ICAN FAVORITES
THIS ST. PATRICK’S DAY, EAT LIKE AN IRISH-AMERICAN AND ENGLISH KING B Y : J U S T I N & K AY L A B U T T S P H OTO S B Y: R AC H E L B E N AV I D E S
Corned beef and cabbage is an Irish-American favorite on St. Patrick’s Day, but it’s a tradition only in America, not in Ireland! The Irish have a complicated history with corned beef. For centuries, English lords owned most of the land in Ireland. These lords fattened their cattle on the rich grasslands of their Irish estates. Irish peasants slaughtered the beeves and preserved them in barrels as corned beef to be shipped to England. The Irish themselves, locked into generational cycles of poverty, watched English cows eat Irish grass, only to be butchered by Irish laborers for the rich landlords in England. The Irish came to resent the corned beef and cabbages grown from their land and labor for the benefit of those who kept them impoverished. The Irish migrated to America in two great waves during the potato famines of the 1800s, and quickly rose to prosperity and power in the big cities of the East Coast. Wealth and privilege gave the Irish new opportunities and new appetites. They could now afford the corned beef and cabbage that, in the old country, had been reserved for the elites. With freedom, democracy, and capitalism, the Irish could finally eat like English kings. Corned beef is salt-cured meat. The name comes from the large grains of salt, called “corns” by the English, used to cure the meat. Brining gives corned beef its unique flavor. Corned beef curing recipes originally called for saltpeter or a similar nitrate. These nitrates, which give the beef a characteristic red color, help prevent botulism in the canned product. However, nitrates have been linked to cancer. You can make corned beef just as well with no nitrates, which gives the meat a browish color instead of a deep red.
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