Re-posted cuz St. Patrick's Day is this Sunday. I don't have any known Celtic blood, bit I sure have lots of Irish relatives via marriage.
Just wanted to set the record straight on the historical facts. Even worse, his name wasn't Patrick.
He was an England-born slave of Irish raiders. Since England was still Roman in 400, he really was a colonial Roman.
The "snakes" he drove out of Ireland were the pagan beliefs. Ireland never had real snakes.
Who was Saint Patrick?
The Irish do not cook Corned Beef and Cabbage - except for American tourists
What is Irish? Shepherd's Pie is.
I happen to love corned beef and cabbage (plus potatoes) - as long as there is plenty of horseradish mustard and beer.
The real name of the meal is New England Boiled Dinner. I cook it all together in a giant pot. If the pickled beef needs a knife, it's underdone. I think it should almost crumble.
I make some for family, including my Irish father-in-law, yearly. No Guiness, though. It really does not go with food in my opinion. Heck, it's a meal in itself. In Irish pubs, they throw one or two raw eggs in it, stir it up, and call it breakfast.
(Our kids are 25% Irish, 25% Southern Italian, 40% English, and 10% Scandinavian probably via the Norman invasion. In other words, all- American. Genetic mongrelization worked well for our kids, cuz I am 90% English, around 10% Scandinavian and thus overly-inbred in New England since the 1600s.)
