The article detailed how all the best Scottish seafood would leave Scotland headed for Spain, as there was no domestic market for the more esoteric or indeed expensive catches. Now I don’t know if it was the fact that I was reading this one morning in the Californian sunshine over coffee, that perhaps fuelled a little nostalgia and a yearning for the bonnie bonnie banks. It certainly evoked memories of my parents driving me, my brother and sister from Glasgow to Palamos in Catalunya in 1974, and our subsequent yearly pilgramages.

Whatever………….. that article stayed with me.

Fast forward 15 years, I’ve had enough of the music business, and developed a high level dependency on sherry. I opened my first restaurant Bar Esteban in Crouch End in 2013, followed by Escocesa a couple of years later in Stoke Newington, with Pablo Rodriguez from Barcelona on the stoves and Naroa Ortega from Bilbao running front of house. Pablo served time in michelin star restaurant Jean Luc Figueras in Catalunya, before coming to London and working in Barrafina and Moro / Morito. Naroa worked front of house in some of the best restaurants in the Basque country, including world famous Asador Etxebarri.

So in a nutshell we’ll be hi-jacking some of the best Scottish seafood on it’s way to Spain and serving it along side some of the best Spanish produce, low intervention wines and sherries.

salud, salut, osasuna

Stephen Lironi – owner

Pablo Rodriguez – executive head chef

Naroa Ortega – operations manager

Stephen, Naroa And Pablo - Loch Ness