We celebrated Robert Burns’s (the poet) 250th birthday last night with friends from Scotland. My favorite Burns factoid of the evening – he stayed busy, as he had 32 known children at the time of his death at age 32. We ate some traditional Scottish food - neeps, tatties, and haggis = turnips, potatoes, and haggis. Haggis is a Scottish ‘sausage’ traditionally made out of sheep stomach and filled with grains and unpleasant meats (think tripe). The newer version uses ground beef and is in a less-repulsive casing. It gets cooked by being steamed for 3 hours. Since you can’t bring meat into the US from the UK, they had to find a more local source of haggis. Local turned out to be Texas and they got a mail-order haggis. It was actually pretty good, although not the most attractive of foods. Earlier in the first trimester, I don’t think I could be in the same room as a haggis without having to excuse myself.
2 comments:
The British Lit courses at Baylor were divided into "Before Burns" and "After Burns"!! But we never got to eat haggis in class!! (And now that I'm thinking about it-- when was Burns studied? Must have been in either--or both--courses.)
needless to say, burns' 250th was a big deal at SHAPE. one of my UK church mates was "indisposed" the next morning. his wife made his excuses. but some of the biggest fans of burns night are the germans, which is not surprising if you know them. they'll seize any occasion to party. apparently they love scottish dancing. one of them had even taken it home to his village in germany a few years ago and the entire resultant scottish dance troupe showed up for burns night.
living in an international setting is fun and surprising.
david
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