Oats So Scottish

Beyond the breakfast bowl lies a grain that helped define Scottish culture and cuisine

- by COINNEACH MacLEOD

SOME childhood heroes arrived beneath stadium floodlights or on the covers of pop magazines. But growing up on the Isle of Lewis in the 1980s, mine stood a little closer to home —right there on the breakfast table each winter's morning. Kilt swirling in the breeze, shot put tucked beneath his chin, he gazed out proudly from the front of my porridge box.

As the wind howled outside and the kettle whistled on the stove, I'd grip my spoon like it was a trophy and dream big. My ambition was set: one day I'd be the one on that box!

Since those early days, my love for porridge has stood the test of time — and countless breakfasts. A few years back, a Danish radio host threw down a challenge live on air: could I eat porridge at every meal for an entire week? To me, it sounded less like a dare and more like my idea of heaven!

Breakfast was simple: classic porridge with water and salt — or sweetened with honey when I fancied a treat.

Lunch meant oatcakes topped with crowdie cheese and smoked salmon. Dinner? That's where I pulled out all the stops: a savoury oat risotto, slow-cooked with pancetta and spring onions, finished with goats’ cheese and a runny egg. For dessert it would be my Drunken Crumble — apples steeped in spiced rum, blanketed by a golden, oaty almond topping.

By the end of the week my Danish challenger admitted defeat, impressed and perhaps just a wee bit jealous.