The Irish Heritage Cookbook (Food & Drink) [Hardcover]

`The Irish American Cookbook' by Biddy White Lennon and Georgina Campbell and `The Taste of Ireland In Traditional Home Cooking' by Matthew Drennan are two relatively inexpensive new books on Irish cooking with lavishly illustrated recipes done with color photographs and very nicely written procedures. Both books are excellent first books on Irish cooking with slightly different audiences. The larger, more expensive Lennon and Campbell book is great if you are really interested in a sound introduction to Irish cuisine and are quite interested in wanting to know a lot more about it. The smaller Drennan book is great if you simply want a few good authentic Irish recipes to make around St. Patrick's Day with superior guidance on how to make them, but you have no interest in studying Irish cuisine, its history, and its `terroir'.

One important word of warning. Both books were written and published for an Irish and UK audience, so there are several expressions which are familiar to residents of the British Isles, but which may not be entirely familiar to the colonies. Examples are `double cream', `rashers of bacon', `saltpetre', `black treacle', `a large swede', and `carragheen moss'. All are taken from the smaller Drennan book. Most occur in the larger book as well; however, they are much more commonly explained in the large book, as it was clearly edited for sale in the United States as well as in English speaking British Isles. I am especially happy to see that both books also give both metric and English measurements for volumes and weights. Even better, liquids are often measured in both fluid ounces and in cups. If you have no patience with unusual culinary terms, I would take a pass on the Drennan book and try `Irish Traditional Cooking' by leading Irish cooking school owner, Darina Allen or `the Irish Heritage Cookbook' by Irish-American high school teacher and culinary writer, Margaret M. Johnson, both of which are very friendly to American culinary knowledge.

With the fact that it is available for a very reasonable price, the greatest virtue of the Drennan book is the fact that it's few recipes are all perfect archetypes of traditional Irish cooking. So, if that's all you want, this will give it to you for a pittance.

The Lennon and Campbell Book also focuses primarily on traditional recipes, but it also gives us much, much more. The book opens with a 30 page illustrated essay on a culinary history of Ireland. The very best thing about it is that it does not overlap much the two other essays on Irish culinary tradition in `Celtic Folklore Cooking' by culinary writer and folklorist, JoAnne Asala which concentrates on Irish pre-Christian folklore and religions and `Elegant Irish Cooking' by culinary scholar, teacher and professional chef, Noel C. Cullen Ed.D, CMC, AAC which focuses on a history of cooking and chefs in Ireland. Our book from Lennon and Campbell explains much more about modern Irish cuisine than the other two do. It even partially answers the question of why, when beer brewing is so popular in Ireland, the most popular types of breads are leavened with chemical leaveners. It is also much more informative of the differences in cuisine for different classes of people, so common and well known of Italy, for example.

This excellent section is followed by a second 30 page essay on `The Irish Kitchen' which outlines all the most important Irish food sources and products such as its eggs, dairy, cheeses, sausages, brewing, and distilling industries.

I am not a big one for photographs in cookbooks except when explaining a subtle or difficult technique such as pastry crust making or omelet cooking, but when the photographs are done very well, it can't help but add to the value of the book, especially when its in a genre where most other books in that genre are without superior illustrations. This is another reason this is an especially good book for a beginning cook or someone starting out with Irish cooking. Not that Irish cooking is complicated. It is generally no more complicated than Italian cooking, although it is much more similar, in general, to the cooking of northwest and western France, with its great output of dairy, apples, pears, pigs, and cattle.

The section on breads and cakes alone is worth the price of admission, as next to potato and corned beef dishes, the most distinctive thing about Irish cooking is its breads, biscuits, scones, and holiday breads and cakes with candied fruit. The most interesting recipe here for me is the `Quick barm brack', a yeasted Halloween traditional loaf whose name derives from the fact that it was originally made with leftover beer yeast.

While I have seen many excellent Irish cookbooks over the last three weeks, I can categorically recommend this as the very best `first' Irish cookbook or `only' Irish cookbook if your interest extends no further than two weeks in the middle of March. My recommendation is even safer due to the fact that the book lists for a mere $29.95, well below the average price, let alone the average price for a lavishly illustrated oversized book.

Very highly recommended.

I bought this a few years ago and have cooked many of it's recipes since then. The "Casseroled Venison w/Stout" has been a particular favorite. The book is also available in a large paperback format with a slightly different title, "Irish Food And Cooking", and different cover.

Love this book - it has recipes in it that range from very simple to a little harder. If you love Irish food, this one is awesome.