an irish feast

Last weekend, my folks were in town for a visit... and as always, we packed a lot into a few short days. Saturday evening, we celebrated our Irish heritage from familes Dunn, Connelly, and McNamee with an Irish feast. On the menu were potatoes (of course), short ribs, and soda bread.

Our festive table, below, was unfortunately decorated with Rollos instead of gold coins. Mom and I made several stops while out and about on Saturday afternoon, but couldn't find the chocolate gold coins that I so fondly remember from childhood. Sooooo... Rollos, it was... think gold chunks instead of gold coins.
.
.

Braised Guinness Stout Short Ribs

.

.

5 – 6 pounds beef short ribs
Flour
3 – 4 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 carrots, cut in 2-inch chunks
2 stalks celery, cut in 2-inch chunks
1 large white onion, chopped roughly

4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 bay leaf
2 sprigs fresh thyme
4 tablespoons tomato paste
2 bottles Guinness Stout
Salt and pepper to taste
Parsley, for garnish

• Preheat oven to 300 degrees.
• Dredge the short ribs in flour, coating lightly. Remove any excess flour from ribs.
• Heat oil in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat on the stove. In batches, brown the short ribs, a few minutes per side, making sure not to crowd them too closely in the pan. This allows the ribs to develop a nice crust.
• Remove the cooked ribs and all but 2 tablespoons of fat from the pan. Add carrots, celery, onion, garlic, bay leaf and thyme and stir, making sure you scrape any residue off the bottom of the pot. Cook for several minutes, until vegetables start to get tender. Add salt and pepper to taste.
• Add Guinness and tomato paste to the pot and stir mixture until incorporated. Add ribs back into the pot, cover, and place in oven.
• Cook for 1 1/2 to 2 hours, stirring occasionally, until the meat is fork tender. Add parsley as garnish.

.

Irish Soda Bread

.

.

3 T. butter or margarine, softened
2½ cups all-purpose flour
2 T. sugar
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
¾ C. buttermilk

• Heat oven to 375ºF. Grease cookie sheet.
• Cut butter into flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt in large bowl, using pastry blender or crisscrossing 2 knives, until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Stir in raisins and just enough buttermilk so dough leaves side of bowl.
• Turn dough onto lightly floured surface. Knead 1 to 2 minutes or until smooth. Shape into round loaf, about 6 1/2 inches in diameter. Place on cookie sheet. Cut an X shape about 1/2 inch deep through loaf with floured knife.
• Bake 35 to 45 minutes or until golden brown. Brush with butter or margarine, softened, if desired.