WHISKY JOURNAL

Recipe: Ballintaggart Whisky Sauce

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Recipe: Ballintaggart Whisky Sauce

January 16, 2021

Celebrate with us on 25th January 2021 with a traditional Burns Night feast of haggis neeps and tatties. This whisky sauce, using one of our local whiskies Dewars 12 adds a luxurious decadent twist to the usual dish.

The sauce is designed to accompany haggis, served alongside neeps and tatties. As the sauce has a sweetness to it, instead of the usual mashed turnip, we serve small baby pickled turnips alongside the haggis and mashed potato.

If haggis isn’t your thing it works equally well with venison and pork.

The sweetness of Dewar’s 12 lends itself well to the sauce, there are notes of heather honey, toffee and fudge which echo the sweetness of the shallot. The sharpness of the lemon and mustard at the end of the sauce balances out the sweetness.

Ingredients:

2 tsp Scottish rapeseed oil
1 banana shallot, diced
1 glove of garlic, crushed
500 ml double cream
2 tsp wholegrain mustard
2 tsp Dijon mustard
30ml Dewars 12 whisky
1 tbsp chopped chives
½ lemon
Sea salt
White pepper

Instructions:

1. Heat oil in a saucepan and sweat shallot until completely soft.

2. Add crushed garlic and cook for 1 minute more.

3. Add whisky to the pan then double cream and mustards and stir to combine. Bring to a simmer and cook for 2 minutes.

4. Remove pan from heat and add seasoning. Stir in the chives and lemon juice.

5. Serve alongside haggis.

Chris Rowley, chef and owner at Ballintaggart.

Chris began with a career in stocks and shares at Lloyds Banking Group and switched to a career in stocks and sauces. The career change was sparked by the sell-out success and creation of Edinburgh’s first supper club Charlie and Evelyn’s Table (established 2009).

In 2015, he moved to London and started the Leiths School of Food and Wine Diploma. He graduated as Best Student in 2016 and from then worked freelance as a private chef and food stylist for Waitrose alongside gaining restaurant experience with Rick Stein and Nathan Outlaw before he and his family moved to a really special spot in Highland Perthshire Scotland, Ballintaggart Farm in 2016.

Ballintaggart comprises Ballintaggart Farm, a Good Food Guide 2019 listed restaurant with rooms, one of The Sunday Times Top 100 Places to Stay; The Cook School by Ballintaggart, our Cook School with a view; The Grandtully Hotel by Ballintaggart (opened September 2018 in partnership with Chris’s brother Andrew) a characterful eight bedroom hotel, restaurant and vibrant bar listed as one of The Guardian’s Top 50 Hotels in Britain and The Feasts by Ballintaggart, bespoke external catering and events. See Ballintaggart.com

Chris’s food showcases Scotland’s outstanding natural larder, with menus changing frequently to reflect the seasons, the best artisan producers and suppliers and elements grown in the Ballintaggart Farm Kitchen Garden or foraged from the surrounding fields, hedgerows and woodlands.