Cooking with Original Spice
Confirmed city girl Kerry Teakle takes time off the grid at Ghillie Basan’s remote foodie outpost
Being invited to an isolated part of Scotland, with intermittent internet access, was always going to be an interesting gig for a confirmed city girl, but the opportunity to learn how to cook mezze from the Original Spice Girl was too good an opportunity to turn down for this Edinburghfoody blogger.
Ghillie Basan runs what must be the most remote cookery course in the UK from her home at Corrunich in the Scottish Highlands.
Ghillie gives an amusing account of her tough lifestyle at her rural outpost, where she has singlehandedly raised her two children and maintained an international career in her book, The Moon’s Our Nearest Neighbour.
Corrunich is an hour’s drive from Aviemore, with nothing but the views of the Cairngorms National Park in between.
A food anthropologist and writer, Ghillie has written more than 40 books on the subject of Middleeastern, Turkish, North African, Southeast Asian and Indian food and is an authority on these cuisines.
Her cookery workshops are informal. You cook in her kitchen, using her utensils and crockery,
There’s no need to be a good cook but you do need some basic knife skills
picked up on her travels around the world, with all the aromas and flavours of the different cultures. She’s a prolific storyteller and you are soon immersed in the customs and cultures of the food as you enjoy the cooking experience. Ghillie will take you on a virtual food safari. You might look at the spices from East Africa and India or cook tagines and couscous from North Africa. There’s no need to be a competent cook but you do need to have some basic knife skills, with Ghillie acting as the guide, teaching you what to do and how to combine the ingredients. This is all enjoyed with a glass of wine or two, before you finally sit down to enjoy the fruits of your labour, either at her farmhouse table or outdoors, weather permitting, soaking in the views.
My experience was to learn to prepare mezze, an ancient tradition, enjoyed by the Greeks, Romans, medieval Arabs, and Ottoman Turks, and which is at the heart and soul of modern culinary life in the Middle East.
Thought to have derived from the Persian word “maza” meaning “taste” or “relish”, mezze is designed to be savoured alongside tea, wine, beer, or a yogurt drink with the aim of pleasing the palate, rather than filling the belly. It is a relaxing custom that can be enjoyed at any time of the day as an appetiser, snack or as a buffet spread, served in small quantities and shared at a leisurely pace.
Using recipes from her book, Mezze – Small Plates to Share, we prepared a feast of roasted baby peppers stuffed with feta; courgette, feta and herb patties; turmeric potatoes with lemon, chillies and coriander; a salad of orange with dates, chillies and preserved lemons; parsley salad with mint and bulgar; hot hummus; and smoked aubergines to make into a dip with tahini and parsley; learned how to prepare labna (yogurt cheese) and also dukkah, a spice rub containing roasted hazelnuts, coriander and cumin seeds, which can be enjoyed as a snack when combined with olive oil and served with chunks of bread or simply enjoyed sprinkled over salads, grilled meats or sautéed vegetables; and to finish, a sweet dish of dried apricots stuffed with labna and soaked in a rose syrup.
All this was prepared whilst snacking on sweet melon with feta and some labna with dried and fresh mint. If the cookery workshops sound too much like hard work (they honestly aren’t), if you are staying nearby, Ghillie can also bring a selection of mezze to your selfcatering location, courtesy of her new venture, Mezze on the Move.
The day workshops can be enjoyed with a partner, family member or a couple of friends or there’s also the option to book a week’s holiday in Ghillie’s cottage and request a day workshop while you are there.
By converting one of her barns into living quarters, Ghillie has created an idyllic wilderness retreat within her property. With stunning views of open moors and hills, it is a perfect place to get away from the stress and noise of daily life. There is no phone – just the sound of the birds and plenty of space. You can step out the door and walk into the hills and it’s the perfect place for a digital detox.
I spent just two days and one night at Ghillie’s and can honestly say that it’s the most relaxing, informative trip I’ve had in ages, and it felt like a week’s holiday. It appears you can take the girl out of the city after all. ■
Day Workshops: £150 per person (minimum two people, reduced rate for four or more) – includes a bottle of wine and all the food, which you can tuck into at the end and take home with you. Residential Workshops: £240 per person (reduced rate for three people) – The price includes a Day Workshop with two nights in Ghillie’s self-catering barn conversion. www.ghilliebasan.com