Cookery
Feasting and drinking was the understood way, in ancient celtic Ireland, to welcome visitors to the home, and cookery was simple: large roasts of beef, mutton, goose, pork, salmon and game birds. Mostly served without sauces but with plenty of ale and mead.
The tradition of large feasts died out with the arrival of the English, and as crops of cereal, grain, and dairy produce were exported, the native Irish had only their staple diet of potatoes perhaps with some cheap/fatty cuts of pig and mutton. The lucky ones also had milk and eggs.
1 1/2 pts or 900 ml 0r 3 cups stock (water with stock cube will suffice)
half pt/300ml/1 cup milk
1pt/600ml/2 cups nettles (young, bright, leaves only with stalks removed)
1oz/30g/1 tbsp oatmeal
2oz/60g/2 tbsp butter.
Better to use a food processor to chop the nettles (wear gloves when gathering). Melt butter in large pan and add oatmeal and cook till golden brown. Remove from heat and add stock. Bring to boil and add milk. When it is boiling again, add chopped nettles and cook for a few minutes. Check seasoning and serve with a little cream added.
2lb/ 1kg/ 4 cups mashed potatoes
4oz/125 g/1 cup plain flour
2 tbsp butter, salt.
Mix the flour into potato nad knead. Divide mix into 2 and on a floured board, roll out each half to the size of a dinner plate. Cut into quarters across the middle. Melt the butter in heavy frying pan and brown the cakes on each side. Great served with sausages and bacon as part of a "fry". Should be golden brown and crisp on the outside.
8 medium peeled potatoes
small bunch of spring onions (scallions)
1/4 pt / 125ml/ half cup milk
salt & pepper knob of butter per person.
Boil potatoes till soft but not mushy. Drain and return to heat to dry out. Mash well and keep hot. Chop spring onion, both green and white parts and cook for 5 minutes in the milk. Beat the milk mix into potato and season with salt and pepper. Serve in a big mound on each plate with a large knob of butter in middle.
a variation is COLCANNON
Add cooked and chopped cabbage when you mix in the milk and serve the same way.
6 medium potatoes, 2 medium onions, 5 cups/2 pt/ 1 & 1/3 litres stock,
1 tbsp butter, parsley, salt & pepper.
Peel and dice potatoes. Chop onions. Melt butter and gently cook onions and potatoes in covered pan till soft but not coloured. Add stock, season with salt and pepper. Simmer till potatoes are cooked. You can serve as it, or puree and serve. Serve in bowl with chopped parsely. For extra flavour add chopped lean bacon rashers and add to potatoes/onions as they cook.
8 oz / 250 gr / 1 cup raw grated potato
8 oz /250 gr / 1 cup mashed potato
8 oz / 250 g / 2 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder, knobs of butter,
1/4 pt / 125 ml / 1/2 cup milk
Cooks often add a bit of this and that, so taste varies from home to home, place to place.
2 1/2 lbs / 1 kg boned mutton 1 pt/ 50-0ml/ 2 cups water
4 large potatoes 2 large carrots 2 large onions parsley and thyme salt & pepper
Cut meat into chunks. Peel and thickly slice vegetables. Chop parsely. Use a good sized saucepan and put ingredients in it, in layers, starting and finishing with potatoes. Pour in the water and season. Cover with well fitting lid and cook over a very low heat for about 2 1/2 hours (simmer, not boil) till meat is tender and potatoes are cooked and have thickened the liquid. Sometimes you may need to add extra liquid during cooking, but not too much.
1 lb / 2 cups/ 450 g flour, half teasp cinnamon, half teasp salt, pinch nutmeg,
2 oz / 2 tabs / 60 g butter, 3 oz/ 3 tab/ 85 g caster sugar,
half pint / 1 cup/ 300 ml lukewarm milk, 1 egg,
3/4 oz/ 1 teasp / 20 g fresh yeast,
6 oz / 2 cups / 175 g sultanas, and also same for currants,
3 oz/ 1 cup/ 90 g cut mixed peel.
(takes 2-3 hours to prepare then 1 hour 10 mins to cook.)
Certain things are baked in for fortune telling, so wrap these in foil or greaseproof paper - rings, stick, rag, coin.
Sift flour, salt, spices into large mixing bowl. Rub in butter. In separate bowl add a teasp on sugar and teasp of milk to yeast and mix well. Mix remaining sugar with flour. Light beat eggs and add the milk. Pour onto yeast and add this to flour and beat well by hand until batter is stiff and elastic. Fold the mixed fruit and fortune tellers. Cover bowl with greased polythene bag or plastic-wrap, and leave in a warm place for 1 to 2 hours, to allow dough to rise. Divide the mixture evenly between 2 greased 7 inch cake tins. Cover and stand for another 30 minutes. Set your oven at 200C/400F gas mark 6. Bake for 1 hour. Dissolve 2 teasp. sugar in 3 teasp of boiling water and brush over the brack. Return cake to oven for 5 minutes with heat off to glaze it. Turn onto a cooling rack. Serve sliced, spread with butter.
1 live lobster about 2 lb, 1/2 cup butter, 1/2 cup irish whiskey,
1/2 cup whipping cream, salt & pepper. THIS SERVES 2
Toss lobster meat into foaming butter over medium heat for few minutes till cooked. Take care not to burn butter. Add whiskey and when heat up set light to it. Pour in cream, heat through and season. Serve in the half shells with green vegetable of choice.
(for best flavour fish has to be freshly killed prior to cooking. Plunge knife into the cross on back of head, slice in half lengthwise and crack open the claws. remove all flesh and cut into large chunks. keep both halves of shell for serving.
5 lb or 2 kg joint of corned beef, 1 large cabbage, bay leaf, 2 large onions,
cold water to cover, 2 large carrots, ground black pepper, 4 potatoes. SERVES 4 to 6
Quarter cabbage and put aside. peel and slice other vegetables. Cover the meat with water and bring to boil. Skim the surface, add vegetables (except cabbage), the bay leaf, and pepper and simmer gently for 20 minutes. Add cabbage and cook further 30 minutes. Serve the meat surrounded by vegetables with additional mashed potatoes.
1 lb / 500 grams / 4 cups plain flour
1 tsp salt 1 tsp baking soda 1 tsp sugar (optional)
1 pt / 500 mls / 2 cups buttermilk or sourmilk.
Sieve dry ingredients into large bowl. Scoop up handfuls and drop back to get air through dry ingredients. Add enough buttermilk to make a soft dough. Work quickly with a light knead - too much makes it tough, too little and it wont rise properly.
Form a round loaf as thick as fist. Place on lightly floured baking sheet and cut a cross in the top with floured knife. Put at once, to bake, near top of pre-heated oven, 450 F / 230C / gas mark 8 for 30 to 45 minutes. When cooked , Loaf will sound hollow when you knock knuckles on bottom of pan. Wrap quickly in a clean tea-towel to stop crust hardening too much. If you add 1/2 cup sultanas to this, it is called Spotted Dick.
4 tabs. pearl barley, 1 1/2 lb peeled, cored and sliced apples, 2 oz sugar,
3/4 tabs. double cream, 1 litre water. lemon juice
Put barley in water and bring to boil. Add sliced apples and continue cooking gently til barley and apples are soft. press through a sieve or put in blender. Put back to saucepan, and add sugar and lemon juice and bring to boil again. Remove from heat, allow to cool, then chill. Serve cool with cream stirred in.
Scone dough...
340 g / 12 oz plain flour, 1 tsp baking soda, pinch salt, 1 egg,
50g / 2 oz caster sugar, 80g / 3 oz butter, 175 ml/1 pint buttermilk
white of 1 egg, whisked, and caster sugar to dust.
Preheat oven to 350 F/ 180C / gas mark 4 and grease a 25cm/10 inch deep pie dish. Sieve flour, baking soda and salt into mixing bowl. Add caster sugar and rub in butter. In separate bowl, beat egg together with buttermilk and g radually add this to the flour until dough is formed. Keand lightly on floured surface and divide dough into 2.
Roll out 1 half and use to line piedish. Fill dish with rhubarb and sprinkle with sugar. Roll our remaining dough to form pastry lid. Brush rim with water and put on lid.
Glaze with whisked egg white and sprinkle with caster sugar. make steam slits in lid
and bake for 50 to 60 minutes, or until crust is lightly browned and fruit soft.
Also can be made with apples......yummy!
1/2 pt / 250ml / 1 cup porter, 8oz/ 250g / 1 cup butter,
8 oz/250g/1 cup brown sugar, 3 medium eggs,
2lb/ 1kg / 6 cups of mixed dried fruit (equal amounts of currants, raisins, sultanas, and half as much mixed peel.)
1 1/4 lb / 500 gr/ 4 cups plain flour, 1/2 teas baking soda,
1 tsp mixed spice, and grated rind of 1 lemon (optional)
Allow cake to cool in tin.
Porter is a dark irish beer, but Guinness, Murphys or other Irish stout can be substituted in recipe if mixed 50/50 with water. This cake is quick and easy to make and though it tastes great fresh from oven, it does taste even better if kept for a week in airtight tin.
