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Scotland: Stovies

If you spend enough time in Scotland, you're likely to run across stovies. This will not happen in any fancy restaurant, but more likely in a pub or similar place where they're serving good commonplace food -- stuff to fill you up, keep off the Hebridean damp, and keep the pints or the whiskey company. Sometimes the stovies will be accompanied by oatcakes, as in the picture to the right, taken at a Scottish ski resort.

Stovies are a leftover dish, and there are probably as many recipes for them as there are families in Scotland. But the basic concept is simple. Cube or chop up your leftover cooked meat (beef from the Sunday roast, sausages, what have you), saute it briefly with onions and part-cooked potatoes, and let the dish finish on the stovetop, developing an attractive and yummy crust.

There will be those who get all tangled up in word history and insist that the name of the dish comes from the French étouffée, "to steam". But despite Scotland's many ancient connections with France, that seems unlikely. The name more likely simply refers to what you cook the dish with, or on.

Click on "read more" for the recipe.

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