Virtually every other country in the world, when it comes time to celebrate the feast day of their patron saint, does just that: they feast. We, on the other hand, prefer to march around the town and then drink too much. Daft!
So, let's get our priorities right from now on and designate St Patrick's Day as a day of feasting, a day to celebrate our national dishes. And, to start the feast rolling, let us take a dish which utilises many of the foods indelibly associated with Irish cooking: stout, soda bread, turnips, carrots and beef, and let us bundle them all up into a delicious De Valera's Pie.
Regina Sexton, in her new book, A Little History Of Irish Cooking (Kyle Cathie £6.99), writes about how "in the 1930s the Fianna Fail government under the leadership of Eamon de Valera issued a number of cookery books designed for use by the young girls working under various schemes run by the Department of Agriculture". Sexton saw one such book from 1936 and from it has adapted a beef stew recipe which she calls De Valera's Pie. Originally known as a Sea Pie because it was served at sea to sailors, the dish used meat, vegetables and potatoes, baked under a suet crust. Here, a terrific, sodabread crust is used with some Guinness to enrich the stew. I found that a final five minutes with the casserole lid removed crisped the top of the soda bread nicely. I suggest you have a hearty march around the town before you sit down to eat Dev's Pie.
De Valera's Pie
900g (2 lb) lean, stewing beef,
cut into generous chunks
2 tablespoons of plain flour,
seasoned with salt and pepper
3 tablespoons of vegetable oil
1 large onion, sliced
1 clove of garlic, crushed
225g (8 oz) swede turnip, cubed
225g (8 oz) carrots, cubed
340ml (12 fl oz) stout
1 bunch fresh thyme leaves
Pre-heat the oven to 160C/325 F/gas mark 3. Trim the meat of excess fat and toss it in the seasoned flour until lightly coated. Heat the oil in a wide pan and throw in the meat and move around until well browned. Remove the meat with a perforated spoon and place in a casserole (for this recipe a round casserole is preferable, as the finished dish with a round cake of soda bread looks much more effective).
Prepare and chop the vegetables. Add the onions and garlic to the pan and cook for a few minutes until soft and translucent. Remove and transfer to the casserole. Cover the base of the pan with three to four tablespoons of stout. Bring to the boil, stirring all the time. Then pour over the casserole content, add the remaining vegetables, thyme and stout and mix well. Cook, covered, in a hot oven for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Just before the end of cooking, make the soda-bread crust.
Soda Bread Crust:
225g (8 oz) plain flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
(bread soda)
150ml (6 fl oz) buttermilk
Sieve all the dry ingredients into a bowl, mixing well. Make a well in the centre and pour in most of the buttermilk. Then, working around the bowl, draw the flour into the buttermilk, continuing in this circular fashion until all has been absorbed. When the dough comes together it should feel sticky but pliable. If you feel the dough needs a little more moisture add the remaining buttermilk.
Turn onto a floured board, kneading lightly, giving it just one or two turns to fix into shape. With the palm of your hand pat the dough into a circular cake (of about 1cm/1/2 inch thickness) to the circumference of the casserole. With a cake of such thinness it will cook well and not remain stodgy on the under-surface.
Alternatively, follow Dorothy Hartley's advise in her authoritive work, Food In England, in which she suggests cutting the dough to shape by pressing the casserole lid into the rolled surface of the dough. Remove the casserole from the oven and lift the soda bread carefully on top of the stew, making sure that it covers the surface of the simmering meat. Score the surface deeply into four. Dust the surface with a light coat of flour and replace the casserole lid. Turn up the oven to 200C/400 F/gas mark 6 and bake for 30 to 40 minutes.
When cooked, cut through the four quarters of soda-bread crust and slip a serving spoon under each quarter, spooning each quarter and a quantity of meat tucked underneath onto one side of a plate. Surround with more meat and vegetables and spoon the gravy around. On frosty days, serve with a pint of stout. While there is nothing finer than a slice of oven-warm soda bread with oozing country butter, melting on top, it is also great fun to play around with the loaf. The leading experimentalists in the country must be Chris and Herb Quigley, of Ballycormac House in Tipperary, who are famous for Herb's bread-baking courses.
Here is a terrific example of one of the Quigley's Celtic Breads. The classic technique of baking bread in an iron pot is given a fresh twist with bacon and leeks and mustard, an idea which the Quigleys have brought over from the Italian tradition of stuffing breads with meats and vegetables.
Wrapped in a kitchen towel, the bread stays warm for hours. So, if the sun shines, maybe it's time for the first al fresco meal of the year. The basic recipe for iron pot scone which Herb and Chris use is from Deborah Krasner's book, From Celtic Hearths.
Iron Pot Scone
2 cups strong white flour
1 teaspoon bread soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon salt
1 to 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
]Generously butter a 1 1/2 to 2 quart cast-iron casserole with a tight-fitting lid. A piece of baking parchment on the bottom guarantees no sticking.
Sift the flour, soda, tartar, and salt into a mixing bowl. Make a well in the centre and add the buttermilk; mix to form a soft dough. Turn the dough into the pot and cover with the lid. Bake at 450 F/230 C/gas mark 8 for 30 to 35 minutes, until golden brown and hollow-sounding when tapped on the bottom. Remove from the casserole and wrap the scone in a kitchen towel; cool on a wire rack. Makes one pot scone.
Savoury Pot Scone
4 slices smoked bacon cut into
1/4 inch dice
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup thinly sliced leeks
(white only)
2 teaspoons whole grain
mustard
Basic pot-scone dough:
Saute the bacon over medium heat in a tablespoon of olive oil until brown and crispy; drain and set aside. Saute the leeks in the remaining olive oil over medium heat until softened - about five minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the bacon and mustard.
Place half the scone dough in the pot. Spread the bacon mixture evenly over the dough, leaving a clear half inch around the edge. Cover with the remaining dough, taking care to press the outer edges together; cover with the lid. Bake at 450F/230 C/gas mark 8 for 30 to 35 minutes, until the scone is golden brown and sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. Wrap the scone in a kitchen towel and cool on a wire rack. Serves 4 to 6.
Dublin Coddle With Buttermilk Cream
Here is another twist on a classic, an updating of the Dublin stew, coddle, by Derry Clarke, of L'Ecrivain Restaurant.
Basic leek and Potato Soup
Mirepoix
1 medium onion
White of 2 leeks
2 sticks of celery
4 peeled potatoes
Knob of butter
1/2 pint milk
1/2 pint pouring cream
Seasoning
Coddle mix:
8 cocktail sausages
4 slices bacon, diced
1 carrot, cut in batons
2 evenly diced potatoes
1/4 turnip, evenly diced
Garnish:
1/4 pint cream
3 dessertspoons buttermilk
Seasoning
Chopped parsley
Method:
Peel and roughly chop the vegetables for mirepoix. Melt a knob of butter in a heavy-base saucepan; add mirepoix. Season and sweat until soft, approximately 20 minutes. Add the milk and cream and bring to boil. Add the sliced potatoes and simmer for approximately 10 minutes. Liquidise the soup and pass through a strainer. Adjust seasoning and consistency.
Coddle mix:
Poach sausages and bacon in water until cooked. Cook potatoes, carrots and turnips until crunchy.
Buttermilk cream:
Semi-whip cream, add buttermilk and seasoning. Whisk until firm.
To serve:
Heat the soup, add coddle mix and simmer until heated through. Place in warm soup bowls. Garnish with a spoonful of buttermilk cream and chopped parsley.