Mallaig goes wild about new food festival
MALLAIG cooked up a storm at the weekend, as the first Taste the Wild food festival was held.
Saturday’s events saw hotels and restaurants working together to produce the food festival, which involved butchery and fish demonstrations, wine-tasting and a whole lot of shelling, as the world prawn-peeling championship was held.
Sarah Winnington-Ingram, of Arisaig House and chairwomen of the Road to the Isles marketing group, said: ‘I’m thrilled with the whole thing. There is a really lovely atmosphere here and I think it’s more than we could have hoped for. We have proper, genuine local food here at the festival which all the hotels worked together to produce.’
Duncan Gibson, of Glenfinnan House Hotel, put his butchery skills on show and said: ‘Interested parties in food and drink got involved and the ideas just grew and grew. It was like a melting pot – we all just came together.’
Duncan produced the main meal for the ‘scran and dram ceilidh’, which was held in the evening and was attended by around 120 people.
Sine Davis, of the West Highland Hotel, was elated with the day’s events. ‘It’s fabulous that we could all come together and work on this project,’ she said. ‘A huge amount of organisation went into the day, and it’s been a real community builder. We really hope to do this event annually.
‘We have put out fish burgers made with Mallaig kippers and our chef is serving the dessert at the ceilidh. Iain Stewart donated all the monkfish for the barbecue, and Mallaig fishermen gave us the prawns for the contest. ’
Special guest Shirley Spears, owner of the Three Chimneys on Skye, added: ‘This is an amazing occasion which I am proud to be part of. They have really hit the nail on the head.’