Linderhof


Gardening, Cooking and Decorating on the Prairie of Kansas


Welcome to Linderhof, our 1920's home on the prairie, where there's usually something in the oven, flowers in the garden for tabletops and herbs in the garden for cooking. Where, when company comes, the teapot is always on and there are cookies and cakes to share in the larder.

Thursday, March 17, 2016

An Irish Kind of Day


It's Saint Patrick's Day
And although I don't have any Irish in my bones
(Husband Jim does because his Scottish ancestors stopped in Ireland
for a generation or so before they came to the United States)

It started with breakfast . . . 


In the breakfast room
(of course)

A Full "Irish"


real Irish sausages, grilled tomatoes, eggs, fried bread


And tea and toast and marmalade!

After breakfast, we readied the house for company
for my Irish friends came to lunch . . . 


A lace tablecloth (Irish lace?)
Damask napkins (Irish linen?)
The Spode blue and white transfer ware


And for each guest, a menu and a small loaf of Top of the Tower Irish Soda bread
with an Irish blessing 


The centerpiece is a bouquet of tulips --
Orange tulips -- because we're "protestant"!


A big loaf of Top of the Tower Irish Soda bread
(enough for both lunch and dinner)

And to me the words Salad and Irish food doesn't compute


But you do find a recipe both in Myrtle Allen's and Darina Allen's cookbooks
(the same recipe)
And I can see an Irish farm wife going out to the henhouse to gather the eggs and on the way back in, picking what is ripe from the garden for a salad to go with the leftover Sunday joint.


 And both provide a recipe for a salad dressing
made with egg yolks, brown sugar, malt vinegar, a tad of mustard and cream
To be passed at table
(and at our table in a Waterford jug)


The entree is cock-a-leekie pie
A take on traditional cock-a-leekie soup


Dessert was a Guinness chocolate orange cake with an orange butter creme

And after . . . 


Irish coffee


Some Irish liqueurs for those who wanted

And this year since next Sunday is Palm Sunday,
we went to church to make palm crosses


Not hard once you get the hand


One for every parishioner on Sunday

And dinner . . . 


Why, corned beef and cabbage, of course.
I can't remember a St. Patrick's Day when we didn't have
corned beef and cabbage.

A new recipe that I tried this year
In the oven -- the beef rubbed with brown sugar and then simmered in Guinness

It was a great St. Patrick's Day
full of wonderful Irish food!

2 comments:

Debbie - Mountain Mama said...

What a wonderful Irish day! You really had a full day...and every bit of it Irish - how nice! I had a dinner party last night with Corned Beef & Cabbage (of course) and we did a pseudo Irish breakfast this morning with eggs, soda bread, bacon, and grilled tomatoes. Your home is lovely - glad I found your blog!

Fox and Finch Antiques said...

For not having an Irish bone in your body as you said...you do it up right. There wasn't one thing on that beautiful table that I wouldn't be super happy to be eating right now. Wow!
Ginene