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Enlightening, entertaining and often surprising, Irish Food History: A Companion takes you on an unforgettable and expert journey through Ireland’s culinary past.
Beginning at the end of the Ice age, before reindeer, brown bears, and the giant Irish deer became extinct; this vital and brilliantly researched collection brings us forward from the introduction of farming and livestock, to the delicious world of medieval honey, banqueting, bog butter, whiskey distilling, to eighteenth century feasts, famines, and on to the modernisation, industrialisation, and eventual globalisation of food. Through analysis, storytelling, and mouth-watering descriptions, every dish and moment in time reveals ancient techniques, hidden gems, and innovative cooking seemingly far beyond its time, all of which have shaped Ireland’s culinary landscape for centuries. Irish Food History: A Companion brings the reader on a gastronomic odyssey from earliest times and the start of the hunter-gatherer community, all the way to the abundant world of modern Irish cooking, safe in the hands of the world’s most highly regarded food historians. With an engaging introduction from the editors Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire and Dorothy Cashman, and a foreword from Professor James Kelly, the thirty-two different contributors, all experts in their own particular field or period of study, provide the latest thinking and research from a wide range of academic disciplines. This book offers you the chance to explore the rich tapestry of Ireland’s history with food in these twenty-eight urgent and compelling chapters.
Whether you are a seasoned ‘foodie’ or a novice in the kitchen, a keen historian or merely curious about life, Irish Food History offers a glimpse at horizons old and new, unfurling a complex culinary history and revealing nuances of our cultural heritage. Comprehensively chronicling the island’s deep connection to food and drink and bringing us right up to the present moment, we are presented with a portrait of a country and a place forever connected to its culinary traditions while also showing us a new and exciting snapshot of a vibrant, modern daring and connected nation of eaters and drinkers.
Beautifully designed, this volume is richly illustrated and interspersed with folklore, songs, recipes, and food-related poetry from Seamus Heaney, Paula Meehan and Raiftearaí, making it a must-read for the culinary and culturally curious both young and old.
Foreword: Professor James Kelly
Introduction: Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire and Dorothy Cashman
Section 1: Prehistory and Archaeology of Food in Ireland
CH.1: Food in Irish Prehistory: Archaeological, Linguistic, and Early Literary Evidence, with a Note of Caution - J. P. Mallory
CH.2: Lovely Bones: Osteoarchaeological Evidence of Animal Produce in Ireland - Finbar McCormick
CH.3: ‘A Landscape Fossilized’: Céide Fields, Dairy Farming and Food Production in the Irish Neolithic - Seamas Caulfield
CH.4: Dishing up the Past: A Review of Plant Foods, Food Products and Agriculture in Early Medieval Ireland - Nikolah Gilligan
Section 2: Bog Butter, Bees and Banqueting in Medieval Ireland
CH.5: A History of Bog Butter in Ireland - Maeve Sikora and Isabella Mulhall
CH.6: Beekeeping and Honey in Ancient Ireland - Shane Lehane
CH.7: Banqueting and the Medieval Gaelic Chiefs - Katharine Simms
CH.8: Irish Diet in the Eleventh Century as Reflected in the Satire of Aislinge Meic Con Glinne - William Sayers
Section 3: Sources for Food History in Early Modern Ireland
CH.9: The Humours of Whiskey: Uisce Beatha in Feudal Irish Hospitality and Medicine - Fionnán O’Connor
CH.10: Franciscans and the Power of Fish in seventeenth-century Ireland - John McCafferty
CH.11: Food in Eighteenth Century Ireland - Toby Barnard
CH.12: Receipt Books from Birr Castle, County Offaly, 1640–1920 - Danielle Clarke
CH.13: Prodigious Fine Dinners: Drinking and Dining with Jonathan Swift - Tara McConnell
Section 4: Developments in Food Supply, Technology, and Trade
CH.14: Food, Feast and Famine in the Correspondence of Daniel O’Connell - Grace Neville
CH.15: Eating Abroad, Remembering Home: Food Parcels, 1845–1960 - John Mulcahy
CH.16: ‘Joined in Butter’: The Material Culture of Irish Home Butter-makers, Using the Dash Churn, up to the Late Nineteenth Century - Claudia Kinmonth
CH.17: A Dairying Democracy: The Co-operative Movement and the Improvement of Pre-Independence Irish Dairying 1889–1922 - Patrick Doyle
Section 5: Food, Folklore, Foclóirí, and Digital Humanities
CH.18: ‘Níl aon tinteán mar do thinteán féin’: Hearth Furniture from the Famine to Rural Electrification - Clodagh Doyle
CH.19: Seventy-two Words for Potato: Exploring Irish Language Resources for Food History - Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire agus Dónall Ó Braonáin
CH.20: The Wake for the Dead and Traditional Hospitality in Ireland in the Twentieth Century: Continuity and Change - Patricia Lysaght
CH.21: Food in the Irish National Folklore Collections - Jonny Dillon and Ailbe van der Heide
Section 6: The Development of Modern Irish Food and Identity
CH.22: Cookery Notes: Domestic Economy ‘Instructresses’ and the History of their Cookbooks in Ireland - Dorothy Cashman
CH.23: Hunger and Starvation in Modern Ireland - Ian Miller
CH.24: Food in Ireland in the 1930s and 1940s - Bryce Evans
CH.25: The President requests the Pleasure: Dining with the Irish Head of State 1922–1940 - Elaine Mahon
CH.26: Fact and Fiction in Maura Laverty’s Food Writing, 1941–1960. - Caitríona Clear
CH.27: ‘If its eatin’ and drinkin’ you want, take a spoon and fork to a pint of stout’: A Brief History of Food and the Irish Pub - Brian J. Murphy
CH.28: The Matriarch of Modern Irish Cooking, Myrtle Allen (1924–2018): Her life and legacy - Margaret Connolly
