Another St. Patricks Day Irish Recipe for Champ potatoes. The recipe is inside the story and some Irish culture. For St. Patrick’s Day the Irish Potato “Champ” with a Little History Champ or Thump is the Irish method of serving mashed potatoes. It can be made with many additions such as parsley, chives, scallions, peas or young nettle tops. It was a favourite meal for a, “fast day”, back many decades ago when the Irish Catholic population in Ireland would fast from eating meat on Fridays or during prescribed days in the liturgical year. Champ is served in mounds, each with a hollow in the centre into which is put a large lump of butter. The champ should be eaten from the outside, dipping each mouthful in the melted butter. As a boy I enjoyed Champ with a glass of fresh buttermilk, thick and lumpy and strangely pleasant, the buttermilk in Ireland at that time came as a by product and was not the imitation product sold today. Champ is also a Hallowe’en dish and in the rural parts of Ireland, it is an old custom to place the first two portions on top of the flat pier at the farm gate for the fairies. In old Irish cottages with clay floors there is sometimes a large, ”pothole”, or hollow into which the iron pot is set while the potatoes are beetled with a long handled masher or beetle. This was often the work of the man of the house-his wife adding the hot milk. For Champ the peeled potatoes are boiled in the usual way and, while they are cooking, the chopped scallions, nettle tops or peas are cooked in milk. When the potatoes are drained, dried and mashed free of lumps, the milk and second vegetable are beaten in together with salt and pepper (white). Chopped chives and parsley are generally added without cooking. A beaten egg/s added to the Champ give it added life. Serve Champ hot with a generous lump of butter in the centre of each portion. Note Quantities were not specified, the potatoes should be a creamy yet firm consistency with all the pleasure of the vegetables and herbs added. In my Belfast home my mother cooked 7 pounds known as half a stone of potatoes every day of the week except for Sunday when she would cook 14 pounds known as a stone. Guess who taught me how to cook potatoes! Note the term “pothole” in the recipe, if you can call it that, now we know the origins of potholes on the road. In some literature the term was used, “I will beetle you over the head” a violent indication of being attacked and knocked senseless perhaps. This recipe was transposed from, “The Belfast Cookery Book” 1967 by Margaret Bates. Some changes were made to clarify the language, and personal comment was added. Chef: Matthew Stinson.
Posted on: Tue, 28 Jan 2014 06:58:15 +0000
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