Hurray for Paddy’s Day!!

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17th March St George's (2)

St George’s Market in full Paddy’s day mode!

This is the first time in my lifetime that I remember the St Patrick’s Day parade being cancelled. With the pubs mostly closed too, it’s going to be the weirdest Paddy’s Day ever! However, that’s no reason not to celebrate our Patron Saint.. We’ll be having Irish Stew, Soda Bread and Irish Coffees as always!

St Patrick’s Day has so much going for it! In Ireland, it’s the first Bank Holiday of the year, a welcome break from Lent – that’s an Irish thing – and what often seems like a never-ending Winter.

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This is my absolute favourite St Patrick’s Day cartoon! It makes me laugh every time.. :)

 It’s so nice to get a break in those long days between Christmas and Easter, even if it is mid-week. Better still if the Saint’s day falls on a Friday or Monday – hey presto – a long weekend!

 

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My darling little Mickey Mouse in full Irish mode!

As children in Dublin we went to the St Patrick’s Day Parade, green ribbons in our hair for the girls, and bunch of shamrock on coat lapels for the boys. And very cold it was too – there always seemed to a be a marching band from America, freezing to death.

13th March Belfast (20)

 

17th March St George's (3)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then home for Irish Stew (more of that later), and the second-last of my Mother’s Christmas puddings (the last one emerged on Easter Sunday). Hard to believe, but even as children we absolutely adored Christmas Pudding, so it was a huge treat!

There was a film on the telly for us too, usually one with an Irish theme, or starring an Irish actor. All-in-all, a pretty good day, with the promise of Winter’s end, and Easter looming.

It’s different in our house nowadays. Depending on the weather, we start with a Special Breakfast. Those of you familiar with my blog will have heard about Special Breakfasts before – it’s usually pancakes or French toast, but 17th March gets a different treatment – it’s the Full Irish, or the Ulster Fry, or both, whichever you like.

There are a couple of differences between the two – the Full Irish has bacon, eggs, sausage, sometimes fried bread, and mushrooms or fried tomato, AND Black and White pudding  -and oh, I love black pudding!  The Ulster fry has bacon, egg, sausage, mushrooms, tomato, plus Potato bread, fried Soda farls, and sometimes even a bought pancake.. I love potato bread  and soda as well! I am a truly ecumenical breakfast eater!

Anyone mentioning baked beans should leave now.. 😉

I’m torn…so obviously I do a combination of both – potato bread, soda farls and black pudding – as long as I have a runny egg or two to dunk them in, I’m happy :)

My Mum used to make Potato cakes using leftover mashed potato – they are softer version of the Northern Ireland Potato Bread, but are perfect in the Full Irish along with that runny egg! Here’s the recipe:

https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/my-mothers-potato-cakes 

Potato cakes (1)

 

Another great treat for St Patrick’s day is Tea Brack – here’s  Mrs Halpin’s version – best eaten with lots of lovely Irish butter  :)     https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/mrs-halpins-tea-brack/

 

tea brack 2 tea brack 4

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you make a pot of tea today, and soak your fruit overnight, you’ll be impressing your friends and neighbours by  the weekend!

Don’t forget some easy-as-pie Soda Bread too – I make at least 2 loaves of this traditional Irish bread every week. I like to throw in a good handful of raisins, but the plain version is delicious as well – especially with Irish Stew

https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/the-white-cottages-soda-bread/

Soda bread from Skerries (2)

 

For those of us lucky enough to have access to the accurately-named Soda Bread Flour – why not try Mrs Norah Brown’s Soda bread Bannock?

Norah Brown's Soda Bread (5)

https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/mrs-browns-soda-bread-bannock/

And Soda Bread leads us nicely along to Irish Stew.. and well, here’s a bone of contention, if ever there was one..

I’m not going to say which is the true owner of this title, because it comes down to a very simple fact – whether you have beef or lamb in your Irish stew depends entirely on what your family ate when you were a child, and I for one am not going up against that number of Irish Mothers! Apart from the meat involved, the recipes are absolutely similar.

I’m going to offer both here, in the interests of peace and quiet.. :)

Irish Lamb Stew:

https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/irish-lamb-stew-as-my-mother-used-to-make-it/

Wheaten bread

Irish Beef Stew:

https://eatingforireland.com/recipe/irish-beef-stew-as-his-mother-used-to-make-it/

Almost exactly like lamb stew, except with beef pieces, and beef stock.

 

beef stew

Once again, the weather this Paddy’s day is promising to be cold, so pick your stew and run with it. You’ll be glad that you did :)

To finish off my St Patrick’s day feast, I think a few Bailey’s Truffles will be acceptable..

https://eatingforireland.com/2017/12/28/baileys-truffles/

Truffles (4)

La Feile Naomh Padraig! Happy St Patrick’s day to all!

And regardless of how we spend it this year – have a lovely day!  :)

And here’s a picture that I took last week in Athlone – the charity shop was all decked out for St Patrick – I just love those snakes at the bottom of the window!!

March 8th Athlone (1)

About

I started writing down recipes in an old copybook when I was about 16. With 6 children at home, my Mother was always glad of a hand in the kitchen, and really allowed us to experiment - as long as we washed up afterwards, and left the kitchen immaculate! Having a tidy kitchen has followed me through my life, as has the habit of writing down my favourite recipes; except that these days I write them for my website, and add photographs when I can. The website really started when it occurred to me that my daughter might like to have these recipes when I've forgotten them. In my early days of cooking for family and friends, I used to phone my Mum all the time to ask her for the recipe for some of our favourite family dinners. She rarely had a recipe to hand - I think, like me, she made a lot of it up as she went along.. So welcome to Eating for Ireland - these are the recipes that my friends and family having been eating these past 40 years.. yes, I truly am ancient! They are tried and tested, and have worked for me for all that time - I have updated them as new ingredients became available - I really hope you'll find something that you can make into a family favourite of your own. You don't have to tell anyone where you found these great new dishes that you're serving up - it can be our little secret, but I'd really love it if you could give me a sneaky 'follow' on Facebook and Instagram.. So off you go - have a good rummage around, you're bound to find something new! My sincere thanks to all of you who have found a recipe that you liked and dropped me a line to tell me - I really do love to hear from you! Happy Cooking! Becks xx

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