M.P. is proud of his French and Irish descent, so St. Pat's is always a festive occasion here. We actually celebrated twice, once on Friday night and again on Sunday.
Our Irish pub dinner on Friday was memorable for M.P.'s whimsical use of paper napkins to give a subdued lighting effect to the kitchen and breakfast bar.
In the pic above, you can see a tray of just-baked
pasties on the counter; at the far left is a pan of delicious
rarebit sauce (one of M.P.'s specialties) and a little pot of parsley sauce, yum. Both were used for dipping or spreading.
Below is a platter of hot, fresh
jambons, which M.P. has discovered are all the rage in Dublin these days: they are made with pastry dough and a mixture of ham and cheese filling with
bechamel sauce. (Sort of a
croque monsieur.) Scrumptious! Of course, we each had a rare bottle of Guinness to wash it all down with.
Buttered toast points, left, and homemade French fries, right.
Some of everything.
The pub dinner was all finger foods, but Sunday dinner was rather more formal, starting with the place settings.
M.P. likes to use the gravy boat to make a centerpiece, if it's not needed for gravy.
Tasty Irish soda bread, hot out of the oven. Smells good too.
Roses were on sale at the grocery store, and M.P.'s favorite dining-room colors are green and white, so it all worked out beautifully. However, I must confess that these roses are actually a very pale green, which doesn't show up in the photograph.
The bamboo plates are a bone china set from the 1930s or 40s that M.P. found online years ago and snagged at a bargain price. They do lend a bit of old-time glamour to the table, we think.
The oversized cups were for the soup course:
Dublin Coddle. Diced potatoes, leeks, bacon, ham, and sausage. Poor man's food but mighty tasty, and perfect on a cold night.
The entree was corned beef, of course, with some sliced potatoes and baby carrots, all cooked together in the crock pot from noon to midnight. At top right, a bowl of homemade mustard sauce (mostly mustard and a lot of brown sugar, with a drop of Louisiana Hot Sauce™) that goes perfectly with the meat. At bottom right, a bowl of M.P.'s famous Truckstop Cabbage, the perfect complement: it's cabbage, carrots, red onions, and bacon cooked together till everything is tender and delicious.
M.P. says white beans and carrots are a traditional Irish dish. Okay.
Determine the area of a quarter-section of one-quarter of a circle: geometry at work in the kitchen.
Wish I could hand all you boys a plate of this mighty fine eatin'!
Dessert was a Guinness Cake - the body contains Guinness and cocoa, and the frosting is cream cheese, mostly.
Dee-licious!
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