Tradition through and through
Unique Irish Farmhouse Cheeses
corned beef, spicy black and white puddings, and
dry-cured and smoked ham and bacon; air-dried lamb
Ireland’s farmhouse cheeses are superb, unique, and
and venison; and turf-smoked beef. If you’re lucky
appreciated by cheese lovers all over the world. They
enough to be in the south or east of Ireland over
have a common secret ingredient – exceptional quality
Christmas, spiced beef cooked in stout is a delicious
milk, be it cow, sheep or goat milk. Grass and herbage is
and memorable seasonal dish.
Ireland’s principal crop, and “white foods” (banbhianna)
made from milk have been central to Irish food culture
Irish Traditional Baking
since Celtic times.
There are endless variations on the distinctive tradition
In Ireland, unlike our European neighbors, there are
of Irish baking. Home cooks and artisan bakeries use
no broadly regional cheeses such as Camembert or
Irish-grown produce (soft wheat and oat flour, eggs,
Parmesan, since each farmhouse cheese is unique to
richly flavored Irish butter, tangy buttermilk, aromatic
its maker and the family farm. There are more than
honey, native fruits, berries and nuts) to produce an
75 farmhouse cheese-makers, with a growing number
astonishing array of products that are subtle in flavor
producing cheese from organic milk. Some make a
and varied in texture. The names may seem unfamiliar,
single cheese, others a variety. Farmhouse cheeses are
but you should not miss out on biting into buttermilk
imbued with subtle flavors and aromas by using milk
scones, oatcakes, boxty, potato cakes, soda farls, Kerry
from a specific small area and taking full advantage of
apple cake and porter cake.
the unique flora, natural herbage, microclimate, geology,
and – last but certainly not least – the creativity and
Some of the tastiest baked treats are eaten on Irish
personality of the cheese-maker.
festive days. For example, St. Brigid (Ireland’s second
patron saint) is associated with a delicious cider cake,
Smoked, cured and spiced
while the fruity Halloween barmbrack contains
fortune-telling charms: according to folk tradition, a
The ancient Irish tradition of smoking food was dictated
ring brings marriage, a bean brings riches, a rag means
by the moist, humid climate that made air-drying
poverty and a dried pea connotes spinsterhood.
difficult. The Irish have always salt-cured or smoked
almost any food and have a particular liking for the
For all the Irish love of sweet things, bread remains at
unique flavor given by smoking using oak, beech and
the heart of Irish baking, and traditional brown soda
sometimes turf.
bread (or wheaten bread, as it’s cal ed in Northern
Ireland) is the best known. It’s made with wholemeal,
Visitors are often intrigued by the wide range and
soft wheat flour, raised with buttermilk and baking
variety of seafood, meat, poultry and game that is
soda, and often features unusual flavoring ingredients
smoked. While Irish mild-cured salmon and dry-cured
that remain a closely guarded secret. The result is a
smoked bacon are the best known, there are many
bread of unique flavor and texture that always delights.
other specialties, such as smoked mackerel, trout,
herring (kippers), eel and mussels; smoked duck and
chicken, and occasionally game birds; meats, including
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