When Michelin-starred Edinburgh chef Martin Wishart was a boy on Shetland, eating local food was a way of life – ‘Lobster or mussels, or lamb from the croft, and vegetables people grew themselves’. He still prizes the ingredients that come from Scotland’s wide open spaces and sparkling waters, and he has embraced with enthusiasm his new public role as leader of a Scottish Government campaign to promote Scottish produce. ‘Because of the Auld Alliance, we share similarities with French cooking,’ he points out. ‘Cullen skink, for example, is very similar to bouillabaisse – a meal in a bowl.’

He is keen to see the iconic haggis and Arbroath smokie protected as regional specialities under European legislation, and he values growers who have made it their mission to revive delicious old Scottish varieties of fruit and veg. Among his foodie heroes are Northumberland farmers Lucy and Anthony Carroll, who started Carroll’s Heritage Potatoes in the kitchen garden of their farm near Berwickupon- Tweed in the year 2000. Today they produce some 20 varieties on 50 acres, including the evocatively named Arran Victory, Edzell Blue and Highland Burgundy, plus a Shetland Black that Martin Wishart especially enjoys. The little town of Newburgh on the banks of the Tay in North Fife has also been on a horticultural rescue mission, identifying and rescuing its old fruit trees. The area has a tradition of fruit-growing dating back to the 12th century, when the Benedictine monks of nearby Lindores Abbey grew fruit that was famed throughout Scotland. After the abbey closed in the 16th century, its orchard became the gardens of Newburgh.

The Newburgh Orchard Group organised a survey of the town’s fruit trees, planted a new community orchard and started seasonal fruit fairs that now draw visitors from far afield to buy Newburgh fruit and preserves. ‘Newburgh plums in particular seem to have something special about them, says Paul Dodman, Secretary of the NOG: ‘The flesh has a slightly honey taste.’ First Minister Alex Salmond and Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment Richard Lochhead have both spent a week this year ‘eating Scottish’ as a way of drawing public attention to the bounty on our doorsteps. And they are putting public money into giving Scotland’s food and drink industry a boost, not only with measures such as the campaign Martin Wishart is leading but also in the form of capital grants to businesses that produce, process and market local food.

Richard Lochhead recently announced awards of almost £6m to 27 Scottish companies, funding projects as diverse as a burger mixing machine and a packhouse for organic vegetables. One of the beneficiaries of the recent round of grants was the Orkney Cheese Company, which won £16,000 to research uses for the whey that is a by-product of its cheese-making process. Owned largely by a cooperative of local dairy farmers, the company is a local success story, supplying 1,400 tonnes a year of fine Orkney Cheddar to supermarkets across the north and north-east and developing a range of speciality cheeses for delicatessens. Oatmeal is a national staple that can often be overlooked, but it’s at the heart of a giant industry.

Hamlyns Porridge Oats were a highlight of Richard Lochhead’s week of eating Scottish, and no wonder – the product is 100% Scottish and the firm, part of a larger group, buys in some 50,000 tonnes of oats grown from Thurso to the Borders to process in its Banffshire mill each year. Venison, too, is a Scottish classic, but it took a vet, John Fletcher, and his wife Nichola to have the confidence to pioneer the farming of deer at Reediehill Farm in Auchtermuchty some 33 years ago. They have seen great changes in the way they sell their products as time has gone by, starting out by selling from the farm gate, then getting into mail order and the internet. Their most recent venture has been into farmers’ markets. As Nichola points out: ‘In Scotland there hadn’t been a history of outdoor markets since the Second World War, and when we did our first one in 2001 our initial feeling was ‘This is great, but how long will it last after Christmas?’ But it did.’ Nowadays they have a presence at several markets every month. Like farmers’ markets, farm shops have grown enormously in importance as a way for producers to make a direct connection with their customers.

Andrew Booth and his family established The Store on their farm near Aberdeen in 2000. ‘We’re great foodies as a family,’ he says, ‘and we started selling our own beef and lamb and other local produce. The result was amazing.’ When his sister in Edinburgh wanted to get involved in the business three years ago, they set up shop in Stockbridge too. ‘A lot of our customers are time poor,’ Andrew says, ‘and things like lasagnes and shepherd’s pies sell week in, week out.’ Farm shops and farmers’ markets don’t work for everyone For Will Henderson, who produces some 2,000 tonnes of organic carrots and 2,000 tonnes of organic potatoes each year on his farm near Blairgowrie, it’s supermarkets that are key, and he welcomes the way many of them now make a point of sourcing local food and flagging it up on their packaging, so that customers can opt for home-grown produce if they wish.

‘The idea of identifying a product with the grower must be right.’ Scottish seafood has sometimes seemed more highly valued on the Continent or in southern Britain than it is at home, but times are changing. Walter Speirs established Muckairn Mussels on Loch Etive in Agyll back in 1985, at a time when mussels were rarely seen on Scottish menus, but now they are immensely popular. ‘More restaurants are making an effort to use fresh local produce,’ he observes. Today, in addition to running his mussel farm, he is a director of the Mussel Inn seafood restaurants in Glasgow and Edinburgh, and he applauds the recent establishment of the Seafood Trail down the Argyll coast. Food and drink producers in several regions have found it an advantage to get together as a group to market their wares.

Three years ago Prince Charles, Duke of Rothesay, was a leading light in helping to establish Mey Selections, which sells quality products sourced within 100 miles of the Castle of Mey in Caithness. Packed in a sophisticated livery of navy and white, and featuring an illustration of the castle by the Prince himself, the range adds up to a unique foodie portrait of the far north, and Mey Selections’ parent company, North Highland Products, has become the fastest growing food and drink company in Scotland.

Other areas will no doubt follow this impressive lead, laying ever more delicious home-grown food on our plates and, in the process, helping Scotland to prosper too.