IT may turn the stomachs of many diners but to others it is the latest development in the growing trend of using wild and foraged ingredients to create an innovative meal.
While using indigenous vegetables, fruits, plants, herbs, fish and meats is fast becoming the norm, influenced by culinary experts in Scandanavia, one leading Glasgow chef believes he is the first to use hare's blood - and he is using it to make a special savoury custard.
Craig Grozier, whose dining events company Fallachan is about to mark the launch of a new series of “guerrilla bespoke dining experiences”, is preparing to make the dish with the blood of fresh wild Perthshire hare.
Flavoured with locally grown juniper and gin and cooked with cream, it’s believed to be the first such dish using hare blood. Mr Grozier serves the custard with hare haunch, fermented wild sloe berries, wild leek oil and baked Crapaudine beetroot, garnished with Scottish-grown Russian kale chips.
He has also made a Scots boudin noir or hare black pudding. As soon as he can obtain a new-season stag, he will also make the first-ever red deer black pudding.
“Hare blood tastes richer and gamier than pig’s blood, which is the blood most commonly used in such dishes, and it’s also super-local,” he said. “As the hare is very small it means you only get small quantities of blood, which helps increase the dish’s rarity.”
Mr Grozier, who counts Nordic chefs Rene Redzepi, Magnus Nilsson and Christian Puglisi as his greatest influences, will launch Studio93 on St Andrew’s Night, November 30, with a six-course £60 tasting menu which includes a haggis broth (clear haggis-flavoured dashi or consommé) with neep and potato steamed dumplings and ramson oil; herring in oatmeal with gooseberry beer and dill; Gartmorn chicken leg and foot with prune, leek and lovage, and an iced milk with whisky malts, cloutie dumpling and burnst spruce trunk vinegar.
“Hare blood acts like egg white as it has the same protein and can be used as a stabiliser,” he explains. “I’m not the first to use hare blood – it’s used in classical French dish lapin a la royale – but I reckon I’m the first to create a stand-alone hare blood dish.
“Since Scandinavia is on a similar latitude as Scotland it makes sense for us to look to our own land first, and we’re finding more inspiration daily from the amazing range of wild and foraged foods available.”
• For tickets, visit www.fallachandining.co.uk
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here