MVTimes Online - The Martha's Vineyard Times: Island News Now

(Editor's note: St. Patrick's Day will not arrive until next Thursday, but we wanted to print some traditional recipes this week to allow plenty of time for shopping, cooking, and sampling before the big day. Who better to ask for some Irish menu tips than Elaine Weintraub, history teacher at the Martha's Vineyard Regional High School, who grew up in Ireland and visits her family there every year? Ms. Weintraub also began a popular Irish Studies class at the school and junkets to Ireland have been a high point for the students.)

The thought of Ireland evokes images of flickering firelight, spiced whiskey, and boxty potato cakes that are the perfect dish when returning from confession. Though Irish cuisine is most famous for the bacon and cabbage, translated into Corned Beef and Cabbage in the United States, the food that speaks to me of home revolves around potatoes. There is an old Irish rhyme about boxty that makes clear the priorities of Irish people: “Boxty on the griddle, boxty in the pan. If you can't make boxty, you'll never get a man.”
Crisply fried and dripping with butter, boxty is surely the way to any man's heart.

Boxty

1lb. of potatoes coarsely grated and dried
1lb. of potatoes boiled and mashed
2 Tbsp. flour
2 ounces water
3 Tbsp. butter
salt and pepper to taste

Mix the potatoes together with the flour to form a dough. Add the salt and pepper. Melt the butter in the frying pan and form the dough into a cake. Fry each cake three minutes on each side until crisp.

Colcannon

1lb. potatoes, boiled and mashed
1lb. kale, sliced
1 large leek, sliced thin
1 pint cream
3 ounces butter, melted
1 tsp. salt (or to taste)
1 tsp. black pepper (or to taste)

Boil the kale in a little water for about 10 minutes. When soft, chop the kale leaves finely. Sauté the leek in the cream until soft. Mash the potatoes into the leeks and cream. Stir the kale into the potato-leek mixture and whisk thoroughly. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Spoon the mixture into a deep serving dish.

Make a well in the center and pour the melted butter into it. This is a lucky food of which the fairies are very fond. To please them and your guests, put small coins and silver rings into the dish. For the lucky person who finds that they have a silver coin or ring in their food, their luck will continue for another year.

The same dish is known as Champ when it is cooked without the kale and leeks, and milk is used instead of cream. In this recipe, spring onions take the place of the leeks and are sautéed in milk and then mashed into the potatoes. Place a tablespoon of butter on each dish underneath the potato mixture. There is nothing that tastes better on a dark night around the fire listening to the stories of ghosts, fairies, and changelings.

Hot Irish (the perfect beverage)

1 extra-large measure of Irish whiskey
1 teaspoon of Demerara sugar
6 cloves
1 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
1 tsp. freshly grated cinnamon
1 slice lemon

Warm a sturdy glass with very hot water. Then fill it two-thirds with boiling water. Dissolve the sugar in the water, then add the whiskey. Stick cloves into the skin of the lemon slice, then add the lemon slice, nutmeg, and cinnamon to the glass, stirring gently. Hold in the hands and savor the aroma. Sip slowly.

This is an old cure for a cold that has never been known to fail. Health and long life to you, land free of rent to you, and until the next St. Patrick's Day, may God hold you in the palm of his hand.