Irish Dinner

As I finished up leftovers from Thursday's St. Patrick's Day meal for lunch today, I thought I should document what I made so that when I search around a year from now, I'll have it written down somewhere!

Usually I am on top of celebrating Pi Day, which is of course on March 14, but this year, since it fell on a Monday, I didn't get any pies made, and neither did anyone else in the fmaily.  The day before Rivendell is not a good day for anything extra or special!  So I really wanted to make something for St. Patrick's Day, which was Thursday.  Last year we celebrated Pi Day but not St Patrick's Day, so maybe that will be our plan from here on out--one or the other!  It seems more reasonable to celebrate Pi Day since we are all pretty math-minded, and we are Polish/Slovak/German, with not really even a hint of Irish.  But hey, cooking new things is fun!

I went searching around for a new Irish recipe to try, and I found Irish Coddle.  Even better, I read in the comments that I could make it in the crockpot, and that is what I did.  I needed something in the crockpot because I had to pick up the kids from Jonathan's math class, as well as have biology lab, so I didn't have a lot of extra time in the afternoon. It was super easy and delicious!  I fried up the thick bacon, and then I cooked the sliced onions in the bacon grease for a few minutes.  After removing the onions, I cooked the sausage breakfast links for a few minutes too, just to give them a little brownness.  Then I layered the potatoes, carrots, onion, salt, pepper, bacon, and sausage links, and poured 2 cups of chicken broth (not beef, like the original recipe said, but chicken, like the crockpot comment said) over it all.  I cooked it all day, and I didn't bother making the white sauce with cream and stout.  It was an easy crockpot meal, which I am always searching for, so this might actually make the rotation more frequently than once a year.  I was going to make Irish soda bread to go with it, but I completely forgot (because I got wrapped up making the dessert).  I did make a cabbage salad, which went really well with it.

For dessert, Anna and I made an Irish apple cake with custard sauce, and it was also very good!  It was hard to tell when it was done in the middle , though.  Luke suggested cooking it in a 9x13 pan next time (instead of a 9 in. springform), and I think I will try that.  The custard sauce was delicious.  It was gobbled up quickly!  Someone in the comments had a caramel sauce with it instead, and I imagine that would also be very yummy.  Next time!