Tag Archives: Flora MacDonald

Cafe Portrait

29 April 2024 billpaterson1@me.com 4 Comments

A few months ago we visited Cafe Portrait in late afternoon only to be told that if we wanted any of their “absolutely delicious” scones we would have to be there much earlier in the day. The manner in which we were told sounded almost like a challenge, throwing down the gauntlet, even!

External view of the National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh — Opened in 1889 at a cost of £70,000, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery on Queen Street

Scones versus lunch

Never ones to shirk a scone challenge we set about it today. Rather conveniently the Portrait Gallery is on the same street as the Whisky Society where we were to have lunch. Suffice to say we were there early enough and they had scones … fruit and cheese and mustard. Mindful of our lunch date later we decided to share one of the cheese and mustard scones … unexplored territory for us! But first we spent some time going round the exhibits.

Internal view of the National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh — The Foyer. The Gallery was built in 1889 at a cost of £70,000 funded by John Ritchie Findlay, owner of The Scotsman newspaper.

Scotland certainly had its fair share of heroes and scoundrels. Here’s a random selection.

Robert Burns, reproduced on shortbread tins the world over, this is the first time we have seen the original by Alexander Nasmyth in 1787

Gregor MacGregor painted in 1804. Scotland’s greatest scoundrel through selling packets of useless land in a semi fictitious Kingdom in Central America. Somehow he managed to be buried with full military honours in Venezuela

Portraits of Flora MacDonald and Bonnie Prince Charlie — Flora Macdonald who famously helped Bonnie Prince Charlie escape to France (painted by Richard Wilson in 1747) and the Bonnie Prince himself (painted by William Mosman in 1750)

Execution of Charles I — The rather jolly looking beheading of Charles I. Perhaps we have progressed after all … Charles III shouldn’t have to worry too much nowadays (painted by Jan Wessop in 1649)

Okay, but what about the scones? Cafe Portrait is big and airy and busy. We might discover whether or not their rather immodest claims for their scones were justified or not.

A first

There’s lots of delicious looking food on offer but, mindful of our lunch date, we only wanted a scone to share. The fruit scones looked good but we decided to be adventurous and try their cheese and mustard offering. We hadn’t come across that combination before. No need for jam and cream, butter was all that was required. It was delicious with a lovely textured crunch and soft interior that tasted like nothing we had tasted before. Probably more cheesy than mustardy but the two together formed a very savoury treat! We had to admit that their original bragging was entirely justified and we felt slightly chastened for having even doubted it … topscone.

Illogical

The only downside to our visit was that the lift wasn’t working.

Painting of photographer with a plate camera — I started my career on plate cameras like this. Now, just fifty years later, I only ever use my phone … incredible.

Turned out that it hasn’t worked for the whole of this year. Apparently it’s the only one of its type in the world and they are currently waiting for technicians to come from Italy to try and fix it. Only the directors of an art gallery could get into a situation where a completely unique lift is required. Hopefully it will be sorted soon because there are a lot of stairs.

Talking of illogical decisions It would appear that this year the world reached an all time spending high of £2.6 trillion on arms manufacturing. Surely this is an indictment on all of us. Just think for a second on what that vast amount of money could have done had we not directed it towards death and destruction. The world needs a ‘reset’ button where it can return to original settings. But were the original settings any better? Aaaargh!

And today Humza Yousaf stepped down as First Minister of Scotland in a very graceful speech. Probably too nice a man for politics, it will be interesting to see what happens now.

Robert Moffat missionary with John Mokoteri and Sarah Roby. Mokoteri and Roby were supposedly his adopted children but were more akin to servants

In case you’re worried, we hadn’t spoiled our appetite and managed a fantastic lunch at the Whisky Society, helped down by a few glasses of the amber nectar.

EH2 1JD tel: 0131 624 6200 Cafe Portrait

///supporter.united.emerge

Ordinary, Scones

Antlers Tea Room

12 November 2023 billpaterson1@me.com 5 Comments

You know how we’ve been going on bit about family connections to the Isle of Skye. We’re very aware that if you’re not a MacDonald or a McKinnon then it could be of limited interest. So, if you’re bored already you should stop reading because there’s more MacDonald stuff coming up in this post. My middle name being MacDonald has got nothing to do with it … honest!

Titles

Today we are at the Antlers Tea Room which is part of the Portree Hotel. The hotel was built in 1875 and stands on the corner of Somerled Square.

Painting of the Portree Hotel — A painting of the hotel in the bar

The Square is so named to commemorate the great Celtic warrior Somerled who died in 1164. His son, Donald, became the first Lord of the Isles and the MacDonalds (sons of Donald) are all descended from him. The current Lord of the Isles is Prince William, Prince of Wales, who also bears the other Scottish titles of Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick and Baron of Renfrew … really? We think the MacDonalds, whose chief now lives at Kinloch Lodge, need to get that “Lord of the Isles” title back! It seems only right.

Anyway, we ordered a fruit scone to share at Antlers because they were quite big and we thought that’s all we could manage. We have to be ever mindful that there’s a fabulous dinner being prepared for us back at Kinloch Lodge. It would be rude not to be able to do it justice. A good decision because our scone wasn’t that great. It had plenty of fruit but it was just too soft and a little bit stodgy. Shame because with its big wood burning stove it was a nice cosy place.

View across Portree harbour — Looking over Portree harbour

Good guys

There’s a small plaque on the wall outside that commemorates a speech given from the hotel balcony by radical republican Michael Davitt in 1887. He had already been imprisoned a couple of times for speechifying. Scotland’s land ownership has long been something of a monopoly. Most private land is held by a mere handful of people. During the Highland Clearances people were driven off the land – you can see ruined and abandoned villages all over Skye. Davitt campaigned long and hard for crofters to have the right to stay on their land. Not a MacDonald but still a ‘good guy’. He must have been because he spend much of his life being imprisoned by the British establishment.

But enough of Davitts, let’s get back to MacDonalds. When we left Antlers replete with half a scone each we headed north on the road that leads to the Old Man of Storr. Normally we would cut off at Staffin and take a rather tortuous road across to Uig where we were usually trying to catch a ferry to the Outer Hebrides. The road, however, carries on through Staffin and round the Trotternish peninsula. Eventually it ends up at Uig as well. It’s longer hence we have never taken it before. We were now venturing into unknown territory. It’s very scenic and, if you’re not in a hurry, well worth the extra miles.

Unsafe

At the most northerly point we came to ruins of Duntulm Castle, an ancient MacDonald stronghold.As recently as the 1990s a large part of it fell into the sea and what’s left is considered too unsafe to visit. However, that may also be because of several ghosts that we’re told still reside there.

Just a mile or so further south we came to Kilmuir churchyard. There’s no church these days but the graveyard where Flora MacDonald is buried is still there. She and Bonnie Prince Charlie landed here having sailed from Benbecula where he had been hiding from the redcoats. He was dressed as Betty, one of Flora’s female servants. Something, we suspect the Bonnie Prince enjoyed more than he should. The crossing was romanticised in the song The Skye Boat Song.

Monument to Flora MacDonald — The monument looks out over the Minch to South Uist in the Outer Hebrides where she was born

The headstone inscription reads: ‘Flora MacDonald. Preserver of Prince Charles Edward Stuart. Her name will be mentioned in history and if courage and fidelity be virtues, mentioned with honour.’

She was imprisoned in the Tower of London for her trouble and is generally seen as a Jacobite heroine. Later, however, she said that if she had found the Prince’s arch enemy, the Duke of Cumberland in similar circumstances she would have done the same for him. She was just another ‘good guy.’

Fashion

Amazingly we also found that Alexander McQueen, the talented but troubled fashion designer and couturier is also buried here. Although from London he loved the Isle of Skye … the land of his father. Readers have probably always wondered why Pat and I are always so stylish and debonaire. One of our twin daughters was Digital Director for Alexander McQueen while her sister was doing the same for Jimmy Choo. We know you’ve always wondered!

Sadly this is our last day on Skye. On our way back for dinner at Kinloch Lodge we stopped off at Sligachan hotel. This was an old haunt when it was mainly frequented by hairy unwashed climbers. It’s definitely gone upmarket since then.

Black Cuillin from Sligahan — Evening view of the Black Cuillin from Sligachan

Seeing this view of the Black Cuillin brought back memories of camping high up amongst these peaks and using them as a kind of playground. At that time ‘wisdom’ wasn’t a word that could be remotely associated with me or my friends. However, they say it comes with age. I wish I could say that today when my desire to be back up on the Cuillin ridge was tempered by age-acquired wisdom. It wasn’t, t was all down to age-acquired decrepitude.

The Cuillin Ridge — Black Cuillin ridge by www.summitpost.org

There was nothing else for it … back to Kinloch for more pampering!

9EH tel: 01478 612511 Antlers Tea Room

///exploring.risking.starch

ps: In the interests of balance we should point out that some people see the MacDonalds and the McKinnons as nothing more than lying thieving good-for-nothings. However, they are usually McLeods or Campbells … and what do they know? Pots and kettles come to mind!

Scones, Top

Greywalls

4 September 2023 billpaterson1@me.com 8 Comments

Isn’t it really silly that a country like Scotland has to resort to protest marches just to get a say in our own future. Well here we are in Edinburgh, along with thousands of others, being really silly. If this is what it takes, so be it. It was a very happy day with all age ranges well represented. Being part of a sea of Saltires, however, made us wonder how it came to be the national flag … the oldest flag in the world. We probably understand the American and Australian flags better than we understand our own, Because our readers are spread all over the world we feel a duty to enlighten, not only about scones but about Scotland as well. So here goes! Hang in there, we do eventually end up with scones at Greywalls.

WARNING:

Like a lot of Scottish stuff … haggis, unicorns, kelpies, Nessie etc. one has to keep an open mind. To get Saltire answers we travelled about 20 miles east of Edinburgh to the tiny village of Athalstaneford and the Flag Heritage Centre. It’s housed in a doocot (dovecot) built in 1583 when people were presumably a lot smaller than they are today.

Saint in a quandary

In 832 the Battle of Athalstaneford took place here. The Northumbrian’s were totally brassed off with the Picts coming south and stealing their cattle. They formed an army led by Athalstane and headed north bent on revenge. Angus, King of Picts, feared what was coming and prayed for help from St Andrew. Lo and behold, in the sky there appeared a cloud formation in the form of a diagonal cross the same as the one on which St Andrew had been crucified. Inspired, Angus won the day and promised to make Andrew the patron saint of Scotland for helping him win. Mind you Andrew is also patron saint to both Russia and Ukraine … bit of a quandary there? Readers should also bear in mind that in the 9th century they hadn’t realised that these patterns were invariably caused by vapour trails from high flying jets.

Anyway, Greywalls is just a hop skip and a jump from Athalstaneford. You can probably tell from the title picture that it’s our kind of place. Lovely country house surrounded by beautiful gardens. Expectations were high!

Mashie niblicks

The house was built in 1901 as a holiday home for the Hon Alfred Lyttelton. He insisted that it be built ‘within a mashie niblick shot of the eighteenth green at Muirfield’. That’s a lofted club so not very far. You will remember that, in 2017, this was the golf club at the centre of a sexism scandal for refusing to allow women members. Obviously they lost that battle! As a hotel, however, Greywall’s remains a favourite haunt of golfers from all over the world. The interior is as you would expect of such a grand country house, though somewhat oddly, we were shown into a rather modern conservatory area which contrasted strangely with the rest of the house.

We ordered tea and scones. And they were duly delivered in what we would describe as an efficient rather than a friendly manner. Again, as with our previous post from Craobh, they arrived on a slate. The scones were excellent. Slightly warmed and crisp on the outside with a fabulous soft interior. Lots of jam and cream. We felt they might even challenge our benchmark scones from Fonab Castle and Schlosse Roxburghe. They definitely would have if the service had not been quite so rigid. Still a good topscone though.

A life and a half

In the hall there was a portrait of Flora MacDonald Horlick. She was a direct descendant of Flora MacDonald who bravely disguised Bonnie Prince Charlie as Betty Burke, her Irish spinning maid to help him escape the redcoats. He fled to France but she was caught and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Years later she arrived in South Carolina at the beginning of the American Revolution.

But having backed the losing side she ended up forced into hiding herself. She lost everything and opted to return to her beloved Skye. During her return this defiant woman, refused to opt for safety below deck and was shot in the arm by pirates. We think she would have been a member at Muirfield whether they liked it or not. She died in 1790, survived by seven of her children and is buried on Skye wrapped in a sheet in which the Bonnie Prince had slept. That’s a life and a half. But her descendent in the picture, by comparison, seems to have had a much more privileged life.

Marches, flags, battles, scones and heroines … quite enough for one day!

EH31 2EG. tel: 01620 842144 Greywalls

///shaped,sweetened.undivided

ps This Falkirk made K6 telephone box is outside the Flag Heritage Centre in downtown Athalstaneford. It still has a working telephone and also functions as a library.

Scones, history and a dollop of politics