LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – They say that everyone’s Irish on St. Patrick’s Day, and this month many in our country will mark the date by drinking green beer and feasting on corned beef and cabbage.

It’s not well known, however, that corned beef is rarely served in Ireland and is not a St. Patrick’s Day tradition there.

Irish immigrants in the U.S. and Canada found that beef was more plentiful and less expensive on this side of the Atlantic. They used the corned (or salted) version in place of an Irish favorite, bacon joint, to cook with cabbage, thus spawning the tradition.

The Irish don’t have a particular dish they associate with their patron saint; instead, they may mark the holiday by attending Mass in his honor or by enjoying a pint at the local pub. Sometimes they do both.

Since we’re all honorary Irish this month, let’s take a look at some favorite foods that are served year-round on the Emerald Isle.

Lamb stew may be considered the quintessential Irish meal; in fact, some call it the national dish of Ireland.

Irish stews began when animals were slaughtered for landowners and tenant farmers were given the less desirable cuts. They threw these into a three-legged pot to boil over a fire. Over the years, the recipes were refined to use lamb as the only meat in the stew. While there is some controversy as to whether carrots or peas should be included, potatoes always are.

Other dishes that include lamb are Kerry pies (lamb and vegetables in a rich pastry crust made with mutton fat) and shepherd’s pie, which is ground lamb and vegetables baked with a mashed potato crust. If ground beef is substituted in the latter, it’s called a cottage pie.

Not surprisingly, potatoes form the basis of many Irish dishes. They were introduced into Ireland from America in the second half of the 16th century, eventually becoming the main food crop of the poor. Because they provide a high amount of energy per land unit as well as lots of nutrition, they were a valuable staple.

“Irish champ” is the name of a traditional mashed potato dish that includes sliced scallions. It’s served with a pool of melted butter in a well in the middle.

“Potatoes colcannon” (or colcannon potatoes) is a combination of mashed potatoes and cabbage. The word colcannon is from a Gaelic term, cal ceannann, which means white cabbage.

Another popular potato dish is “boxty,” a simple griddle cake that combines raw and mashed potatoes. Sometimes boxty is served as part of an “Ulster fry,” a hearty breakfast dish that includes eggs and a variety of fried meats such as bacon and sausage. There’s a traditional Irish poem that goes, “Boxty on the griddle; boxty in the pan. If you can’t make boxty, you’ll never get a man.”

“Bubble and squeak” is the name of a large pancake that’s made from potatoes and the vegetable remains of Sunday lunch, traditionally served on Monday. Any veggies will do for bubble and squeak, including cabbage, carrots, rutabagas (called “Swedes” in Ireland), or Brussels sprouts, but it must include a good amount of potatoes. The name, among my favorite as food names go, comes from the sound it makes as steam is released from the vegetables as it cooks.

Oats and barley are traditional grains in Irish cooking and are often the main ingredients in desserts or breads. Puddings are made from barley and cakes or breads from oatmeal. Apples, which grow well in Ireland’s clime, are often added to each.

Other fruits used for desserts include strawberries, raspberries, and rhubarb, which also grow well there. These three are used in fruit “fools,” a fluffy, chilled dessert that is a precursor to ice cream.

Years ago, I asked a local Irish celebrity of sorts, Father James McSweeney of Middletown’s St. Joseph’s Church, which food he missed most from his homeland. Sausages topped the list for him. He was especially fond of the simple sausage and brown bread breakfasts of his youth.

According to McSweeney, sausage makers in the U.S. have been unable to duplicate the taste of those from his home in County Cork, where a local herb added unique flavor.

Sadly, Fr. James passed away in August of last year, which makes me especially thankful to have his authentic brown bread recipe, which I’ve shared below. It’s a rustic bread, very hearty, and can be equally delicious in savory or sweet applications. Try it with sausages or cheese, for example, or with some good Irish butter and jam. It can be accompanied by some Barry’s Irish Breakfast Tea, another favorite of Father James.

It’s hard to talk about bread in Ireland without mentioning Irish soda bread. There are many varieties of this (and some will show up in supermarkets this month), but the traditional version is simply four ingredients: flour, salt, baking soda, and buttermilk. A special alchemy occurs with the buttermilk and baking soda that renders yeast unnecessary.

I enjoy adding currants to mine (it doesn’t feel like real soda bread to me without them), but if you want yours to be authentic, stick to the original four ingredients.

Believe it or not, a Society for the Preservation of Irish Soda Bread exists. If you’re interested in learning more about this comestible – including history and recipes – visit their website.

St. Patrick’s Day will be here in just ten days, and in case you’d like to adventure outside the corned beef and cabbage box, I’ve provided some recipes inspired by Ireland below. First up is Fr. McSweeney’s Irish brown bread and following that are three from a culinary class I taught on Irish cooking.

Though they’re not used often in our country, parsnips are a common vegetable in Ireland. In the past they were a year-round staple, sustaining people through cold winters when other vegetables were scarce. They’re paired below in a soup with another vegetable popular on the Emerald Isle, leeks. A bit of horseradish adds a dash of interest and an apple is added to round out the flavor.

Shepherd’s pie with a twist is next on the agenda. A bottle of the dark Irish stout Guinness imparts a rich flavor to the dish. Guinness is Ireland’s oldest stout and has been brewed there since 1759.

Jonathan Swift, dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin, was an Irish satirist, essayist, clergyman and poet who lived in the 17th and 18th centuries. His deadpan, ironic writing has led to that style of satire being called Swiftian. He’s known for such quotes as “satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everyone’s face but their own” and “but nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches, as to conceive how others can be in want.”

The final recipe, a dessert with intense citrus flavor paired with sweetened flamed whiskey, is a centuries old Irish recipe that is said to have been his favorite.

Whatever you do on St. Patrick’s Day and whatever you eat, I wish you a happy March 17!

Father McSweeney’s Irish Brown Bread

The seven-grain cereal that Fr. James used for this bread is made by Bob’s Red Mill. If unavailable at your local market, it can be found online.

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 ½ cup seven-grain cereal
3 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 cups buttermilk
1/3 cup butter, melted
2 eggs

Mix dry ingredients in the bowl of a large mixer using stir speed for about 30 seconds.

Add buttermilk, melted butter, and eggs to bowl. Mix all ingredients until well blended, but not longer than a minute. Scrape sides of bowl to moisten all ingredients.

Remove to a floured board and knead about four or five times only. Form into six small round loaves. If desired, cut a crisscross on top of loaves.

Place loaves on greased or parchment paper-lined baking sheet and bake for 30 minutes at 400 degrees in an electric oven or for 25 minutes at 450 degrees in a gas oven.

Leek and parsnip soup with horseradish and frizzled carrots

2 medium carrots, peeled
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
Salt
3 cups diced leeks, white and light green parts only
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 pound parsnips peeled and cut into half inch dice
½ pound thin-skinned potatoes, peeled and cut into half inch dice
1 apple, peeled and diced
4 cups vegetable stock
Freshly-ground black pepper
1 tablespoon prepared horseradish
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
¼ cup chopped fresh dill, plus for garnish

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Use a vegetable peeler to peel carrot strips the length of the carrots.

In a medium bowl, toss the carrots with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil and ¼ teaspoon salt.

Transfer to a parchment paper-covered baking sheet and roast, stirring every 10 minutes, until the carrots are crispy and curled, about 40 minutes. (After 30 minutes, remove the ones that are browned.)

Remove from the oven and store in a container at room temperature.

Meanwhile, warm the remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil in a medium pot.

Add the leeks and sauté over medium-low heat until softened but not browned, about seven minutes.

Add the garlic and sauté an additional two minutes. (Be careful not to burn the garlic as it becomes bitter.)

Add the parsnips, potatoes, apples, stock and 1-1/2 teaspoons salt.

Cover the pot, raise the heat and bring to a boil. Then lower the heat and simmer, partially covered to allow the steam to escape, until the vegetables are tender, about 20 minutes.

Use the back of a spoon to smash half of the vegetables against the sides of the pot to thicken the broth or use an immersion blender to roughly blend some of the vegetables.

Stir in a generous sprinkling of black pepper, the horseradish, lemon juice, and dill.

Taste and add more salt if necessary.

Serve hot, sprinkled with fresh dill and topped with a mound of carrot curls.

This recipe serves four to six and is adapted from a recipe that appeared in “The Healthy Hedonist Holidays: A Year of Multicultural, Vegetarian-Friendly Holiday Feasts” by Myra Kornfeld.

Guinness shepherd’s (or cottage) pie

Vegetarians may substitute mushrooms for the ground meat.

1 teaspoon black pepper
2 pounds ground lamb or beef (with beef, it becomes Cottage Pie)
1 large onion, finely diced
4 large carrots, finely diced
1 cup frozen peas
4 sprigs fresh thyme, leaves removed and finely chopped
2 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon butter, plus more to grease the pan
1 bottle Guinness
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 cup stock, chicken or vegetable
1 large quantity mashed potatoes (estimating 6 cups, fresh or leftover)
1 egg, beaten
Grated parmesan cheese (optional)

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F and grease a 9-inch by 13-inch oven-proof dish with butter.

Sautee carrots in the olive oil until starting to get tender.

Add in the onions and sauté for a minute or two, and then add the meat.

Season with black pepper and thyme.

Cook until browned then drain fat.

Add the butter and peas.

Sprinkle with flour and stir through.

Add tomato paste, Guinness and Worcestershire sauce.

Let this reduce slightly then add the stock. Allow to reduce down until you have thick, meaty gravy.

Season to taste with salt & freshly-ground black pepper.

Remove from heat and pour into prepared pan.

Spoon or pipe the mashed potatoes over the top.

Brush with egg and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese if using.

Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the potato crust is nicely browned.

This recipe serves four to six and is adapted from a dish served at the Old Bay Restaurant, an Irish pub in New Brunswick, New Jersey. (It closed in 2017 after 30 years of serving up Emerald Isle fare.)

Dean Swift’s burnt oranges

4 large oranges (or 6 to 8 Seville oranges)
About 5 ounces (just over ½ cup) medium white wine (or sweet wine with Seville oranges)
4 tablespoons butter
6 tablespoons granulated sugar
About 10 ounces (just over 1 cup) fresh-squeezed orange juice
2 tablespoons warmed Irish whiskey

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Using a fruit zester or a very sharp knife, remove all possible zest from your oranges. (If using a knife, carefully peel just the orange skin from the oranges and slice into thin strips.

Put the zest in a bowl with the wine and allow to steep gently.

Peel the zested oranges and separate the segments out. Pull or scrape off as much as possible of any white pith from the flesh of the orange segments.

Put the oranges into an ovenproof dish that can also be used over direct heat (as the final stages of this dessert happen on the stovetop). Dot the orange slices evenly with the butter. Then sprinkle the orange slices with half the sugar.

Put the orange slices into the oven for 10 minutes, or until the sugar caramelizes.

Meanwhile, mix the orange juice with the remaining sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Lower the heat slightly and let the mixture cook and thicken until syrupy. When it has thickened and reduced, add the orange peel and wine mixture and bring to the boil again, then cook rapidly to reduce and thicken again.

Remove the oranges from the oven. If they're not fully browned, you may want to run them under a broiler for a few minutes, watching carefully to make sure the caramelizing sugar doesn't scorch.

When the browning process is finished, pour the warmed whiskey over the orange segments and set it alight. (Do not neglect to warm the whiskey – otherwise it won't catch fire.)

As the flames die down, add the orange syrup and let the whole dish simmer and bubble gently on a stovetop burner on medium heat for about 2 minutes.

Serve the burnt oranges at once, or if you prefer, they can be served cold. (Pouring double cream – a high-fat cream with 48 percent butter fat not generally available in the U.S. – over the cold version, in the Irish style, works very well.)

This centuries-old Irish recipe serves about four.

Esther Oertel is a writer and passionate home cook from a family of chefs. She grew up in a restaurant, where she began creating recipes from a young age. She’s taught culinary classes in a variety of venues in Lake County and previously wrote “The Veggie Girl” column for Lake County News. Most recently she’s taught culinary classes at Sur La Table in Santa Rosa. She lives in Middletown.