Great Scot
Nick Nairn teamed up with food service firm Payne & Gunter to create an inspiring meal for leading Scottish figures as they embarked on a Scottish revival. Janet Harmer hears about last month's Friends of Scotland dinner.
A canape of a mini-haggis on a potato rösti was the only nod to traditionalists in a contemporary menu designed to project Scotland as a forward-looking nation at last month's Friends of Scotland dinner.
Held in the historic Banqueting House in London's Whitehall a few days before St Andrew's Day, the dinner was attended by 220 leading Scotsmen and women from the world of industry, business, culture, the media and politics.
It was an opportunity for Secretary of State for Scotland Helen Liddell to announce her initiative to reach out to Scottish expatriates around the world and encourage them to reconnect with their homeland in the fields of business, culture and leisure.
Although Prime Minister Tony Blair was unable to attend, he sent a message applauding the initiative and describing Scotland as "one of the finest tourist destinations in the world".
Liddell was keen to deliver her message within an environment in which the very best of modern Scottish food would be served. So she approached Nick Nairn to provide the catering for the event.
"She wanted a menu that showed how far Scotland has moved on in culinary terms from traditional items such as haggis and shortbread," said Nairn. "The idea was to serve the best of Scottish produce in an up-to-date, innovative way."
To help him, Nairn called on two friends and fellow chefs - Andrew Fairlie, chef-proprietor of Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles, Auchterarder, and Stewart Cameron, executive chef de cuisine at Turnberry, Ayrshire.
The infrastructure for the event was provided by Payne & Gunter, which worked alongside the start-up team from Nairns Anywhere, the outside catering company set up by Nairn and bought by the Compass Group earlier this year. From January 2002, the UK Leisure division of Compass will manage Nairns Anywhere alongside its other fine-dining brands, Payner & Gunter, Letheby & Christopher, Leith's and Roux Fine Dining.
"From a caterer's point of view, the Banqueting House is a nightmare," said Adam Slater, operations manager for UK Leisure, whose team gained access to the venue at 8am on the day of the dinner.
"It is a difficult building to get into, as you have to enter via the Ministry of Defence car park, where there are high security considerations.
"Then all you've got in the kitchen are gas rings and refrigeration, so everything else down to the last teaspoon has to be taken in. On top of that, the kitchen is on the ground floor and the only routes up to the banqueting room on the first floor are via stone steps."
The menu was finalised a fortnight before the dinner, following a tasting between the three chefs and Eric Miller from the Scotland Office at Nairns Cook School in Port of Menteith, Perthshire.
The starters and desserts, together with the preparation of the lamb main course, took place in Scotland the day before the dinner and were driven south to London in refrigerated lorries.
The starter of a ballotine of salmon with a salad of baby leeks, crème fraîche and Avruga (a caviar substitute) was produced by Fairlie. "As well as making something that tasted good, I wanted to do a dish that I could be confident about turning out on a large scale," he said. "And with this dish, I would be happy to knock out 500 of them without too much bother."
Whole fillets of salmon were marinated in sea salt and cracked pepper for two hours before being washed off and coated in finely chopped herbs, including chervil, tarragon, dill, parsley and chives.
Wrapped in clingfilm and foil, the salmon was then lightly poached in a vegetable nage. At the point of service, the ballotine was plated with the leeks, seasoned with lemon oil, and garnished with a dollop of crème fraîche topped with Avruga.
The main course, a saddle of Ayrshire lamb with a smoked bacon, bean and mushroom farce, was a joint effort between Cameron, Turnberry's head chef Colin Watson and junior sous chef Austen Reid.
"Colin suggested smoking the beans used in the stuffing and it was fascinating just how much it improved the flavour of the dish," said Cameron.
The beans - cannellini, kidney and haricot vert - took on a smoky flavour when cooked in stock flavoured with home-smoked vegetables. They were combined with bacon, mushrooms, herbs and lamb trimmings to make a farce. The saddles were stuffed before leaving Turnberry for the journey to London.
At the Banqueting House, the lamb was sealed and roasted, then sliced and served with freshly roasted garlic fondant potatoes and charred slices of baby fennel and aubergine. A lamb jus, reduced with some sherry vinegar, and a herb oil completed the dish.
For pudding, Nairn chose one of his favourite banqueting dishes - a Talisker cream served with marinated strawberries, raspberries, blackberries and blueberries.
"The two components together taste fantastic," he said. The skill in the dish, which is based on a panna cotta-style recipe using milk, double cream, vanilla and Talisker malt whisky, is to judge the amount of gelatine needed to achieve the exact level of "wobbleness" required, and to add the right amount of whisky.
The meal, served with great efficiency by a Payne & Gunter team led by Slater and operations director of UK Leisure Peter Champain, ended with coffee served with tablet and hand-made Scottish chocolates.
Friends of Scotland Dinner
The Banqueting House, Whitehall Palace
27 November 2001
Sea trout wrapped in nori seaweed
Goats' cheese and crushed tomatoes on a croûton
Mini-haggis on a potato rösti
Ballotine of salmon, salad of baby leeks, Avruga
Sauvignon Blanc 2001, Palliser Estate, Martinborough, New Zealand Saddle of Ayrshire lamb with smoked bacon, bean and mushroom farce, sherry vinegar reduction, chives and fresh mountain thyme. Roast garlic fondant, charred baby fennel and aubergine
Rioja Reserva 1997, La Rioja Alta, Spain Talisker cream with marinated berries
Selection of liqueurs and whiskies - Talisker, Johnnie Walker Gold Label, Baileys over ice
