I was hoping the SDopers might be able to tell me some names of some traditional Irishes main dishes, side dishes, and desserts. Besides the typical Irish stew, stuffed cabbage, and corned beef-n-cabbage, what else makes a tasty dish? (No need for recipes…I’ll google from here.) Thanks - Jinx
Stuffed cabbage is an Eastern European dish, not Irish. And real Irishmen don’t eat corned beef and cabbage…that’s an Irish-American thing. The closest thing I’ve seen in Ireland proper is bacon with chopped cabbage under a kind of cream sauce. Which was awfully good, especially with a nice pint of Guinness or Murphy’s on the side.
Try making some colcannon. And try finding a better recipe. My own version includes green kale as well as cabbage, and substitutes yellow onion for the scallion. And uses chicken stock instead of milk.
Here is a nice listing of some recipes. I make a boxty with smoked salmon as an appetizer that is particularly well received.
Irish soda bread
– but I have no idea of it’s really Irish.
Hmm, it isn’t an easy question to answer really but I’ll give it a shot.
There are many “traditional Irish main dishes” but traditional is what thay are, not actually being cooked nor ate by the majority of the Irish people themselves.
As Ukulele Ike said, cabbage and bacon with spuds and ‘white’ sauce (often parsley) is the most typical Irish food that is still served in homes today.
“Colcannon” is great but I’ve never actually had it in an Irish home, only in restaurants and it being aimed mostly at tourists. But it’s 100% Irish.
When I grew up there in the 1970’s / 80’s, food served mostly to nourish the body and provide energy as opposed to an art form. Food was functionary and often basic. Most of my friends would consider an irish main meal to consist of a meat and 2 veg. And my mother was always proud that she learned to cook Mexican/Italian/French, no matter how simple, and not have to eat the food that she was always brought up with (i.e. potatos with everything! 
Just taking a look at MikeG’s list…
Parsnips, turnips, carrots are all popular as the 2nd veg on the plate.
Barm Brack, a type of fruit cake, is eaten at Halloween.
Black and white puddings, eaten fried with other pork produce.
Irish Stew, or just plain ‘stew’
And it’s not surprising, if what “me sainted grandmather” used to cook was any indication of what traditional Irish cuisine was like. And by the looks of your list, it was. :eek: I always cut her slack because her people had come over during the Potato Famine and probably hadn’t had a square meal before emmigrating so there was no family tradition of edible food made of stuff people would eat voluntarily.
Thanks, all. One website I found mentions dishes like cod cobbler and a bread called aran spiosrai bread? …and calconnon. Also, various desserts with brack in the name.
BTW, I politely disagree that corned beef and cabbage and stuffed cabbage are not traditional Irish dishes. The few websites I have confirm they are, but this does not mean they are not eaten in other parts of Europe and called something else. For example, I know many Italians who would swear biscotti is 100% Italian, but it eaten throughout Eastern Europe better known as mandelbroit (sp?)or, mandle bread.
Please keep the ideas coming!
Thanks,
- Jinx
Would be “redundant” to serve stuffed cabbage with colcannon? Is this a boring meal, or do they complement each other? - Jinx
If you do the bacon and cabbage thing, make sure you boil the cabbage in the water that the bacon is/was boiled in. That’s what’s makes it nice.
Generally speaking Irish food=potatoes with everything. A cliche, but very true I assure you.
(For example: chips will be served with Chinese food, Thai food, pasta and so on. It’s also not unheard of for a meal to have scoops of mash and chips. Oh and then maybe roast potatoes too.)
Full Irish breakfast (a “fry”) is nice. They work best for me when served after a lie-in late in the afternoon rather than first thing in the morning, unless you intend to do heavy manual labour all day. This involves any or all of the following: scrambled egg, fried egg, baked beans, hash browns (potato cake thingies. Got to get the spuds in there), sausages, rashers (different from American style rashers. More meaty and chewy, less crispy), fried tomatoes, mushrooms, black pudding (meat stuff made from blood. Yummy, but acquired taste), white pudding (meat stuff made from er…something…I’ll eat it but I never ask :eek: ), toast and strong milky tea.
Although bacon and cabbage and fry-ups are pleasant enough I am curious now. Since it is not St. Patrick’s day, why would you bother making Irish food? I like this country a lot, but the food is hardly the draw.
Of course one cannot miss out on Shannon Airport’s finest: the Irish Coffee.
Never ever seen stuffed cabbage in Ireland. Nearest thing was stuffed wine leaves at a Greek restaurant in Dublin…
One of my favorite pub meals (as a tourist) was in, I think, Killkenny. It was shepherd’s pie, of course with whipped potatoes broiled on top. Served with chips *and *crisps, buttered boiled potatoes and a potato shell with cheese melted in it. *And *some broiled sweet potatoes, but those don’t count, right?
I have to say, while I was a little sick of potatoes by the end of my trip, y’all do some wonderful things with spuds. 
Could shepherd’s pie or meat pies be considered “traditional Irish”? What about bangers to go with the colcannon? (One of my favorite combos, but I don’t know if it’s “accurate”.)
Agreed. But there’s some amazing sea food down in Cork. Served, of course, with potatoes.
For what it’s worth, I didn’t see a single cabbage leaf in my two weeks there. I didn’t taste colcannon until I came back to the States.
I also think the Irish are more disdainful of their own food than the tourists are. I found some of it quite tasty, while locals were complaining of how awful it was. At one hostel I made a huge batch of Chicago style spaghetti and meatballs, and a couple of nights later Chicago style pizza. There were local guys who came to the hostel those nights just to eat my food!
It is. But you can’t make it properly outside of Ireland. Something to do with the water. Allegedly.
WhyNot, what are “bangers”? The word sounds vaguely familiar. Is it related to sausages, I WAG?
Also, for the general dopers, are desserts with rhubarb traditionally Irish, or if not traditional, at least popular in Ireland?
If curious…I’m just looking ahead to March! 
Thanks, Jinx
Yes, bangers are a type of fine grained sausage. I had them in Ireland, and the same ones are available at Tommy Nevin’s Pub here in Evanston. Absolutely indistiguishable from the real thing.
I’m not sure if some Jew in Italy liked biscotti and borrowed a recipe before heading back to more familiar territories, or whether it was independently discovered by some shtetl cook. In any event, they continued dropping in on the relatives and brought a nice plate of nosh.
WhyNot, try Cullens for some good bangers and mash. THere’s a new Irish place opening up on Church St. across from the Library in the next week or so called the Celtic Knot, I know the owners and the food should be fantastic. (Debbie the ex head chef at Nevins along with Jamie the ex GM and Patrick one of the ex bartender/managers…see a trend?)
FWIW I grew up with chicken ala king and pork chops cooked in brown sauce with mash.
Oh, and at Tommy Nevin’s, don’t miss the Sticky Toffee Pudding. Maybe it’s traditional, maybe it’s not, but it’s amazing. Warning: it can clog arteries at 100 paces.
I had a dinner of duck and orange sauce when I was in Dublin.
Is that Irish?
Not with the orange sauce.
Dublin Lawyer is absolutely delicious!
Also, Irish breakfasts are extremely close to English breakfasts, if that helps you in your recipe search - although Irish Breakfast tea is much stronger than English Breakfast tea.
Lastly, “bangers” not only have a more finely-grained pork in them, they have plenty of breadcrumbs too. They taste similar to American sausages, but the texture is completely different - much “smoother” and less “meaty”. Which make sense, I guess, as I believe that Germans took over sausage-making in the US and American sausages are much more like German ones than their British cousins.