IN the hospitality business, we all look forward to the end of August with an enormous sense of relief. It is such a hectic time of year, and the pressure to perform constantly and consistently every day is challenging for everyone who earns a living from serving the travelling public.

Back in the 1700s and 1800s, life was also hectic for those who ran taverns, inns and cookshops. In Edinburgh, eating out was commonplace as often, lodgings were literally a room, a bed and a bucket. This was how many people lived in the tenements which tottered high above the Old Town, a warren of narrow closes, steep stairways and darkened doors to hidden homes. The cobbled streets contained open markets stalls, luckenbooths, coffee shops and popular howffs, hectic with working traffic. Many local residents didn't have the means to cook for themselves and the numerous public eating houses provided plentiful, inexpensive hot food as well as good company and conversation.

The food was of a much higher quality and nutritional value than the fare we associate with today's fast-food outlets. Once upon a time, oysters were shucked and consumed in vast quantities and regarded as poor man’s food rather than a luxury. I lament the decline in stocks of Scotland’s fabulous wild salmon. In my early years at The Three Chimneys, the king of fish was a speciality on the blackboard in the summer months. Recently, I cooked a whole fish for my husband’s birthday buffet lunch. This brought a flashback memory for my daughter when she arrived at the house to find me preparing the hefty, silver-skinned fish in my kitchen sink.

Sundays used to be my salmon days. The restaurant was closed to the public, but I spent most of the day off scaling, gutting, filleting and portioning at least 10 beautiful, firm, wild salmon ready for the following week. These fish were bag-netted at one of two licensed salmon stations in Staffin Bay and at Camustianavaig by Braes and usually weighed around 20 pounds each. It was a big job.

The River Tweed – one of Scotland’s most famous salmon rivers, winding from high in the Border hills above my home town of Peebles to the North Sea by Berwick-upon-Tweed in Northumberland – must have provided fresh salmon in copious amounts. Tweed Kettle – often described as a salmon and potato hash – was a common, everyday meal. There are many references to this dish in our culinary heritage, but it is difficult to find a specific recipe. Potatoes and mushrooms seem to have been significant ingredients, at a time of year when Scotland’s new potato crop was available and indigenous, chanterelle mushrooms plentiful to pick. With the addition of available fresh garden herbs, new season’s onions and sometimes, fresh peas or white turnips, this must have been greatly enjoyed by students and workers in the capital city, washed down with a tankard of local ale.

For Scotland's Salmon Festival – which begins this week in Inverness – the following recipe is my own interpretation of what Tweed Kettle may have been like when served in Edinburgh taverns centuries ago. I have created it on a domestic scale, but imagine it would have been cooked in something akin to a salmon kettle: a large, long, double-handled metal pot with an internal trivet upon which the fish sits while poaching in the liquor.

http://scotlandsalmonfestival.org

Tweed Kettle

(Serves 4 – 6)

900g fresh salmon fillet, taken from the middle, or tail end, of a whole side

700ml water

150ml white wine vinegar

1 lemon, juice only

1 mixed bunch fresh herbs, stalks included (I used fennel, lovage, parsley and lemon thyme, but you may like to add some dill, or a few celery leaves)

2 bay leaves

¼ tsp sea salt

½ tsp white peppercorns

150ml white wine

900g Scottish new potatoes, preferably of a floury variety, not too waxy

1 large onion

200g Scottish chanterelle mushrooms

75g fresh Scottish butter

Sea salt, pepper and/or dried seaweed flakes for seasoning

4 large syboes

1 tbsp chopped chives

Method

1. Take a large, shallow saucepan or roasting tin, big enough to take the whole piece of salmon. Add the water, vinegar, lemon juice and all herbs, bay leaves, salt and peppercorns, plus seaweed flakes if using. Place the salmon on top, cover with a lid (or foil, ensuring the foil does not touch the surface of the fish). Bring water slowly to boil and turn down heat to allow salmon to simmer gently for up to 5 minutes, depending upon thickness.

2. Test the salmon with the point of a sharp knife in the thickest part. This should have just turned paler pink and appear opaque throughout. Turn off heat and leave in the poaching liquor for a further 5 minutes.

3. Lift salmon from pan and set aside to cool. Strain the poaching liquor through a sieve into a measuring jug. Discard contents of sieve. When the salmon is cool enough to handle, remove the skin and gently break fish into large flakes with your fingers. Retain the skin.

4. Brush and scrape the thin skins from the potatoes, cut in half and boil in salted water until cooked. Strain and set aside to cool a little. Gently crush the potatoes, but do not mash them.

5. Peel and cut the onion in half. With the cut side down on the board, slice the narrow edge from right to left into thin, half-moon slices. Set aside.

6. Clean the chanterelles with a damp pastry brush, or kitchen paper. Tidy them up, remove any crumbly bits and the base of the stalks and set these aside for making the final stock. In the main, keep them whole, but if some are larger than others, cut in half.

7. Wash, top and tail the syboes and cut into thin slices, retaining as much green as possible.

8. Place the salmon skin, mushroom offcuts and clean syboe trimmings in a saucepan, together with white wine and 275ml of the strained poaching liquor. Bring to the boil and simmer until liquid has reduced by half. Strain reduced stock through a fine sieve into a measuring jug, discarding contents of sieve.

To assemble the dish

1. Heat 25g butter in a frying pan until foamy, add onion slices and cook gently until translucent. Season lightly.

2. Add cooked onions to the crushed potatoes and turn both together gently.

3. Add flaked salmon and turn again. Once mixed gently, place all into an ovenproof dish.

4. Heat another 25g butter in the frying pan until foamy. Add the prepared mushrooms and toss in the butter until beginning to soften and glisten. Season with a pinch of dried seaweed flakes, if using, but don't add too much salt or seasoning, as you want the natural flavour of the mushrooms to shine through.

5. Add the sliced syboes and turn again.

6. Spoon the cooked mushrooms and syboes over the salmon mixture.

7. Pour over the reduced, hot stock to no more than ¼ of the depth of the ovenproof dish.

8. Season the whole dish with a sprinkling of sea salt and pepper, or seaweed flakes, but do not overdo it, as the reduced stock will add a lot of flavour. Dot the mixture with the remaining 25g butter and place in the centre of a moderate oven (180°C, Gas Mark 4) for 10-15 minutes, until the ingredients are hot and the surface is turning golden. Sprinkle the finished dish with chopped chives and serve immediately.

Shirley Spear is owner of The Three Chimneys and The House Over-By on the Isle of Skye www.threechimneys.co.uk