Why does Ireland lack a culinary heritage?

Paddy Cow · 03-04-2019 11:21pm

MrMusician18 wrote: »

Not actually true. When foreigners visited Ireland in the 19C, famine times aside, they were generally surprised at how well nourished the peasantry looked. The potato is almost the complete meal, and combined with some oatmeal and dairy it's a wholesome if somewhat boring diet.

This comment brings me back to a history class about the famine in school. Our teacher was explaining that the diet back then consisted almost exclusively of potatoes and milk. Meat was a rare treat and certainly not something you ate everyday. She asked us if we thought that was healthy and most people said no. She said that it was healthy, if boring, for the reasons you outlined above but it became a double edged sword.

Farmers had the choice between growing grain or potatoes. Potatoes gave higher yields and people became reliant on them. If the potato crop failed one year, it was a struggle for people but they got through till the next. The problem with the famine was that it failed four years in a row and the British were exporting all the grain.

harr · 03-04-2019 11:23pm

I remember growing up in the 80,s all we got was porridge for breakfast weekdays, lunch was sandwich with home made bread and dinner was meat , spuds and 2 veg all cooked for way to long,
Weekend breakfast was a fry and a roast on a Sunday. Monday was cold cuts from Sunday’s roast.
My dad grew all his own veg. But definitely our palette was very very Basic.
I still remember my first taste of curry in a cousins house and my first pizza slice and this was into the 90,s .
I would consider Irish stew to be our national dish and nicest one if done correctly.
My parents still eat the same simple way they always have , as in not much variety.

Huge huge difference now to what my own kids will eat and are willing to try compared to the choice I had growing up.
It’s great to finally see so much fresh Irish food being used in restaurants and not having them turn the ingredients into foreign concoctions.

Doctors room ghost · 03-04-2019 11:25pm

BRINGING THE FOOD TO THE PEOPLE AND THE PEOPLE TO THE FOOD ðŸ˜‚ðŸ˜‚

“The Druid chef”

sheesh · 03-04-2019 11:26pm

Alot of it is gone, you cannot get nice Drisheen anymore, my mother used to boil beef tongue and loved it (it really looked like a tongue!) She talked about making crab-apple jelly, there is still a good tradition of baking pies, cakes and bread the local shop still sell butter milk as people are still baking.

There are existing books describing what the the native irish gentry used to eat like venison and Rabbit there was a starchy root vegetable that they used before the potato arrived.

Btw don't knock bacon and cabbage, Corned beef and Irish stew these are all fine dishes.

Harry Palmr · 03-04-2019 11:32pm

Boiled bacon is lovely if it's done well. Mind you I'm having to think back many years to the last time I had it. Maybe it's time for a "poverty week" week at the cooker.

Capt'n Midnight · 03-04-2019 11:34pm

castletownman wrote: »

I tell ya. There was no gluten-free dishes during the famine.

Everything was gluten-free during the famine.

The wheat was exported. At gunpoint.

And the church in Ireland secretly had lots of potatoes during the famine, and they hid the potatoes in pillows and sold them abroad in potato fairs. And the Pope closed down a lot of the factories that were makin’ the potatoes and turned them into prisons for children.

Del2005 · 03-04-2019 11:34pm

The Rape of Lucretia wrote: »

Fair enough.
Its the people then. No skill, no imagination, no creativity, no refined tastes, too lazy to put effort into using the fine ingredients to enhance the quality of their lives and enjoyment of food.

All our good food was shipped out of the country , food was being shipped to to England during the famine, so how could we develop a culinary culture when we had no selection?

And what have you done to improve our palate?

harr · 03-04-2019 11:37pm

sheesh wrote: »

Alot of it is gone, you cannot get nice Drisheen anymore, my mother used to boil beef tongue and loved it (it really looked like a tongue!) She talked about making crab-apple jelly, there is still a good tradition of baking pies, cakes and bread the local shop still sell butter milk as people are still baking.

There are existing books describing what the the native irish gentry used to eat like venison and Rabbit there was a starchy root vegetable that they used before the potato arrived.

Btw don't knock bacon and cabbage, Corned beef and Irish stew these are all fine dishes.

We often got tongue for dinner and and it was lovely on a sandwich , also loved beef or lambs heart,
All cheap nutritional cuts of meat, pheasant and rabbit were often eaten as well when a neighbor would drop one in.

Paddy Cow · 03-04-2019 11:37pm

Day Lewin wrote: »

Darina Allen's book on Traditional Irish cooking is a mine of information, and some of the recipes and methods are hundreds of years old.
Of course, like in most countries, the rich had access to a greater range of materials than the peasantry.
But poor people had their own foods too...and the locally-produced cheap foods had to be cooked, often needing greater care than tender and rich foods.
Nettle soup, watercress, shellfish, milk products, sheep and goat meat, salted pig-meat, milk and butter in dozens of forms, apples and plums, oatmeal and whiskey...
there is lots to be discovered if you look. Ask your Granny or Great-granny...and write it down!

I've tried cooking bread in a pot-oven, and using a griddle with an open fire. Not as easy as it looks!

I know a Dutch woman who lives in Ireland and she makes nettle soup. I've never tried it myself and she's the only person I know who makes it. I never even considered nettles as a source of soup because those feckers were the bain of my childhood and I considered them something to be avoided, not a food source!

I didn't know until last year that you can actually use dandelion leaves in a salad. I came across a Youtube channel from a woman in her 90's who posted videos (via her grandson) about cooking in the depression. Her name is Clara and she was 91 when she made her first Youtube video. She died at 98 but her video's capture a forgotton time. I would highly recommend looking them up. Her cooking is very basic, like in poor Irish times but there's something very engaging about the simplicity of it all. She has some great memories of those times as well. This is her talking about potatoes and how life was back then. Life was really hard but she has a good sense of humour and doesn't complain. I imagine if she was Irish with an Irish grandson videoing it, it would be similar

Airyfairy12 · 03-04-2019 11:50pm

Id say Irish Stew would be a national dish, both my grandmothers made it regularly.

Ireland wasn't just in poverty, our food was deported to England, most Irish people only had access to basic ingredients like potato, carrots, turnip, cabbage and cheap meat. We didn't have the herbs and spices readily available to us like other countries such as Italy or France. The Uk doesnt have specific culinary dishes either, theyre known for fish and chips.

Tacklebox · 03-04-2019 11:54pm

Last summer I went out fishing frequently just to see how sustainable I can be and had a great time.

I caught trout flyfishing and Pollock from the rock's.
Had a lobster pot thrown into deep water in a quiet spot, had a rope to pull it up.

They were all cooked properly and I had peas and spuds from the garden.

It's easy to do when you're single and have no commitments.

Doctors room ghost · 04-04-2019 12:00am

A goose carrots and roast spuds with gravy is the best dinner you could have.

Odhinn · 04-04-2019 12:04am

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Everything was gluten-free during the famine.

The wheat was exported. At gunpoint.

And the church in Ireland secretly had lots of potatoes during the famine, and they hid the potatoes in pillows and sold them abroad in potato fairs. And the Pope closed down a lot of the factories that were makin’ the potatoes and turned them into prisons for children.

Nonsense.

The Brits robbed all the spuds to make Kings crisps, which no catholic would eat because they'd turn ye protestant and you'd burn in hell. Mr Tayto saw this, and descended from heaven. He allowed himself to be fried for our sins and so we didn't go extinct, which is why he's the patron saint of Ireland.

Elemonator · 04-04-2019 12:09am

Hello? Spice bag?

Conorbarry1984 · 04-04-2019 4:07am

Maybe it’s been said already but fresh Oysters and a pint of Guinness....no other country can claim that combination as their own.

Realt Dearg Sec · 04-04-2019 4:26am

The landlord/tenant relationship, the forced end of commons herding, and the rapid subdivision of land in the 1700s and 1800s is to blame. Across the country, and especially in the Congested Districts, keeping families viable on smaller and smaller pieces of land, whose soil was overworked, led to a reduction in the diversity of vegetables and the availability of meat: everyone was reliant on the (relatively recently imported) potato, and we know the results that followed.

Slightly undercooked potatoes (which take longer to digest and therefore keep you full) and hopefully some milk, will between them provide a pretty well balanced, but completely bland and boring diet. As a survival technique, it worked until it didn't work anymore, but definitely contributed to the decline of a peasant culinary tradition.

But it's a chance for people to whine about another of our failings as a nation, so I'm sure there'll be plenty of people on to tell us how terrible we all are in comparison to our much more sophisticated continental cousins.

Realt Dearg Sec · 04-04-2019 5:07am

Doctors room ghost wrote: »

BRINGING THE FOOD TO THE PEOPLE AND THE PEOPLE TO THE FOOD &#55357;&#56834;&#55357;&#56834;

“The Druid chef”

HAHAHAHA he was spectacular. I remember once he chopped a beetroot in half and showed it to the camera saying "look at the Celtic rings on that beetroot!"

I could never tell was he touched in the head, or just spoofing us all along.

paulbok · 04-04-2019 8:19am

Conorbarry1984 wrote: »

Maybe it’s been said already but fresh Oysters and a pint of Guinness....no other country can claim that combination as their own.

Cos they don't have sewers big enough to deal with the aftermath

Graces7 · 04-04-2019 8:36am

farmerwifelet wrote: »

Black and white pudding too. Though black pudding is now becoming fashionable again. Most of our dishes would be slow cooking, thus not very restaurant friendly. Stews, coddle, boiled ham. Also a lot of the cuts of meat used years ago aren't available now. My mam used to get a lamb neck made into chops and stew pieces. Can't get neck in the local butchers anymore. Beef Tongue seems to be making a comeback.

when I lived on a very traditional North sea island, the families on farms raised a pig every year, slaughtered it and the old adage was they ate every scrap except the tail and the squeak .

The vegetable gardens were rich in potatoes, cabbages, turnips and rhubarb.. they had only recently got the ro ro ferry so most food was grown ... pork and lamb were the meats.
Some wonderful baking recipes though. bere meal bannocks; would love bere meal here.
Interesting that among the ready meals from any shop there is always cabbage and and bacon.

My neighbours here go winkle picking frequently and offered me some but...

mariaalice · 04-04-2019 8:59am

We do it's just not vast things like soda bread which is universality recognised as Irish, black pudding, Guinness, whiskey and cider, butter.

What I do not understand is why we didn't have a cheese heritage apparently cheese was made in monasteries here but when they closed it fell away as a craft or why hazelnuts or wild garlic don't feature more in our cooking or why the bits of Tipperary/Waterford that have a cider heritage haven't exploited it as a tourist asset.

My theory is that despite the poverty accesses to meat in the form of a pig and the accesses to potatoes and eventually dairy products for everyone meant there was no incentive to be inventive like the way Italians use turnips tops as a food. Cooking methods such as an open fire which were common until recent limited what could be cooked.

Doctors room ghost · 04-04-2019 9:09am

Realt Dearg Sec wrote: »

HAHAHAHA he was spectacular. I remember once he chopped a beetroot in half and showed it to the camera saying "look at the Celtic rings on that beetroot!"

I could never tell was he touched in the head, or just spoofing us all along.

Ha brilliant.i really miss that show.
Do you remember the thing he had for burning Celtic designs into meat.he used to brand the steaks with it.it was a great show.we should start a petition to bring it back

LimeFruitGum · 04-04-2019 9:11am

My grandparents were pretty self-sufficient fadó. They kept hens, couple of ducks and pigs, cattle, and a horse. They had an orchard and grew vegetables. My granddad and uncles would catch some trout and rabbit. They just bought things like tea, tobacco, sugar, etc.

My nana would sell off any excess eggs, milk, and veg to the neighbours or at the village market. She could also make butter and cheese, swore by nettle soup, but she largely lived on tea and fags

Before she got married, she won some kind of scholarship to study butter-making in Cork. She ended up working for a Big House in Meath for a few years as their chief butter-maid before she had to come home and take over the farm. I remember we found an old job reference from the Big House about how great she was; I hope we still have it somewhere.
Annoyingly, I don’t ever remember her making butter and cheese. I seem to recall her keeping Calvita cheese in the fridge!

Graces7 · 04-04-2019 9:13am

mariaalice wrote: »

We do it's just not vast things like soda bread which is universality recognised as Irish, black pudding, Guinness, whiskey and cider, butter.

What I do not understand is why we didn't have a cheese heritage apparently cheese was made in monasteries here but when they closed it fell away as a craft or why hazelnuts or wild garlic don't feature more in our cooking or why the bits of Tipperary/Waterford that have a cider heritage haven't exploited it as a tourist asset.

My theory is that despite the poverty accesses to meat in the form of a pig and the accesses to potatoes and eventually dairy products for everyone meant there was no incentive to be inventive like the way Italians use turnips tops as a food. Cooking methods such as an open fire which were common until recent limited what could be cooked.

We did in Orkeny. Turnips aka neeps were grown as cattle food as well as human in big fields and when they were thinned we are the tops. bashed tatties and neeps made clapshot.. the 2 cultures, Irish and orcadian, are so alike in many ways. Mackerel etc .. cabbage

Graces7 · 04-04-2019 9:15am

If you want to see bread made on an open fire the traditional way, visit the Traditional Farms at Muckross in Killarney.. a living museum

Sebastian Dangerfield · 04-04-2019 9:16am

Our attitude to food is different. We tend to eat in a structured way, set courses and done. I spent some time in France recently with work and while there was a full meal served at events, they were smaller courses and instead food was part of the whole day. There were platters of fruit, salami, cheeses, pate and breads all around, people were constantly eating something, with a smaller dinner later. It was normal for them, whereas the Irish people kept commenting on how they were going to eat their dinner if they ate all this food in the afternoon.

It results in a wider range of food being familiar to people I think. Plus, everything tasted and smelled so much better - even the coffee. Have we maybe been too dependant on low cost, tasteless produce from Mace and Centra shops for too long, whereas other countries are more used to consuming whats on their own doorsteps from local markets and smaller producers?

suicide_circus · 04-04-2019 9:22am

there must be (or have been) a heritage cuisine of ireland. but virtually know irish people know what it it. its a bit like the irish language. dead.

we certainly dont have the same kind of traditional food culture you see in any of the many continental european countries i've been to.

food here is fuel.

i'm sure the church or the brits are to blame. some how.

mariaalice · 04-04-2019 9:28am

Have you ever eaten new potatoes out of the ground cooked perfectly with a bit of homemade butter and salt on top?

Or homemade soda bread with homemade butter.

harr · 04-04-2019 9:52am

mariaalice wrote: »

Have you ever eaten new potatoes out of the ground cooked perfectly with a bit of homemade butter and salt on top?

Or homemade soda bread with homemade butter.

I do believe nothing nicer in the world than new potatoes with skin on with real butter and salt .
We would eagerly await my dad pulling up the first potato stalks.
Also shelling peas , more were consumed when shelling than when cooked.

El Tarangu · 04-04-2019 9:58am

pwurple wrote: »

You’re joking, is it?. First of all, poverty breeds the great cuisines, because it forces inventiveness.

I mean, sometimes; but if you are a poor peasant farmer the only thing that will grow in the boggy clay of your land is potatoes, turnips and carrots, these will probably be the staple of your meals,and you are probably not going to start experimenting with rocket.

Secondly, We have an ideal climate for food.

We have the ideal climate for potatoes.

Look at our dairy, all grass fed, same with most of our livestock. Huge array of vegetables, fruit, mushrooms.
Blackberries alone! Food of the gods, growing in frikken ditches by the road.

Irish cheeses, butter, meats, honey, fish. Wild herbs. Seaweed. Irish craft butchery is just one of the best food crafts we have.
Irish drinks! Beers, whiskey, spirits.

Nearly all of the things you are listing would have been beyond the means of all but the richest people in the country until relatively recently, so it's not that surprising that we don't have such an extensive national cuisine based on these rarely-eaten luxury foods.

Genuinely think Irish food is among the best in the world and we should be so proud of our cultural heritage here.

I enjoy soda bread and sausages as much as the next person, but our handful of dishes does not even register against the wide and varied cuisines of France, Italy, or Thailand; I mean, come on, who are we codding...

topper75 · 04-04-2019 10:10am

harr wrote: »

I do believe nothing nicer in the world than new potatoes with skin on with real butter and salt .
We would eagerly await my dad pulling up the first potato stalks.
Also shelling peas , more were consumed when shelling than when cooked.

You should visit a Danish pea farm - fields bigger than a Dublin suburb.

Why does Ireland lack a culinary heritage?

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