As we all know, St. Patrick’s day was this week so I decided to try out a traditional Irish recipe for this week’s post. At first, I was going to go with a recipe for corned beef. However, after a little bit of research, I was surprised to learn that corned beef is actually not considered a traditional Irish meal. So after a little more research and a lot of cookbook readings later, I decided to make boxty.
Boxty is a potato pancake dish that hails from the northern area of Ireland. In terms of history, many cite the Irish Famine as the event that inspired the creation of this recipe and it has been considered an Irish meal staple ever since.
The recipe itself is actually pretty simple. The recipes are all pretty standard and include things that were already in my kitchen which I greatly appreciated. In terms of actually cooking the boxty, the process was very similar to making a pancake just a lot stickier because the batter is very thick. One important thing to note is that according to the several blogs I read through, flattening the boxty while they cook is important to make them as thin as possible. The first recipe I used suggested using mashed potatoes in addition to actual potatoes, but I was really not prepared to make mashed potatoes in addition to making this recipe. Instead, I found another recipe to supplement the ingredient suggestions that only required one type of potatoes that I only had to prep by peeling which was helpful. However, this did make the version of the recipe stray a little bit from the traditional version. So, if you have a little more time or want to make the boxty as authentic as possible, have some mashed potatoes on hand!
Like some of the recipes I’ve tried in the past for this blog, boxty is considered a staple item that can be dressed up in a seemingly infinite amount of ways. I decided to try boxy in three ways. The first was just plain, the second was with peppers, and the third was with a mushroom sauce. I personally favored the last of the three, but all of them were surprisingly delish. If you want the standard version, I would recommend eating it as a side dish. If you’re looking to try out some of the variants on the recipe, then it’s honestly perfect for any meal. I’m also a really big fan of trying out a bunch of different spices and seeing how they end up, which I will definitely try on this recipe in the future.
I really liked this recipe and it was a fun cultural take on the typical potato pancake, which I appreciated. Be warned though, the boxty is very filling and the recipes do make quite a few so you may want to adjust accordingly if you’re just cooking for yourself.
If you try this recipe out or already have, I’d love to hear about it. I’ll attach a link to the recipes I used down below for you to refer to in the future.
Recipe:
https://www.chowhound.com/recipes/boxty-irish-potato-pancake-28172
Sources:
https://www.irishcentral.com/culture/food-drink/traditional-irish-potato-cakes-boxty
https://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/sns-holiday-st-patricks-day-dishes-story.html
Easy Irish Boxty Recipe From the Experts at Gallagher’s Boxty House, Dublin
Yummy!!! This sounds delicious! They kind of look like little hashbrowns in pancake shape! I love that you chose an Irish-inspired recipe for this week! The more I read your passion blogs, the more I want to try out these recipes! You seem like a great chef and I am sure everything you make is absolutely delicious. I cannot wait to see what recipe you try out next!!!
Loved how you made an Irish recipe for St. Pattys day! It sounds so good, at first when you said potato pancakes I thought about lefsa but honestly the picture looks more like hash browns. If I had good cooking skills I would definitely try this recipe…maybe someday 🙂 I love your blogs, they always make me hungry, I am looking forward to see what you make next!
Hi Anna,
I want to start off and say, the recipes you pick always seem so delicious! I also want to applaud you for doing further research and not choosing the norm of “corned beef”. I always get so excited to read your posts because I often find it so fascinating that I have never been exposed to a recipe like that. The “Boxty” truly made me feel super hungry, and I clicked on the links that you provided and wow it looks awesome.
I look forward to trying this recipe and hearing your next blog!!