For some reason, Ireland has always fascinated me, but I don’t really want to know that much about it. I like to admire it from afar—I play Celtic songs for Christmas, drink Guinness mixed with Stella Artois (it’s called a blondie!), practice a terrible Irish brogue and want to buy one those thick, wooly white sweaters that I think may be Scottish. Unlike other cultures, which I prefer to know the truth about, I don’t really want my Ireland to be authentic—I think maybe because people of Irish blood and Irish culture has been so accepted to mainstream society that it is American culture. So I’ve let myself off the hook on this one.

When I was a little girl, I used to be so sad that I couldn’t really celebrate St. Paddy’s day because I didn’t have even a drop of Irish blood. So I made up for it tenfold, in eating Irish food. I would eat soda bread and beef stew, waffle fries and shepherd’s pie. And that’s what so great about Irish culture in America—it’s for everyone. I never knew if what I ate was what they really ate in Ireland and I didn’t—and I don’t—care.

The Irish pub in my hometown was what I think Americans must think Ireland looks like. The interior was made all of wood—with wooden tables and a little private wooden rooms, wooden benches up against wooden shelves on the wall. The waitresses were redheaded girls with freckles and the waiters were strapping blondes. There was a little stage in one corner for my uncle—he isn’t Irish, either—and his band to play boisterous jigs on Sunday nights.

And that’s what Irish pubs are like everywhere, I think. Seattle has a version that is nearly exactly the same, called Paddy Coyne’s, that serves aioli dipping sauce with its ketchup for fries, but that’s about the only difference. It’s a comfort to know that wherever you go in this country, there will be an Irish pub that looks inauthentic in the exact way as the one you grew up with.

With all the fancy gastropubs specializing in $12 hamburgers infused with eyeball imported from Peru and restaurants serving specialty cocktails mottled with lavender extract and set on fire, sometimes I’m in the mood for a hearty bowl of stew, some greasy fries and a Guinness—a meal fit for times where you want to be an Irish worker coming up from the coal mines (OK, that’s from Billy Eliot) rather than a frou frou American in a $50 flannel shirt and handwoven feather earrings.

By the way, even though I don’t care, it’s a comfort to know that a lot of the food served in Irish pubs are traditional Irish staples. The cuisine of Ireland uses a lot of potatoes, vegetables and meat and is simple to prepare, so it’s no wonder that busy pubs continued to serve it even when it was transplanted overseas. Popular shepherd’s pie combines a stew-like combination of pulled beef, carrots and peas and covers it with a fluffy layer of mashed potatoes. So, I guess I can rest a little easier knowing that my negligence in learning about the true food traditions of Irish food wasn’t really so negligent after all.

Sources and further reading:

http://homecooking.about.com/od/foodhistory/a/irishfoodhistry.htm