There must be plenty of luxury food suppliers who are wondering what this Christmas will hold. In a normal year, many would expect to do up to half their annual business in the coming month, but, as we are all too painfully aware, this is no normal year. The question is, will we go for one last splurge while we still have two coins to rub together, or can Tiny Tim go whistle? It’s probably still too early to say, although word has it that while restaurant bookings are down, sales of tea bags and scatter cushions are up, so at least we’re geared up to sitting out the recession in comfort.

Where that leaves Fergus Granville is anybody’s guess. As owner of Hebridean Smokehouse, he is responsible for what is widely recognised to be some of the finest farmed smoked salmon in the country (Albert Roux is a fan, as is Prue Leith, who describes it as “the best in the world”). It’s a luxury product, to be sure.

“Our salmon is more expensive than most. There’s absolutely no getting around that,” Granville says from the island of North Uist in the Outer Hebrides. The reason, he says, is that compared with most producers, he gives their fish an extra year in their open sea pens, where they develop stronger muscles from swimming against the naturally fast current. “Fish from an industrial-scale farmer would be more oily and flabby from having been grown very quickly. There’s a place for that, of course – like any other product, such as bread or wine, there are all sorts of different levels, and it would be fine for cooking with – I just wouldn’t want to smoke with it.” In addition, the currents and open position keep the fish naturally free from disease. “Uniquely among fish farmers, we don’t even have a licence to treat our stock. We’ve never needed to.”

His fish are killed by hand, salted and smoked for 12 hours over the local peat (“an important fuel,” explains Granville, “as the islands are treeless”) to give them their pronounced flavour. You can cut right down to the Neolithic period in terms of peat formation, but, “You have to use the right level. Go too deep and it burns too hot; too near the top and it’s too smoky.” He finds 150-year-old peat just right. “After smoking, the remaining pin-bones are removed with tweezers and the smoked sides chilled overnight before being hand-sliced and vacuum-packed the next day.” A 250g serving for four costs £14.95 including delivery.

If that doesn’t make you gulp, then you’ll be pleased to learn that, this year, Granville has further bucked the economic forecast by introducing peat-smoked lobster tails, which he admits is “a specialised market for people who know and like lobster, and are keen to try a new angle on it”. These are not farmed – juvenile lobsters are terrible cannibals, apparently, and would have to be kept in individual boxes or they’d turn on each other – but landed by day boats on North Uist. Within three hours, they are in Granville’s smokehouse. “As with all foods, the fresher you get them, the easier it is to produce something of good quality,” he says. In this case, that means a beautifully firm yet tender tail of meat, whose natural sweetness is enhanced by the robust smoke flavour. “A few people question what the smoke adds – they say the same of our smoked scallops – but it really does give the lobster a new dimension.”

Granville recommends serving it on a blini with lime mayonnaise and topped with lumpfish roe or, if the fancy takes you, caviar. At £15 for a 100g tail, it’s certainly no recession-buster, but as Granville says, a little does go a long way.

Hebridean Smokehouse, North Uist (01876 580209; www.hebrideansmokehouse.com)

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