40 years of BAKING in SCOTLAND
Originally from the Western Isles, they now produce traditional shortbreads and sweet biscuits together with a range of enjoyable and energising oatcakes at the modern bakery in Forres, centrally located between the Highland, Speyside and Grampian regions of Scotland. This year they’re celebrating 40 years of baking. It was in 1978 the Maclean’s set up the bakery in Forres, in the shop on the High Street. Since then four generations of the Maclean family have been creating shortbread and sweet biscuits along with Maclean’s Oatcakes, that are made with a family recipe that is over 100 years old. The shortbread is all hand baked and skilled bakers take time to select and combine the finest ingredients to create traditional recipes. Over the years they’ve grown the range of shortbread from luxury butter shortbread to chocolate chunk shortbread and chocolate and ginger shortbread too. For the perfect accompaniment to cheese, your packed lunch or as an appetiser the Maclean family recipe has been used for over 100 years. Campbell Maclean (now there is a contradiction of names!), said, “the secret is in the type of oatmeal that we use and the extra time we take baking them that gives them such a distinctive texture and flavour.”
This is a range which will have an oatcake for everyone: Original, Cheese, Seaweed and black pepper, Haggis, Sweet Chilli, wheat free is now available across all the carton range and canape.
MCLEANSCOTLAND ties up with MACLEAN’S BAKERY all the time, last year (2017) we gave their products away at the Clan Maclean Gathering on Mull. This year, with the help of Lewis Maclean (good Celtic supporter) we will be blending our whisky tours in Elgin and Dornoch (festivals of whisky) with many of his products. My own favourite is the Macleans’ Rhubarb & Custard biscuits, smacking of sweet vanilla crunchy oat biscuits with rhubarb. Heaven! It’s ironic that one of the Maclean family was on the other side of the world when he thought about developing a Haggis oatcake. This vegetarian oatcake is suited to being eaten on its’ own or with any type of soup – another great traditional recipe with a unique twist. After a considerable amount of sampling and tasting they finally found a small company that could produce a great smokey flavour seasoning, that match the profile of their oatcakes. They’re really suitable for all types of cheese, or to be different spread it with pate and a small amount of relish to top it off. Or a dram, of course!
At Maclean’s Highland Bakery they have recipes going back over a 100 years, handed down from generation to generation of Maclean’s family bakers. Over this time many things have changed but there are some things the Maclean family will not change: quality of ingredients, quality of the finished product and eating quality and flavour. Most of these values are adhered to by not taking short cuts in the baking process. Paying attention to the little things really do produce results in the finished bakery products.
They are available all over the place, from Denmark to USA! My advice, forget all the other shortbreads and go and try Maclean’s. With a dram or two! http://www.macleansbakery.com