25 January, 2018

By VIVA Team

Burns Night Blog photo

Many Scottish Expats will be eagerly anticipating a traditional Burns Night supper much like this one, accompanied by lines from a Burns poem.

There are many of you out there who will be forgiven for not knowing your cock-a-leekie soup from your tartan Tam O’Shanter… Perhaps even the celebration of Burns Night itself is an unfamiliar January festivity. However, for Scots all over the world, Burns Night is an unmissable rite of passage that takes place every 25 January, commemorating the life and times of the Scottish bard, Robert Burns…


Who was Robert Burns? Named “Greatest Scot of all time” by the Scottish public in a 2009 poll, Burns was a poet and lyricist who is widely regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic Movement, despite his mere 37 years at time of death. He is perhaps best known for his poem “Auld Lang Syne” (roughly translated as “Old long since” or “Days gone by”), sung on the stroke of midnight at many a New Year’s Eve – or Hogmanay – party down here on the Costa del Sol.

Celebrating all things Scottish, Burns night is a fusion of music, dancing, story-telling, theatre and – of course – feasting on traditional national delicacies. The feast typically includes haggis, a type of sausage prepared in a sheep’s stomach that is minced with onion, oatmeal, suet (raw beef or lamb fat), spices, and salt, mixed with stock. Those celebrating also have mashed neeps and tatties which are turnips, swedes and potatoes.

Haggis neeps tatties

Haggis, neeps and tatties… three staple ingredients in a Burns Night supper for Scots all over the world, including those here on the Costa del Sol.

Here on the Costa del Sol, expats can enjoy Burns Night far from the icy chill of, say, “Auld Reekie” (Edinburgh, by any other name), where temperatures in January far exceed those in Northern Europe.

Burns Night 2018 is set to be a great night of festivities in Mijas Costa, where the Cudeca Goldies will hold their first fundraising event of the year this evening at the Tamisa Golf Hotel. The fundraising ensemble gives concerts and entertains at various events all over the Costa del Sol in aid of the Cudeca Cancer Hospice in Benalmádena. Read more about the Cudeca Foundation here and support what is truly a great cause!

…and if you were wondering, Tam O’Shanter is a name given to the traditional tartan Scottish bonnet or hat worn by men and is named after the eponymous hero of a poem written by – yep, you guessed it! – Robert Burns in 1790.

Happy Burns Night!