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The Potato
Recipes
The Irish traditionally served
colcannon at Halloween for dinner, often with a silver
sixpenny wrapped in greaseproof paper and buried within
the dish. To be served the sixpenny meant a year of
good luck.
As with most recipes, there are several ways to make
colcannon. Some cooks substitute kale for cabbage.
Others fry the finished mixture in an iron skillet
until the bottom is brown. Still others add minced
garlic.
Today colcannon-a stomach-filling dish-might be served
at any time, especially St. Patrick's Day. It is also
a favorite among vegetarians seeking a healthy food.
Non-vegetarians often eat it with sausage, an Irish
custom.
Ingredients
1 medium cabbage, cut into quarters with core removed
2 pounds of potatoes, scrubbed, peeled, and cut
into large chunks
2 medium leeks or a small bunch of scallions (spring
onions)
1 cup milk
8 tablespoons butter
salt and pepper
1/2 teaspoon of mace (optional)
Cooking Instructions
1. Boil
cabbage in salted water until tender; drain, chop,
and set aside.
2. Boil potatoes in salted water until
tender; drain and set aside.
3. Chop leeks/scallions and simmer in milk
until tender (be careful not to scald or burn
milk).
4. Add leeks to the potatoes, reserving
milk.
5. Mash potatoes by hand, adding enough
milk for a smooth mixture.
6. Mash in the chopped cabbage, then the
butter.
7. Add spices to taste.
8. Serve as is, or place in an ovenproof
dish and broil until top is brown.
Potato farls, or potato cakes,
come from the northern part of the island. Traditionally
cooks fried the farls in bacon fat, not the vegetable
oil suggested below. The dish forms an important part
of a breakfast known as the Ulster Fry: farls, bacon,
eggs, sausages, and fried soda bread. Don't count
the calories! The meal is meant to fuel a hard day
of work. (Take a look at the recipe for boxty, which
is sometimes used instead of farls.)
Ingredients
1 1/4 pounds of potatoes, scrubbed, peeled, and
cut into quarters
2 teaspoons melted butter
1 cup flour
4 teaspoons vegetable oil (or bacon fat)
1 teaspoon salt
Cooking Instructions
1. Boil potatoes in salted water until soft.
2. Drain, add the butter, and mash thoroughly.
3. Add flour and salt, mixing thoroughly.
4. Divide mixture in half.
5. Knead one half on a lightly floured surface until
it forms a flat circle about the size of a
dinner plate.
6. Repeat with the other half.
7. Cut each half into quarters.
8. Heat the oil (or bacon fat) in an iron skillet
and fry batches of the farls until crispy on
each side.
| Boxty
(Potato Griddle Cakes) |
Boxty can be part of an Ulster
Fry, too. The dish was so popular that an old Irish
poem warned:
Boxty on the griddle,
boxty in the pan,
if you can't make boxty,
you'll never get a man.
Meant to be humorous, the poem still showed the importance
of boxty to Irish diets. It was eaten nearly every
day, often with a tart apple sauce.
Ingredients
1/2 pound raw potatoes
1/2 pound (about 2 cups) mashed potatoes
1/2 pound flour
1 egg
milk
salt and pepper
Cooking Instructions
1. Grate raw potatoes.
2. Mix with mashed potatoes.
3. Beat egg and stir into potato mixture.
4. Add flour and salt and pepper.
5. Stir in just enough milk to make a batter (should
drop, not run, from a tablespoon).
6. Drop spoonfuls of batter onto a hot iron griddle
or skillet (can lightly oil).
7. Cook until lightly browned.
Irish cooks wasted nothing,
especially the water used to boil vegetables or, if
they were lucky, a chicken or shank of ham. This stock
formed the vitamin-rich basis of Irish potato soup,
a standard in peasant cottages. It might be served
with another standard, potato bread.
Ingredients
6 medium potatoes
2 medium onions
1 tablespoon butter
2 pints vegetable stock
1/2 pint milk
1 teaspoon cornmeal (or flour)
salt and pepper
parsley
Cooking Instructions
1. Peel and dice potatoes.
2. Chop onions.
3. Melt butter in a heavy, covered pot.
4. Add potatoes and onions.
5. Cook potatoes and onions until soft
(do not brown).
6. Add stock.
7. Bring to boil and then reduce heat;
simmer until the vegetables are soft (stir
constantly).
8. Remove from heat and put through a
sieve (or food processor/blender in modern
times*).
9. Return to pot and reheat.
10. Mix cornmeal (or flour) and milk; stir gradually
into soup until the desired consistency
is reached (can
skip this step, if desired).
11. Add salt and pepper to taste.
12. Garnish with parsley.
*Do not put hot soup into a food processor or blender.
It might explode! Allow the mixture to cool first.
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