Every St. Patrick's Day, my family and friends get together for a huge party with music, drinking and food. Living in a country that has such a wide variety of cuisines, I am always a little reluctant about sharing my family's Irish food recipes, because to me, Mexican, Italian and Chinese food are all much, much tastier.
I am always amazed, however, at how much everyone loves the food each year. Irish stew is the main staple, and it's ever-present at the party. I will also cart out our family's various other Irish food recipes every year to introduce my friends to new dishes, and it's always met with great enthusiasm.
Four years ago, I decided to try Dublin Coddle. To be fair, I had never eaten coddle personally, but I had read about it in a James Joyce novel and had to give it a try. I did not have a recipe for it, but fortunately my grandmother did, and it turned out great.
Everyone raved about it so much, and so many friends kept asking me for my Irish food recipes, that I decided to try colcannon next. Colcannon is a dish that consists of potatoes, cabbage and sour cream, and I was not really sure what type of reaction such a simple dish would receive, but once again, everyone loved it and ate every last bite.
The next year, I asked my grandmother to make her famous Shepherd's pie, which is actually more representative of the British Isles as a whole as opposed to just Ireland. In my grandmother's version, there is beef, onions, cheese and, you guessed it, potatoes.
One of my friends astutely pointed out that all of my Irish food recipes included potatoes in some form or fashion. She asked me why I had never included corned beef and cabbage on the St. Paddy's Day menu, as it is the meal that most Americans seem to associate with the holiday.
I explained that corned beef and cabbage was actually an Irish-American dish. It originated in the United States, not in Ireland.
I told her that, as an Irish-American, I had no problem including corned beef and cabbage on the menu if it was something people really wanted, but that it was not included in my Irish food recipes because it is not something that is authentically Irish.
In the coming years, I plan to introduce boxty, which is sort of a potato pancake with a few other ingredients, and I am sure it will be a success as well. I'm still not sure if it is the Irish food recipes that everyone loves so much or the free pints of stout, but one thing is for certain it is probably the one and only time of year that my friends get to experience what it is like to truly eat like the Irish.