Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
listings include a mix of high-quality and budget
establishments. Wine in restaurants is marked up
strongly, so you'll often pay £15 for a bottle selling
for £5 in the shops; house wines generally start
around the £10 mark.
If you're travelling in remoter parts of Scotland, or
staying at a B&B or guesthouse in the countryside,
ask advice about nearby options for your
evening
meal
. Many B&Bs and guesthouses will cook you
dinner, but you must book ahead and indicate any
dietary requirements.
As for
restaurants
, standards vary enormously,
but independent restaurants using good-quality
local produce are now found all over Scotland. Less
predictable are hotel restaurants, many of which
also serve non-residents. Some can be very ordinary
despite the highfalutin descriptions on the à la
carte menu. You could easily end up paying £30-40
a head for a meal with wine.
In central Scotland, particularly in Edinburgh and
Glasgow, you'll find a range of
international
cuisines
including Japanese, Thai, Caribbean and
Turkish, as well as the more common Indian,
Chinese and Italian establishments. Glasgow is one
of Britain's curry capitals, while Edinburgh's restau-
rant scene is consistently lively, its seafood and
vegetarian restaurants a particular strength.
Among traditional
desserts
, “clootie dumpling” is
a sweet, stodgy fruit pudding bound in a cloth and
cooked for hours, while Cranachan, made with
toasted oatmeal steeped in whisky and folded into
whipped cream flavoured with fresh raspberries, or
the similar Atholl Brose, are considered more refined.
CLASSIC DISHES
Arbroath smokies
Powerful smoked
haddock (see p.351).
Cullen skink
Rich soup made from
smoked haddock, potatoes and cream
(p.385).
Haggis
Flavoursome sausage meat
(spiced liver, offal, oatmeal and onion)
cooked inside a bag made from a sheep's
stomach. Tasty and satisfying, particularly
when eaten with its traditional
accompaniments, “bashed neeps”
(mashed turnips) and “chappit tatties”
(mashed potatoes).
Porridge
A breakfast staple, this is
properly made with oatmeal and water,
and cooked with a pinch of salt. Some
prefer to add milk and honey, fruit or
sugar to sweeten.
Scots broth
Hearty soup made with stock
(usually mutton), vegetables and barley.
filling, equalling the à la carte dishes served in
adjacent hotel restaurants. Pubs or hotel bars are
among the cheapest options when it comes to
eating out - in the smallest villages, these might
be your only option.
Restaurants
are often, though not always, open
at lunchtimes. When they tend to be less busy and
generally offer a shorter menu compared with their
evening service, and this can make for a more
pleasant and less expensive experience. For
morning or afternoon snacks, as well as light
lunches,
tearooms
are a common feature; you will
often find decent home baking on offer.
As for
fast food
, chip shops, or
chippies
, abound,
the best often found in coastal towns within sight of
the fishing boats. Deep-fried battered fish is the
standard choice - when served with chips it's
known as a “fish supper”, even if eaten at lunchtime
- though everything from hamburgers to haggis
suppers is normally on offer, all deep-fried, of course.
Scotland is even credited with inventing the
deep-
fried Mars bar
, the definitive badge of a nation with
the worst heart disease statistics in Western Europe.
For alternative fast food, major towns feature all the
usual pizza, burger and baked potato outlets, as well
as Chinese, Mexican and Indian takeaways.
Food shopping
Most Scots get their supplies from supermarkets, but
you're increasingly likely to come across good delis,
farm shops and specialist
food shops
. Many stock
local produce alongside imported delicacies, as well
as organic fruit and veg, specialist drinks such as
locally brewed beer, freshly baked bread, and
MEAL TIMES
In many parts of Scotland outside the
cities, inflexible
meal times
mean that
you'll have to keep an eye on your watch
if you don't want to miss out on eating.
B&Bs and hotels frequently serve breakfast
only until 9am, lunch is usually over by
2pm, and, despite the long summer
evenings, pub and hotel kitchens often
stop serving dinner as early as 8pm.
Evening meals
There's no doubt that, as with the rest of the UK,
eating out in Scotland is
expensive
; our restaurant
