The Scottish Society of Santa Barbara decided to hold a Scottish Chinese New Year Dinner as inspired by Vancouver's Todd Wong.

Gung Haggis Fat Choy is spreading to California.  2008 marks a suprise appearance in Santa Barbara.  I had always thought it would start in San Francisco or Berkeley, because of my many dragon boat connections.  Indeed, the San Francisco based Dieselfish dragon boat team got a taste of the haggis during the 2006 Victoria dragon boat festival.

Officially, the only American Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner that has occurred has been in Seattle, organized by Bill McFadden of the Caledonian and St. Andrew's Society of Seattle. It has been a wonderful event that grew from 120 people in 2007 to 340 people in 2008.  Funds raised have gone to help support the Northwest Junior Pipeband, in their quest to compete at the World Championships in Scotland for 2008.

As for the Santa Barbara event, I guess it was a clandestine Gung Haggis Fat California event.  I hope I can get invited to the next Santa Barbara “Gung Haggis inspired event.”  I like Santa Barbara.  It's nice and sunny.  Okay… I haven't been there since 1989, after driving up the coast from Los Angeles after visiting Disneyland.  I wonder if they have any dragon boat races in Santa Barbara?

Check out this newsletter and report from:
http://www.scottishsocietysantabarbara.org/recent.html

Haggis and Chinese food.   Kathleen explains the haggis, and even has pictures of Gung Haggis Fat Choy – with Todd Wong wearing a Royal Stuart tartan + Chinese Lion's Head mask.

February: Scottish Chinese New Year This month's theme was inspired by 5th-generation Chinese-Canadian Todd Wong. In 1998, Chinese New Year and Robert Burns Day were only two days apart. Todd had an idea to combine the two celebrations, and so the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner began. So our recipe of the month was haggis and, in the silly spirit of Gung Haggis Fat Choy, we feasted on haggis won-ton and Peking haggis, among other goodies, while Kathleen gave us an overview of haggis lore. According to Kathleen, a haggis is a four-legged hairy creature whose fur is used to make sporrans. The haggis hunting season is from St. Andrew’s Day in November to Robert Burns’s birthday in late January. The food known as haggis is made of lamb, beef, organ meats and oatmeal stuffed into a sheep’s stomach. The filling is similar to turkey stuffing, but with oatmeal instead of bread crumbs. Gung Haggis Fat Choy has become quite an event in Vancouver, BC. You can read more about how the event came about on Todd’s Gung Haggis Fat Choy Dinner page.