What’s Boxty? Irish Food Traditions
March 13, 2012
•Le Cordon Bleu
•Atlanta
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What’s Boxty? Irish Food Traditions
For most of its history, food from the British Isles has been seen as more of a dare than as a cuisine. Of those foods, the cuisine of Ireland has often been regarded as the greatest offender of taste and good sense. What the world’s gourmands and gastronomes don’t realize, however, is that there are many wonderful dishes in Irish cuisine that would please even the most finicky eaters. Even the pickiest Georgia culinary snobs could learn to love the downhome goodness of Irish cooking.
That’s no to say that some of its reputation for bad food isn’t deserved. For several hundred years, leading up to independence in the early 20th century, Ireland was a desperately poor nation, and its food reflected that poverty. Subsistence farming of root vegetables, grains, and, most of all, the potato were all that was available to the average Irish family.
Five Irish Food Traditions
It was out of these humble ingredients, however, that some of the most treasured dishes of Irish cuisine were born. With a much smaller investment than the time and cost of Le Cordon Bleu training, you can easily learn how to make all of these dishes.
Let’s take a look at a few.
Boxty
If you visit a “traditional” Irish pub in this country, and it doesn’t have boxty on the menu, then it’s not traditional. Boxty is the Irish version of the potato pancake made of grated raw potato, mashed potatoes, flour, baking soda, buttermilk, and eggs. In many parts of Ireland, boxty is still served several times a week. If you’re looking for a Georgia culinary version of boxty, try some of the pubs in Savannah.
Colcannon
Another potato dish, Colcannon is traditionally mashed potatoes with kale or cabbage, onions or leeks, and cream. It can also be served with salt pork or bacon. The Americanized version replaces the bacon with corned beef. Colcannon was often served at Halloween with coins hidden inside for children to discover. It makes a hearty side dish with just the cabbage or a filling main course served with bacon or corned beef.
Green Cabbage and Bacon
What, no corned beef? That’s right. The traditionally Irish way to serve this dish is with bacon or salt pork, not corned beef. Poor Irish families couldn’t afford the salt or the beef to make corned beef and used the more readily available bacon as the meat to serve with their cabbage. It wasn’t until the Irish started immigrating to New York City in the 1840s and 50s that corned beef became a part of the dish. Serve it either way. Both are delicious.
Shepherd’s Pie
Also known as cottage pie, due to its heritage among poor Irish farmers, this delicious meat pie is a stew of vegetables and meat topped with a crust of mashed potatoes. Originally, shepherd’s pie was made with mutton and cottage pie with beef. Today, however, shepherd’s pie describes the dish regardless of the meat used. Shepherd’s pie was made as a delicious way to get rid of leftovers.
Soda Bread
Of all the foods of Irish cuisine, Irish soda bread is the most quintessentially Irish. As with most poor cultures, bread was an affordable way to fill empty stomachs in Ireland, especially during the traumatic years of The Great Famine. Although soda bread wasn’t an Irish invention, it has become closely associated with Irish cultural traditions. The soft wheat grown in Ireland isn’t very suitable for making traditional yeast-leavened breads, but soda, or sodium bicarbonate, is a perfect match for the flour.
As with most things, don’t believe all that you’ve heard about the poor quality of Irish food. These foods, and many others, prove that the proof is in the pudding, or in the case, the colcannon. Slainte!
This article is presented by Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta.Le Cordon Bleu College of Culinary Arts in Atlanta offers culinary arts and pâtisserie and baking training programs in the Atlanta, Georgia area. To learn more about the class offerings, please visit Chefs.edu/Atlanta for more information.
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