the step-by-step so that everyone can recreate a delicious Scottish dish at home! There isn’t really a name for it, because there are multiple components. It definitely isn’t the laziest dish, but it’s definitely worth recreating. In fact, I can’t wait to try making it myself. I definitely won’t be able to make it in the beautiful way that Marc made, but I can certainly try…

Marc kindly provided me with his delicious vegan haggis recipe (see below). If you get a chance to visit Scotland, you’ll probably be eating vegan haggis almost every day (if not every single day). But before that, make sure you try out this recipe!

Vegan Haggis Recipe

Ingredients:

1 x large onion
1x large carrot
100g chestnut/brown mushrooms
2 cloves garlic
50g yellow split peas
50g pearl barley
1tsp ground allspice
Half tsp ground black pepper
Half tsp ground white pepper
2tsp dark brown sugar
1tsp yeast extract
90g rolled oats
400ml veg stock

Instructions:

Place pearl barley in a pot filled with 250ml cold water and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and let it simmer until the barley is soft but chewy (roughly another 35-40 mins). By which point, there will be only a little liquid left. Drain and set aside.
In a separate pot, follow the same instructions for the split peas (cooking time may be slightly longer). Add a splash of water and cook for a little longer if needed. Drain and set aside.
Finely dice the onion, carrot and mushrooms then sweat them down in a large frying pan with a little olive oil on a low heat until all ingredients are soft. Crush the garlic and sweat for another minute. Add in the allspice, black pepper and white pepper and cook out the spices for one minute.
Add the cooked barley/split peas and rolled oats. Stir to combine.
In a jug, combine the veg stock, brown sugar and yeast extract. Stir well to combine.
Add the liquid to the pan, simmer and stir gently until most the liquid has gone. (Roughly 10 mins). A good test is to drag your spoon through the middle of the pan, separating the ingredients. No excess liquid should pool in the centre of the pan. By this point, the haggis should be nice and thick. Check for seasoning and add some salt and pepper to your preference (it should be quite peppery with a nice heat to it)
Transfer the haggis to a 2lb loaf/cake tin and cover the top with foil
Cook in a preheated oven (180 degrees celsius for a fan oven , 200 for regular gas oven) for 20 mins then remove/unwrap foil and cook for another 10/15 mins until the haggis is ready. It should be quite hearty and thick but will break apart nicely with a fork. Serve straight away or allow to cool if you want to wrap it in pastry, etc.
Seal airtight and keep refrigerated for 3 days, if needed.