Cùil: Scots Gaelic n. Nook, nest or corner

Cafe Cùil faces the sea just outside stunning Carbost in the Isle of Skye. In this idyllic setting, award-winning chef Clare Coghill celebrates Highland produce, reimagines traditional Scottish dishes and puts a Hebridean twist on some global ones - think tattie scone tacos, langoustine and whisky bisque, Highland shakshuka, seaweed sauerkraut and Bloody Mhairi.

The Cafe Cùil story began when Clare entered the Channel 4 series, My Kitchen Rules with an old friend in 2017. When they won, she started thinking that cooking might not be just a thing she did for fun, and in 2019 she opened the first Cafe Cùil in Hackney. It quickly became a hotspot for brunch lovers around London, until the covid lockdown forced a move home to Skye.

So welcome to the Cafe Cùil Cookbook. This isn’t a book that demands fancy techniques, instead it shows how easy it can be to cook delicious dishes without taking things too seriously, using many of the ingredients we have on our doorstep, whether you’re in Skye or Dalston.

'Clare has masterfully turned a village cafe on Skye into a must-visit destination for food lovers from across the world to visit. Her passion for not only locally-sourced, sustainable produce but also her commitment to the community, local culture and the Gaelic language makes Cafe Cuil not just a place to eat, but to experience'

Clare Coghill is a Scottish Gaelic-speaking chef who grew up on Skye, where her family had owned a hotel for over 100 years. Despite a childhood immersed in the hospitality industry, she spent her twenties doing everything from training brewers at Tennant’s, pouring candles for an artisan candle company, and working as a TV researcher. After winning the title of Britain’s Best Home Cook on C4’s My Kitchen Rules, she started to think about returning to the world of hospitality. This is her first book.