What will you be eating with your haggis on St Andrews Day? It’s clapshot for me. Clapshot is an Orkney dish which is delicious and easy to make. Here, exclusively, is my mother’s recipe:
Take 1lb tatties (potatoes) and ¾lb neep (swede), or 500g of tatties and 375g of neep if you are metric. Peel and 
chop fairly small, put on to boil together, in the same pot, in cold water. It’s a good idea to put on the neep first as it takes longer. In the meantime, FINELY chop half an onion. Drain the tatties and neep when soft, add the chopped onion, a good lump of butter, salt and pepper, and mash until smooth. Don’t use a blender, the texture is not good. Enough for three good helpings. It freezes well too.
White turnips are not a substitute for swede. Swede has a purple skin and yellow/orange flesh. The flavour is better after a frost but a spell in the freezer may be a substitute.
Clapshot and haggis
Other people will give you different recipes: some even add carrot (perish the thought!), others omit the onion. I’m sure my mother’s recipe is the best one. She probably got it from her mother, who got it from her mother…
Not a bad recipe but a bit different from mine; I would never add onion, it masks the flavour of the neep. Boiling together the neeps with the tatties is good but I use more neeps than tatties; about two parts to one. And don't spare the butter. My grandma' recipe.
Ah – the great Orkney clapshot debate. I'm sticking to my onions 🙂
I add onions too…my Caithness Mother of Orkney descent always did and added dripping when available. We had clapshot every Christmas as far back as I remember (in my mid 60’s now) and I've carried on the tradition. I always make enough for Christmas Day and Boxing Day.
Yes! My mother even added garlic salt in later years. Always plain boiled neep at Christmas and New Year though. And for mercy sake don't over boil and let it go red!!
You do not know me but we must be related! Reading about clapshot. I was brought up on it! In Perthshire. My mum just used "tatties and neips". Onion and garlic would be nice though. Having an 0rcadian mother I never had stovies! And never have made them. As a newbie on Internet since Dec, the first thing I googled was Orkney, Kebro and the Aunties and found you! Yes, they were my great "Aunties" too. All the names of folk and farms I recognised. My grandfather was John Sclater of Kebro. He had 8 children and I'm one of 18 cousins.
Hi, I don't know you but your name rings a bell – from Kebro of course. My mother (daughter of Jessie) would have been your mother's (Pearl?) first cousin which makes us second cousins. Good to hear from you.