Irish Food

One thing I like to do when Renee & I travel is try different types of food. But I wondered, what kind of food do they have in Ireland? I didn't know what to expect beyond potatoes. I was pleasantly surprised.

My first real meal in Ireland was a full Irish breakfast. Lots of places, including the hotel at which we're staying offer it, and let me tell you, it's really something. It includes 2 slices of bacon (which here is closer to ham), eggs, sausages (usually 3 links), baked beans, sautéed mushrooms, half a tomato (grilled), 1 black pudding and 1 white pudding, and toast.

Now black pudding I was prepared for, having looked it up. It's basically a slice of sausage in which the main ingredient is pig's blood. The white pudding is less off-putting, consisting mainly of pig fat along with grains and spices. Renee hasn't tried either, but I've tried both. The black pudding didn't taste gross. I kind of liked the white pudding. Remember, the idea here is to load up your fork with a big pile of stuff and shove it all in together. Eaten like that I rather like white pudding.

Also, they don't ask you how you want your eggs. They just bring them over hard. The idea isn't to chop them up, but to take a slice out of them like you would cut a slice out of a steak.

Though I wasn't used to the idea of mushrooms and beans with my eggs, I gave it a try. I'm now a fan. Since our hotel offers this type of breakfast complimentary (sans beans) I've been having it regularly, but I had to pass this morning in favor of tea and croissant. I thought another full Irish breakfast would kill me.

On our tour through Wicklow county I had stew and mash. Mash is just mashed potatoes. The only thing here is that they use it as a base, pouring other food over it like the way white rice is used in some Chinese food. So they just dumped a lump of mashed potatoes into a bowl and ladled beef stew over the top. It was hearty and warming.

Much of the food here is hearty and warming. I'm telling you, these people cook the way I eat. Here's some meat, here's some more meat, here is a bunch of starch to go with it, and you probably get bacon with that. Vegetable? What vegetable? Isn't potato a vegetable? Renee is missing the fruit and veggie stands of the San Joaquin.

It is all pretty expensive though, as most things here are. That was part of my decision to try an inexpensive Irish fast food place one day called Supermac's, a knock-off of McDonald's. I figured, hey, I can't get an Irish McDonald's clone in the States, so why not? I had the Mighty Mac. I'm sure Supermac's attorneys would tell you that any resemblance to a Big Mac is purely coincidental. Still, it's not identical. The fries are thick like steak fries and the beef is 100% Irish beef, which does taste a little different.

The pastries here have been just wonderful. The croissants are made with real butter and are among the best I've had anywhere. You can go into any corner cafe and get scones, which are uniformly wonderful wherever they come from. The tea has been great.

Yesterday for lunch I had bangers and mash. Bangers are just like sausages. This morning at the Intel cafe I tried porridge for the first time. Porridge is just like oatmeal. Really sometimes the only real difference between Irish food and what you've already had is the name.