Cullen skink

Cullen skink

Cullen skink, served with bread
Type	Soup
Course	Starter
Place of origin	Scotland
Region or state	Cullen
Serving temperature	Hot
Main ingredients	Smoked haddock (finnan haddie), potatoes and onions

Cullen skink is a thick Scottish soup made of smoked haddock, potatoes and onions. An authentic Cullen skink will use finnan haddie, but it may be prepared with any other undyed smoked haddock.

This soup is a local speciality, from the town of Cullen in Moray, on the north-east coast of Scotland. The soup is often served as a starter at formal Scottish dinners. Cullen skink is widely served as an everyday dish across the northeast of Scotland.

Local recipes for Cullen skink have several slight variations, such as the use of milk instead of water or the addition of single cream. Cullen skink was traditionally served with bread.

It has been described as "smokier and more assertive than American chowder, heartier than classical French bisque."

Cullen skink appears in many traditional Scottish cookery books and appears in numerous restaurants and hotel menus throughout Scotland, the UK, and internationally. In 2012 a Guardian columnist described the dish as "the milky fish soup which has surely replaced your haggises and porridges as Scotland's signature dish".

Skink is a Scots word for a shin, knuckle, or hough of beef, which has developed the secondary meaning of a soup, especially one made from these. The word skink is ultimately derived from the Middle Dutch schenke "shin, hough" (cognate with the English word shank and German Schenkel, 'thigh', and Schinken, 'ham'). It is not to be confused with the skink, a family of lizards belonging to the infraorder Scincomorpha.