United Scotland and veggie haggis

Radio 2’s Ken Bruce is a Scotsman and today he’s been talking about Burns’ Night, which this year seems to be enjoying a higher prominence than normal. Perhaps it’s all to do with the fact that Scotland is in the news a lot at the moment.

If I may just add my tuppenny’s worth to the separatism debate. As someone who spends a disproportionate amount of time in Scotland and who has more Scottish associates than English ones, I’m totally against Scottish independence for a lot of reasons, but for two main ones.

Firstly, because if Scotland votes for independence then we in England will be condemned to a Conservative Government for a generation at least. So without a vote I will have had the Tories imposed on me by Scotland – and I’ll never forgive them for it.

And second, because many years ago when I was music journalist in New Zealand, I was subjected to an internal body search by a Scottish customs officer in Auckland Airport. The worst bit was that the whole way through it he insisted on asking me questions about my weekly music section. Having a conversation in these circumstances is like trying to chat to the dentist while he’s scraping at your teeth. I still shudder at the thought of the whole experience. For this reason I am firmly against anything which would lead to customs controls featuring Scotsmen.

But I digress. Ken Bruce was talking about Burns Night and he was denigrating vegetarian haggis, arguing it has no place at a Burns’ supper. I think the view that you can’t have proper haggis without offal is completely wrong.

For those of you who have never had haggis, it has a slightly oily constitution, should be moist, and has a pepper spice taste, but it doesn’t really taste of very much at all. Vegetarian haggis, on the other hand, over-compensates for the lack of ‘meat’ by adding flavour. For this reason there is absolutely nothing wrong with vegetarian haggis at all.

And while we’re about it, let’s not get too hung up about reading Burns on Burns’ Night either. A few years back I made the mistake of making the Burns reading a key part of the evening but because nobody would volunteer I was forced to do it myself. So I attempted to put on a Scottish accent.

It was horrible. What made it worse, though, was that after 15 excruciating minutes a man at the other end of the table offered – in the broadest Glaswegian accent – to put me out my misery and to take over.

What a sick sense of humour.

If you don’t have a pet Scot to hand, encourage your guests to bring something to read – anything. Bawdy, funny, shocking, bizarre, book, newspaper, magazine – it really doesn’t matter as long as it’s entertaining.

And once again, remember that for all the pomp and ceremony, Burns’ Night has about letting your hair down and having fun.