Community Corner
Easy St. Patrick's Day Recipe: Traditional Irish Colcannon Mash
Typically Americans don't eat a lot of cabbage. Green cabbage is a good source of Vitamin C and calcium. Here is a great way to incorporate it into your mashed potatoes.
Traditional Irish Colcannon
St. Patrick’s Day will be here Saturday. Are you planning an Irish menu? Irish cuisine is nothing fancy but simple comfort food. Since my family loves mashed potatoes, we chose to make Colcannon.
Colcannon has a quaint history to it. Charms were wrapped in white paper and stirred into the final product. The charms consisted of a thimble, a ring, a button, a miniature horseshoe and a silver sixpence. Whoever got a charm would know their future such as the ring for marriage, the horseshoe for good luck, the sixpence for wealth, the thimble for spinsterhood and the button for bachelorhood.
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Colcannon is a very simple recipe of mashed potatoes mixed with green cabbage and green onions. Simple. Easy. Delicious. Since mutton chops are not common in America, we served our Colcannon with Southern style breaded pork chops.
Hong Kong Supermarket has an abundance of fresh Colcannon mash ingredients.
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Colcannon
3 lbs. of russet potatoes
½ head of green cabbage, cored and chopped into 1” pieces
1 cup of milk
1 stick of butter (1/2 cup) cut into thirds
5 green onions, chopped
Salt & pepper to taste
Garnish with chives
Peel and cut potatoes into 2” chunks. Place in a large saucepan and cover with cold water until potatoes are under at least an inch of water. Boil until tender, about 15 minutes.
While potatoes are cooking, in a separate saucepan add the cabbage and cover with water. Boil until cabbage is tender, about 10-12 minutes. Drain well and place cabbage back into saucepan with 1/3 of the butter. Cover and set aside but not on the burner.
Once the potatoes are done, drain well and put back into the saucepan. Over low heat, allow the cooked potatoes to dry out then add the milk and 1/3 of the butter. Do not stir until butter has melted and milk is warm. Mash potatoes with a potato masher thoroughly into the butter/milk mixture. Do not use a mixer or a ricer. Russet potatoes will turn gluey if using anything other than a potato masher. Stir in the cooked cabbage and the green onions. Salt and pepper to taste. Make a well in the center of the mound of potatoes and add the remaining butter. Garnish with chopped chives.
Serves four.