Stovies

At home, after the fun of Dookin′ for Apples was over we sat round a huge dish of delicious stovies, which had cooked very slowly on the top of the stove in a covered pan, with salt and pepper and knobs of butter. Threepenny bits and charms were hidden in the stovies.

During the winter months my granny always made me stovies on a Saturday and she would spoon them on top of the hot pie and I would sit at a table in front of the fire eating contentedly and thinking about the films I had seen that morning. Stovies, as my grandmother made them, were potatoes and onions cut into pieces and cooked slowly in a pan with only a covering of water at the bottom of the pan, a tablespoonful of roast beef dripping and some salt and pepper. They were delicious.

They accepted her offer graciously, not having a clue what ‘stovies’ might be. Meg soon explained that stovies was a traditional hearty scots meal made from potatoes, onions and left over meat served as a stew.