Local Food Producers

A smokehouse, or smokery, is a building where meat, fish and cheese are cured with smoke and stored over long periods to absorb the smoky essence. Originally a way of preserving food, smokehouses are now recognised for their distinctive rich flavours. Cold smoking preserves the food and imparts a delicate flavour, while hot smoking flavours the food while it’s cooking. Argyll’s smokehouses were traditionally used to smoke herring into kippers. This process of ‘kippering’ is where the name ‘kipper’ comes from.

Nowadays, smokehouses have direct access to the freshest, finest Scottish salmon and chips from the oak barrels used in whisky production. The artisan skills of dry curing and slow smoking in kilns have been passed down through the generations to produce something very special. It is so special that no visit would be complete without sampling this unique, aromatic fare.

While our smokeries are probably best known for their salmon, they also produce Loch Fyne kippers, trout, seafood, meat and game, cheese, pates and even trout and lumpfish caviars.

If you’re curious about how smoked products are made, Skipness Smokehouse has a visitor walkway where you can observe production in progress. It’s a nice way to connect with the products, people and artisan skills before choosing which delicacy to sample. The shop offers a wide selection of smoked items, and you can buy baskets to make up your own hampers. If you can’t make it to the smokehouse, look out for their products in Lochgilphead Co-op, Glenbarr Stores (Kintyre), One Fyne Deli (Tarbert), and Tayvallich Café & General Store. While you’re in Skipness, head to the castle and grab some lunch at the Skipness Seafood Cabin, described by Rev Richard Coles in The Guardian as a cabin “that has got it exactly right”. From the castle, you’ll get great views across the Kilbrannan Sound to Arran and you can also walk to the beach to explore St Brendan’s Chapel.

Alba Seafood is a family business which smokes using the shavings from oak whisky barrels for a delicious range of smoked seafood products. Holder of a Great Taste Food Award for their hot smoked salmon, the business produces a distinctive smoked range as well as fresh fish and seafood, expertly sourced by Willie. We‘re quite partial to the smoked salmon pate and hot smoked mussels. Buy online or at local events.

Inverawe Smokehouse is a traditional family business which started with the owners smoking fish in their back garden on the banks of the River Awe. The business now has a Royal Warrant and a host of awards but the smoking technique remains simplicity itself. Prime fish, salt, oak smoke and time combine to produce a smooth, smoky flavour with a delicious, succulent texture. Once tried, never forgotten! Sadly, the smokehouse had a fire last year so, for the time being, the shop and visitors centre is closed but you can still find their products in local deli’s and independent food shops. You can also order online. Visit the website for all smokery products plus a divine range of gift boxes and luxury hampers. The adjacent fisheries offer fly, trout and salmon fishing on Loch Awe, Inverawe Loch and Lily Loch.

The Tobermory Fish Company on the Isle of Mull stretches back to 1971 when a pioneer trout farm was established in the garden stream of the owners. The first smokehouse was established a few years later and smoked goods were offered as part of a family cottage industry. In 1999, the smokehouse relocated to the much larger Baliscate Smokehouse and has since been refurbished. The company is still in the family and uses top-secret recipes passed down the generations, and always uses natural smoke with no dyes or additives. The Tobermory Smoked Trout is the flagship product and it’s so legendary that it featured in an episode of All Creatures Great and Small when a vet received a parcel of this beloved delicacy. It was immediately after this that the mail-order business took off. When Scotland’s National Chef Gary MacLean visited in 2017, he had only one reaction on sampling the trout: “Wow”. You can buy smoked trout, smoked salmon, smoked haddock, kippers and shellfish plus a deli selection from other small local producers in The Tobermory Fish Company Smokehouse and Local Produce Store. It’s a haven for fish lovers and their recipe for Scottish Savoury Pancakes with Tobermory Smoke Trout is divine!

The Isle of Bute Smokehouse (formerly Ritchie’s of Rothesay) has been smoking Scottish salmon, trout and kippers on the West Coast of Scotland since 1888. The original Smokehouse was founded by Peter Barr and Barr’s kippers were believed to be a favourite of Queen Victoria’s when in residence at Balmoral. The company has since evolved but remains a small, artisanal business, using methods handed down from each generation of master smokers. The products are cold smoked using shavings and sawdust from oak whisky casks for a wonderful depth of flavour. Try the Oak Smoked Gin Cured Salmon or the Oak Smoked Scottish Cheddar, or treat yourself to one of their luxurious selection boxes, packed with treats from local producers.

Kintrye Smokehouse was founded by trawlerman Archie Macmillan MBE to further his passion for producing fine Scottish seafood. Located in Campbeltown, the smokehouse (converted from a dilapidated kipper house) handcrafts the finest ingredients into a range of delicious fare, from smoked scallops, smoked halibut, smoked cheese and the aptly named Big Kipper. You can buy their products at the shop or find their range in The Fish Shop (Campbeltown) and Loch Fyne Oysters (Cairndow). If you’re a fan of seafood, the website is well worth a visit for its mouth-watering recipes. We love the Luscious Smoked Chowder and Macmillion Fast Scallops.

Murrays Smoked Products is a long-established family-run smokehouse based in the village of Ford on Loch Awe. You can buy fresh and smoked fish and shellfish at their lovely shop in Lochgilphead. It has a full house of five-star reviews praising the scallops, fishcakes, hot smoked salmon, langoustine and wild-caught halibut. The service is friendly too!

Colonsay Smokery was born of a passion for food and a passion for place. Colonsay Smokery produces the finest traditionally smoked and cured salmon from their old farm steading on 'the Jewel of the Hebrides'. They fillet, cure and smoke the freshest Atlantic Salmon the old-fashioned way - entirely by hand and crafted to ensure it always does justice to the 'Kind of Fish', as well as your table.

In years gone by, each of the Scottish islands would have had its own cheese as a way of preserving the summer milk. Nowadays, a handful of producers keep the tradition going, using time-honoured methods to craft something that’s very special indeed. The fertile green land, the pure air and the passion that goes into making these cheeses in unrivalled. Whether it’s hard or soft, from cows or goats, served on a hearty slab of crusty bread or a handmade oatcake, it tastes wonderful. Try some, and we think you’ll agree, “Blessed are the cheesemakers”.
 
Isle of Mull Cheese is produced on Sgriob-Ruadh farm, just outside of Tobermory. All the cheese is made with unpasteurised milk straight from a hardy, healthy herd of cows fed on grass and whisky grains from the Tobermory Distillery. The milk goes straight from the milking parlour to the cheese vats, and by retaining the organisms normally removed by pasteurisation, the cheese develops an individualism and maturity of flavour.  Isle of Mull Farmhouse is a hard, cheddar-like cheese, with punch flavours while Hebridean Blue is a semi-soft blue cheese with a serious kick. Both are pale in appearance – especially in the winter – because no colouring is added. The Farmhouse cheese is widely considered to be the King of Scottish Cheddars and has won a string of awards, including the BBC Food and Farming Award, Best Scottish Cheese, British Cheese Awards Gold and World Cheese Awards. You can visit the farm to take a tour of the cheese-making, see the maturing rounds in the cellar, and enjoy fresh local produce in the stunning Glass Barn Café with its sumptuous plants and vines. There’s also a farm shop where you can load up with cheese and other local goodies to take home!
 
Isle of Bute Cheese was founded when Ian, a former Civil Servant, found himself at a loose end after relocating to Mull. Wandering around the island, he saw lots of dairy cows but couldn’t find a local cheese. From humble beginnings with a home cheese-making kit, Ian now produces Largie, a hard, crumbly Caerphilly cheese made with milk sourced from Holstein Friesian cows on Largievechtrean farm. The cheese is handcrafted and matured for three months for a lovely tangy flavour. And it’s suitable for vegetarians! Largie is stocked in Achnashelloch Farm Shop and Macqueens of Rothesay and at other local events – see the Facebook page for where to find it.
 
The Inverloch Cheese Company, founded by David and Grace Eaton, has been producing goat's cheese ever since there was a drop in demand for fresh goat's milk. After moving to Gigha, the family expanded their range to produce Isle of Kintyre flavoured cheddars and Gigha fruit cheeses. The cheddars are a taste sensation with flavours such as Laphroaig whisky, mild madras, apple smoke, claret and even gin and tonic. Idyllic as Gigha is, the family struggled to find staff and they now own The Creamery in Campbeltown. This bought opportunities to further expand the range to make Howgate Kintyre Brie, Campbeltown Loch brine-washed cheddar and Howgate Kintyre Blue.  The award-winning blue is made using traditional methods for a mild blue flavour and soft creamy texture. The company remains a family business led by David and Grace, who are still both very hands-on with cheesemaking. It’s best to explore the full range online. You can buy the cheese in H McIlchere & Son (Campbeltown,) Glenbarr Stores (Tarbert), and Loch Fyne Oysters Deli (Cairndow).