We're all into cooking now. So: THREADof amazing Scottish foremothers who are Food Icons. Businesswoman Ethelreda Baxter opened the 1st Baxter's tinned food factory in 1916 expanding her in-laws' grocery business into a worldwide food brand. Also a nurse during WWI. Goddess. /1

Pioneer of the organic movement, Lady Evelyn Balfour founded the Soil Association. She was also one of the 1st women to graduate with a degree in agriculture. Her 1943 book The Living Soil is a bible in the farming industry to this day. What. A. Quine. /2

Reay Tannahill from Glasgow was an historian and food writer. Her non fiction books Food in History and Sex in History were both bestsellers. She knew what was important, right? Also wrote award-winning romances under the name Annabelle Laine. Go Reay. /3

Botanical illustrator, Elizabeth Cameron pioneered the commercial freezing of scampi. Without her, 1970s pub grub classic scampi baskets wd not exist.She drove round the Highlands buying fish to start her company & ended up selling out for millions to Findus. Genius. /4

Orcadian Florence Marian McNeill preserved Scottish folk recipes in her book The Scots Kitchen. She has been called the best writer about Scottish food in history. Florence also worked in social research and published her work on the protection of minor girls in 1916. Legend. /5

Elizabeth Craig collected recipes from the age of 12 and wrote 40 cookery books during her lifetime. She was an expert on rationing during wartime. After 1945 she widened the country's post-war culinary horizons. /6

From Arran, Mary Lee Milne was head cook at the Scottish Women's Hospitals. Milne received a medal in 1916 cos she had been under fire. She later said 'I cannot bear to think of the things I saw.' She cooked thru everything. Walked across the Alps to freedom when captured. Wow /7

Born in Falkirk, trade unionist and consumer rights guru Sheila Marshall McKechnie pioneered the setting up of the Food Standards Agency. Also became director of homeless charity Shelter. What. An. All-round. Shero. /8

These women changed the food landscape from the growing of it, to the legislation around it, to its availability. We come from legends & I haven't even included the women who were Booze Queens. Here's one https://twitter.com/sarasheridan/status/1199962012605911041

And another .... https://twitter.com/sarasheridan/status/1256163736693456897

I wrote about these women & more in my book https://shop.historicenvironment.scot/where-are-the-womencos Our grannies are amazing. It's easy to forget them & if we forget the women we come from we can't really understand ourselves, our own capabilities & the important, interesting places our culture came from /11

I'm now getting gyp cos I have a novel out in 2 weeks & I should be promoting that. So feel free to keep my publisher off my back & preorder here https://www.amazon.co.uk/Highland-Fling-Mirabelle-Bevan-Book-ebook/dp/B07VC12KMC/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=highland+fling+by+sara+sheridan&qid=1589998240&sr=8-1 A murder mystery set in the Highlands in 1958 there's a whisky distillery & some great dinner parties incl.

Thanks for reading to the end of my thread and listening to my Lass Patter. So hold your heads up high. We come from fabulous, interesting, clever people. Now get that sourdough in the oven. xx