Cullen Skink

Ainekset

500 g undyed smoked haddock, skin on

A bay leaf

Knob of butter

1 onion, peeled and finely chopped

1 leek, washed and cut into chunks

2 medium potatoes, unpeeled, cut into chunks

500 ml whole milk

Chives, chopped, to serve

Ohjeet

Put the fish into a pan large enough to hold it comfortably, and cover with about 300ml cold water. Add the bay leaf, and bring gently to the boil. By the time it comes to the boil, the fish should be just cooked – if it's not, then give it another minute or so. Remove from the pan, and set aside to cool. Take the pan off the heat.

Melt the butter in another pan on a medium-low heat, and add the onion and the leek. Cover and allow to sweat, without colouring, for about 10 minutes until softened. Season with black pepper.

Add the potato and stir to coat with butter. Pour in the haddock cooking liquor and bay leaf, and bring to a simmer. Cook until the potato is tender.

Meanwhile, remove the skin, and any bones from the haddock, and break into flakes.

Lift out a generous slotted spoonful of potatoes and leeks, and set aside. Discard the bay leaf. Add the milk, and half the haddock to the pan, and either mash roughly or blend until smoothish.

Season to taste, and serve with a generous spoonful of the potato, leek and haddock mixture in each bowl, and a sprinkling of chives.

Muistiinpanot

About that name: Cullen is, of course, a fishing town on the Moray Firth, an inlet popular with haddock, while "skink" has a more puzzling history. The New York Times claims it comes from the Middle High German word for a weak beer, which seems to make some of sense for a thin soup, but the Oxford Companion to Food counters that it's a variation of the German "schinke", or ham, denoting a shin specifically: "so the archetypal skink is a soup made from shin of beef". Cattle perhaps being more valuable than fish in coastal regions, the locals adapted the idea to suit their own ingredients – and I'm very glad they did. Smokier and more assertive than American chowder, heartier than classical French bisque, it's one of the world's finest seafood soups.