Somewhat Simple for St. Patrick’s Day

We survived the Ides of March, yesterday, and look forward to St. Patrick’s Day, tomorrow. Between the two, today, I celebrated my birthday by taking the day off from work.

Benjamin Franklin Parkway

My husband and I were planning to drive up to NYC to walk around the Upper West Side, but we reconsidered when the weather forecast changed to lower temperatures.  Instead, we drove down to Philadelphia. It was somewhat strange to drive past the Philadelphia Museum of Art and not see anyone in line to have their picture taken with the Rocky statue. The colors of the country flags that line Benjamin Franklin Parkway seemed especially bold against the clear blue sky; the sycamore trees were no competition without their green leaves. We found a parking space in Chinatown and walked a few blocks to Reading Terminal Market.

At Reading Terminal Market

City Kitchen had advertised that a cooking demo of a traditional Irish dish would begin at 11:30 a.m. We arrived in time to secure seats in the back row. After forty-five minutes we had sampled “Irish potatoes” (a Philadelphia sweet confection of cinnamon and coconut flavors), soda bread with honey butter, shepherd’s pie, and a platter of bangers and mash laid out with the colors of the Irish flag.  The instruction wasn’t too complex; it seemed more of a sampling, though he did explain the preparation as he put the ingredients together. Overall, the experience was comfortable and inviting.

Joking About Showing Off

If you’re looking for something simple to serve at your St. Patrick’s Day celebration, I recommend the bangers and mash flag:

Green beans in garlic butter, mashed potatoes with seasoned salt and sour cream, Irish sausages, and sliced carrots in honey butter and whiskey.

Bangers & Mash Flag

Bangers and Mash

There’s plenty of time to plan how you will celebrate St. Patrick’s Day.

If you aren’t eager to buy the whole cut of corned beef or to turn on the oven to bake shepherd’s pie, stove-top colcannon might be a good choice.

Although the word coleslaw probably doesn’t have anything to do with the etymology of this potato dish, cabbage (or kale) as an ingredient does play an important part in the recipe.

 

St. Patrick’s Day Cheesecakes

Spring may have sprung here in Columbus. Yesterday, it was warm enough to walk to the stores without a jacket on. Besides soaking in some sun and inhaling the fresh, cool air, my mission was to find some festive sprinkles to decorate a dessert. St. Patrick’s Day is just around the corner, and I wanted to start experimenting early, so that I could have time for a second try if I wasn’t successful with the first attempt.  Unfortunately, it seems that the stores are more interested in green bling and booze than in shamrock sprinkles.  Michael’s, Target, Kroger: no luck there.

The grocery store did carry Bailey’s Irish Cream as well as non-alcoholic coffee creamer. The creamer was cheaper, and I would find it easier to dispose of extra coffee flavoring than liquor, so I bought the creamer.

Creamer in place of liquor was one of the substitutions. I also used a gluten-free crust in place of the crushed “biscuits”. The third substitution was suggested by my European coworkers: cottage cheese for the cream cheese.

Although I do trust them, I wanted to look at several recipes to get a better idea of how the cream cheese would hold up. I also wanted to be sure that adding chocolate and cream wouldn’t cause a negative chemical or physical reaction. Half Price Books was one of the stops on my walk that afternoon, so I peeked at a few cheesecake recipes in different volumes. No book had exactly what was in my mind: some included gelatin, others didn’t have the chocolate, etc.  But I decided to give it a whirl nonetheless.

The 2 eggs, cream, sugar, and cottage cheese came together nicely in my Oster blender.  The chopped Brix extra dark chocolate that I got for Christmas melted quickly in a double boiler, and it was easily incorporated into the cheese mixture.  Another few pulses and the liquid was ready for the muffin cups that I had prepared. After 20 minutes in the preheated oven (300*F) they were finished.

Cheesecake is better if you’re patient enough to wait for it to cool and for the flavors to meld. So, I left them in the refrigerator overnight. This morning I took one to work, so that we could have a taste test. I should have taken more. Only a few lucky people got to have a bite.

Tomorrow, I’ll take a few more in for my coworkers. Now that I know the flavor and texture are good, I want to make sure that the individual cheesecakes are also pleasing to the eye. Whipped cream might not survive the walk to work, so I just drew some shamrocks with green sparkle gel.

Filling:

1/4 c Bailey’s coffee creamer Original Irish Cream flavor
16 oz cottage cheese
4 oz Brix extra dark chocolate
2 large eggs
1/4 c white sugar

Makes 18-20 cupcake sized cheesecakes