Everybody in Scotland has red hair, wears the kilt and says “See you Jimmy” every five minutes, right?
Wrong. Yet as a nation, it is an image we have battled to shrug off for years.
There’s another old picture of Scotland that’s completely out of focus. That’s the one where some assume we have a diet of deep-fried Mars Bars, chips and cakes, washed down with gallons of whisky or that other national drink, Irn Bru.
While these old music-hall images may get a cheap laugh, the truth is far more entertaining.
Scotland has become a magnet for tourists keen to spend their valuable free time exploring a beautiful country where the food and drink on offer is second to none.
Two major food events are under way at the moment which underline how much we have to offer, and how important the food and drink economy is.
The Scottish Food Fortnight has almost 60 events taking place across Scotland over a two-week period, and involves schools and numerous participants from the food and drink industry.
The second is Highland Feast, the north’s biggest annual food and drink festival which this year celebrates its 10th anniversary with a jam-packed programme of diverse events ranging from mushroom meanders to mouth-watering gourmet dinners.
Nicola Chalmers-Watson, director of the Scottish Countryside Alliance Educational Trust (SCAET) which organises Scottish Food Fortnight, said: “We have a huge variety of the most delicious and sought-after food.
“Salmon and other seafood is exported to many countries, while our venison, Angus beef and countless other foods have the highest of reputations with chefs and supermarkets around the world.
“We want the public to take some of the great opportunities Scottish Food Fortnight offers to sample and taste the best of the country’s food and drink.”
Richard Lochhead MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment, who officially opened the Scottish Food Fortnight at Glamis Castle on Friday, added: “Since I launched last year’s event, we have taken major steps to develop our first national food and drink policy to achieve the freshest finest future for Scottish food and drink.
“The time is right for a fresh new future for Scottish food and drink, there is a real enthusiasm to make changes to the way we eat, buy, produce and sell food and drink.
“It is vitally important that we continue to work on improving the nation’s diet and having increased access to the excellent produce our farmers and other suppliers provide is a step in the right direction.”
Top Scottish chef Nick Nairn is an unpaid ambassador of Scottish produce. He has also done his bit to boost visitor numbers since he set about converting an old piggery on his family’s Port of Menteith estate into what has become Scotland’s foremost cook school.
“If there is one message I hope Scottish Food Fortnight gets across, it is to make people much more aware of where their food comes from,” said Mr Nairn.
“We have successive generations of children who have been brought up with a diet of processed food who are divorced from where real food comes from.
“If we continue down that route we will all end up in the hands of the food processors and multiple retailers and that would be a disaster for everybody.”
Nick wants people to use the next few weeks to change their shopping patterns by visiting farmers markets, local butchers and fishmongers, as well as using the time to find out what’s on offer in their area.
Speaking of the standard of fare available in eateries he added: “We have pockets of excellence dotted across Scotland, from the Three Chimneys in Skye to Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles. However, in the bistro/cafe area we often fall woefully short.
“You should be able to eat well on a budget and, by and large, you can but for a country that has an embarrassment of produce from the sea, meat, poultry, game, vegetables and fruit, we should be able to have a much better offering than we currently do.”
Which is all the more reason to support those who do step up to the mark such as Claire, Lady Macdonald, award-winning cook and food writer, who is also Patron of Scottish Food Fortnight.
“Scottish Food Fortnight highlights the huge range and quality of Scottish produce,” said Lady Macdonald.
“Ever increasing numbers of food producers from Shetland to the Borders, from Grampian to the Western Isles, and all points of this country in between, greatly anticipate the publicity that these two weeks bring to every person involved.”
Those who doubt the importance of the food and drink industry to the economy might want to take a look at the visitor numbers attracted to food events.
The Loch Lomond Food and Drink Festival held in June pulled in more than 20,000, while the same month saw more than 14,000 attend the annual north-east celebration of all things edible, the Taste of Grampian food fair in Inverurie.
This month, thousands will attend a living food event in the grounds of Cawdor Castle near Nairn. It is a celebration of organic food, supported and assisted by the Soil Association and the Slow Food movement.
It is part of Highland Feast, a food and drink festival which last year attracted almost 11,000 visitors, more than half non-locals, and generated a whopping £1,723,985 of net economic activity for the region, as well as boosting its profile.
“These headline figures are fantastic news for the festival and for the region,” said festival director Yvonne Crook.
David Broadfoot of Cawdor Castle added: “Highland Feast is a fresh, fun and wonderfully dynamic festival and, importantly, one which clearly has a dramatic impact on the local economy.”
According to Erik Wolf, CEO of the Culinary Tourism Association, culinary tourism is one of the fastest-growing industries in the world, while world experts in food tourism, Professor Michael Hall and Dr Sandra Wilson of the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, argue that local food and tourism are fundamental drivers of sustainable development in rural areas.
In the Highlands, food and drink is worth more than £850million annually to the economy and supports more than 32,000 jobs, while tourism in the region is worth more than £600million annually and supports almost 13,000 jobs.
One eagerly-anticipated Highland Feast event is the Highlands and Islands Food and Drink Awards, which takes place at the Drumossie Hotel, Inverness, on Friday, September 26.
These prestigious awards, now in their fourth year, celebrate excellence and achievement in the food and drink industry in the region. Details of the awards, with full information on Highland Feast can be found on the website: www.highlandfeast.co.uk. For information on Scottish Food Fortnight log on to: www.scottishfoodfortnight.co.uk
A taste of the Highlands competition appears on the back page of today’s See Scotland supplement.