Céad
Míle Fáilte go 'Shop Irish with Moytura'
This is the start of our Traditional
Irish Recipes pages and what better way to kick off than with the Saint
Patrick's Day Fare. For some unknown reason people living across the big
puddle think that Boiled Beef was the traditional main course. Not at all!
Sure very few Irish homes could afford beef and the only beef on the hoof
to be seen was the very odd milche cow, and she was too precious to be
viewing her for the dinner table!
Most Irish farmhouses reared a pig,
sold the bonhams (piglets) bar one and used this one when reared for their
meat supply for the rest of the year. The meat was salted and brined to
keep it from spoiling and hung in the pantry.
Cabbage was always plentiful in the
early Spring as were potatoes. It's unlikely a starter was around in those
days but to spice things up a bit we'll add a fishy one. Apples had been
gathered and were available for pies or crumbles and of course the milk
cow produced the finest of cream, generally used to make home-made butter.
Traditionally buttermilk was the beverage
of choice with the dinner, as this was the residue from the full cream
milk once the cream was skimmed off and used for butter-making.
Now poteen was probably the drink
of the day for afterwards although some would have had a supply of good
Irish whushkie! So here we go then:
Starter:
Smoked
Salmon and Cheese Noisettes
4 ozs thinly
sliced smoked Irish salmon
4 ozs Vintage/mature
Irish cheddar cheese.
Brown Irish
soda bread and Irish butter.
To bake the
bread you will need:
½lb wholemeal
brown flour, ½lb course white flour, ¾ pint of buttermilk
or soured milk,
2 ozs butter/margarine,
1 level teaspoon baking powder, 2 teaspoons bread soda, 1 oz brown sugar,
pinch salt.
Mix all the
dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Rub in the butter until all is
well mixed. Make a well in the center and pour in the buttermilk/sour milk,
mixing with the hand or a wooden spoon. The mixture should be wet and sticky.
Turn out onto a floured board or marble baking slab and kneed gently for
a few minutes. Don't over-do it or the bread will be tough. Shape the dough
into a plate-sized round mound. Place on a buttered/greased baking tray
and score the bread from edge to edge with a cross, cutting half-way into
the mix. Bake at 400F for 30 - 40 minutes. Test its readiness by tapping
the base - it should sound hollow.
Butter the bread
and cut into slices about ½" thich and 2" square. Place slivers
of smoked salmon on each slice and top them off with thin slices of the
cheese. Place under the grill until the cheese has melted. Serve warm.
Main Course:
Pig
& Smuggage
2 ½ lb Collar of bacon (See
our Foodhall
Deli Counter for real Irish bacon)
Medium-sized cabbage
In Ireland, "bacon" can mean any cut
of salted pork except ham. North Americans call bacon what we in Ireland
call "rashers" or "streaky rashers". You want any thick cut of pork, with
or without bones, about four inches by four inches by four or five inches.
It does not have to have been salted first, but if you want to approximate
the taste of the real Irish thing, put it down in brine for a day or two,
then (when ready to cook it) bring to a boil first, boil about 10 minutes,
change the water, and start the recipe from here:
Place the joint in a pot, cover with
cold water and bring to the boil, Remove the scum that floats to the surface.
Cover and simmer for 1½ - 2 hours (or 30 minutes per pound).
Cut cabbage into thin shreds and add to pot after about 1½ hour.
Cook gently for about ½ hour, or until cabbage is cooked to your
liking. (Test constantly: don't overdo it!) Drain, and
serve with potatoes boiled in their jackets and a knob of butter in the
centre cut. Add a sharp sauce -- mustard or (if you can get it) HP sauce.
We like to dress our bacon with a
white onion sauce. Chop up a medium onion finely. Cook till clear in colour
in an ounce of butter. Thicken the mix to a roux with a good tablespoonful
of flour. Pour on 1 pint of milk, mix well and bring to the boil, stirring
constantly. Add salt and pepper to taste and stir until a thick runny sauce.
Dessert:
Apple
Crumble
1 lb Cooking apples, tart*
6 oz Brown Sugar
4 ozs sultanas
3 ozs white flour + 3 ozs brown wholemeal
flour
4 ozs margarine/butter/shortening
1 teaspoon baking powder
Peeled, core and thinly slice the
apples. Make a breadcrumb pastry mix by rubbing the shortening into the
flour until it resembles large breadcrumbs. Add 3 ozs of brown sugar to
the mix. Layer the apples, the sugar and the crumble in a buttered
overproof dish, alternating a tablespoon of sugar and a layer of apples
and finally a layer of crumble. Sprinkle the top with the remaining suger.
Bake at 350F for 40 minutes. Serve with custard or whipped double cream.
Irish
Coffees:
1 fl oz good Irish whiskey per person
(Paddy or Jameson makes great Irish coffee)
1 teaspoon of brown sugar per serving
(or more to taste)
½ pint double cream whipped
to a thick running consistency.
Hot coffee.
Pour the whisky into each of the heated
glasses then pour the hot coffee over the back of a spoon to avoid cracking
the glass. Mix in the sugar. Holding a clean spoon at the inside edge of
the glass pour the cream slowly until a ½" white head sits on top
of the coffee solution.
Slaínte!
Those of you with an interest in Ireland
might enjoy a quick visit to our sister site - Moytura.com
where you can journey with Mary through some of her favourite places in
the West of Ireland and to other places she enjoys visiting a little further
afield. Or perhaps relax a while on her Reflections
pages or maybe even visit the Circle
of Prayer where people all over the world, and from every denonimation
(and none), join together to pray for and with each other every day!.
