Hebridean Food Company adds meat to its range

A SPECIALIST seafood start-up has added organic beef and lamb to its expanding range of sustainable food from North Uist.

Hebridean Food Company's Douglas Stewart with chef Neil Forbes

The Hebridean Food Company – headed by 24-year-old Douglas Stewart – has been selling langoustines, lobsters and other shellfish across the UK for the past year via its online shop. The first cuts from its Highland beef and blackface lamb herds are now also available, with venison to follow in the autumn.

The son of a lobster fisherman, Stewart set up the firm after studying agriculture and business at Edinburgh University. On graduating in 2013, he returned home to start his own business.

“The beef and lamb I’m now able to make available is unique. It’s a genuinely special product,” he said.

Reared on an uninhabited island off the west coast of North Uist, the herds graze on machair grasslands and the surrounding shoreline of seaweeds before being moved back to the heather hills. This traditional method gives the meat a unique flavour showcased at a launch event this week at Café St Honoré in Edinburgh with chef Neil Forbes.

KRISTY DORSEY