a full Irish Breakfast, Culinary Orgasm style

Ed. note - second in a series of three St. Patrick's Day reposts this week...stay tuned for Corned Beef tomorrow !!

just a small part of the spread

I really love having people over for breakfast. Well, really, I love having people over for any meal, but breakfast is just fun. And Irish breakfasts are especially satisfying...just the thing for a day's hard labor. Or, in our case, a day's hard pub crawl (our traditional activity on St. Patrick's Day proper....we are lucky enough to live within crawling walking distance of some fine pubs...you'll have to check Facebook for those photos though ;) ).

We are also lucky enough to live within easy shopping distance of everything you need for a full Irish - and this year we put on a real winner. Whole Foods carries fantastic bangers (Irish sausages) as well as clotted cream, and this week had some of the best strawberries I have ever eaten in my life (which is why we needed clotted cream !) . Russo's has rashers (Irish bacon), and black and white puddings, which are also forms of sausage, using oatmeal as filler. White is pork meat and fat, and black is a blood sausage spiced with clove. I know what you're thinking...but calm down and try it...it really is delicious ! Corned Beef Hash from the boiled dinner leftovers of course, and Irish Brown Bread to round out the meal (with some amazing blood orange marmalade from Stonewall Kitchen). Oh, and eggs...keep reading for the eggs.

Bangers

Rashers, Black and White Puddings

Corned Beef Hash

oh, those strawberries !!

Irish Brown Bread

Mark did a fantastic job with all the meat, and his Corned Beef Hash is killer - it's the only time I actually eat turnips !

The eggs, though...that was my department. The problem with serving eggs at a big breakfast is that they're not the easiest thing to make in advance, especially fried eggs which are the most traditional in a full Irish. I could have done a mess of scrambled eggs or something, but that seemed kind of boring. However, Mark had given me a cookbook years ago as a Christmas gift (I sort of collect them), and it had a Baked Eggs with Creamy Leeks recipe that I'd always wanted to try. The perfect thing about them is you bake them all at once and just serve them up...exactly what I wanted. Besides, I seriously love leeks....in soups, roasted, steamed, sauteed....any way you cook them, I want them. I adapted the recipe quite a bit - really, it was just the general idea that I liked - and oh my god, were these insanely good. So luxurious, and yet soooo easy. Definite Culinary Orgasm !

Leek-y goodness

Filling the cups

Finished product

Baked Eggs with Creamy Leeks
Heavily adapted from "The Ultimate Christmas Cookbook"

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus extra to grease custard cups
3 medium leeks, white and tender green only, cleaned and thinly sliced (see note)
2 - 3 shallots, thinly sliced
3/4 cup heavy cream
salt, pepper, and ground nutmeg to taste
12 eggs

Preheat oven to 375. Grease bottom and sides of 12 custard cups or other small ovenproof cups. Melt the 2T of butter in a frying pan, and saute the leeks and shallots until soft (not brown), about 10 minutes. Add 1/2 cup of the cream and cook over low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring, until cream thickens a bit. Add salt, pepper, and a pinch of nutmeg to taste.

Divide leek mixture among the cups (which you have placed in a large roasting / baking pan), and carefully crack an egg into each one. Drizzle the remaining cream on top of the eggs, and season lightly with additional salt, pepper, and nutmeg (go easy with the nutmeg or it will try and take over !) Fill the pan with hot hot water until it reaches halfway up the cups, and place the whole pan in the oven. Bake for 10 - 15 minutes, or until the eggs are done to your liking.



Note : to clean leeks - cut the leeks in half lengthwise, and rinse well (leeks trap mud like crazy). Soak for 15 minutes in a bowl with water to cover, to which you have added a tablespoon of cider vinegar. Lift leeks out (leave sand in bottom of bowl) and proceed.

Irish Soda Bread

Ed. note - this week, I will be reprinting my favorite St. Patrick's Day entries, in preparation for the big day on Saturday. Here's the first of the three. " May you have warm words on a cold evening, a full moon on a dark night, and the road downhill all the way to your door !"

grand, super, brilliant !

First off, a shout out to Culinary Orgasm's new official main photographer...#1 Son Alex. Alex took all of the pictures in this entry with his new Nikon Coolpix, and he's done a great job - see the end of this entry for more of his work. Much easier having someone else wield the camera !

So...Irish Soda Bread. I cannot make this bread without thinking about Uncle Ed. Growing up, I spent every summer with Uncle Ed (great uncle, technically) and Narn (my great aunt Alice, who everyone called "Narn"). Uncle Ed was a textbook Southie guy, an Irish American war vet with a gruff exterior covering the biggest heart of anyone I've ever known. Uncle Ed took to retirement in Maine with gusto - dog food in his pockets everywhere he went, a fixture on his benches waiting for the mail, reading his Herald, listening to the Sox or just watching the world go by. He doted on his nieces and nephews, and no birthday was ever complete without Uncle Ed calling and singing "Happy Birthday" in his trademark vibrato-filled baritone. Lord, I miss that man.

In any event, as much as Uncle Ed loved Maine, he was always so happy when folks came down from Boston - especially from Southie, and especially if they came bearing Irish Soda Bread for him to have with his beloved tea. His eyes would light up, and he'd make that stuff last as long as he possibly could. But it was only when I married a part-Irishman and learned to actually appreciate a good corned beef dinner that I even thought about making it myself. It took a few tries, but now I really have it down...I think Uncle Ed would have absolutely loved this, and that is saying something. I only wish I had made it for him when he was still alive...don't put things off, folks. Do things for the people you love now. I promise you, you'll both feel better for it.

A few notes about the ingredients...it calls for two ingredients you may not have around the house, buttermilk and Golden Cane Sugar. Golden Cane Sugar is a very light brown natural sugar with a fantastic flavor - like brown sugar but not quite as much molasses flavor. I use it in all sorts of things so usually have it around - but you can very easily substitute one tablespoon of regular brown sugar and one of white sugar with no ill effects. The buttermilk, though, really is essential. The slight acidity of the buttermilk reacts with the baking soda to make your final bread super light and moist (the bane of many soda bread recipes is that the loaf is heavy and dry). If you are absolutely in a bind, add two tablespoons of white vinegar to the 3/4 cup of milk and let sit at room temperature for 10 minutes...it will work, but really not as well as real buttermilk. Buttermilk is sold right next to the regular milk at my trusty Stop + Shop, so it's not hard to find...this bread - and Uncle Ed - are worth the real thing.

Irish Soda Bread

2 cups flour
2 tablespoons Golden Cane Sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons butter
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons buttermilk
1/2 cup currants

In a bowl combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Cut the butter into the flour mixture with a pastry blender or two knives. Add the buttermilk and mix thoroughly into a soft dough. Add the currants. Knead the dough lightly on a lightly floured board for 3 minutes or until smooth. Form the dough into a 7 inch flat round, and place in a lightly oiled cake tin. Cut a cross about 1/2 inch deep in the center of the round. Bake in a 375 oven 40 minutes, and cool on a wire rack.

dry ingredients waiting for butter (double batch)

mix until it's a soft dough

kneading in the currants (my bowl is huge so I can do it right in the bowl)

cut a cross into the top

out of the oven

perfect !!

don't you want some ?