Potatoes For St Patrick

St Patrick’s Day was traditionally the best time to plant your potatoes. But if you don’t fancy waiting twenty weeks for your harvest, you can choose from over 110 delicious ways to celebrate the humble spud with Eveleen Coyle’s The Pocket Irish Potato Recipe Book.

With tips on when to buy them, where to store them and how to cook them perfectly every time, Eveleen Coyle has created the ultimate potato bible. Here are a few tips to getting your spuds right this Patrick’s Day and every day:

·         Always remove potatoes from plastic bags and store them in brown paper bags or bags made from natural fibres.
·         Not sure how much to make? You should allow 225g of potatoes per person, allow more if you are roasting them.
·         Even if potatoes are small, cut them in half – just one cut surface on each potato means they will cook faster.
·         Preserve the flavour of new potatoes by steaming them instead of boiling them.
·         With older potatoes, put them in a saucepan of lightly salted cold water and bring to the boil.

In The Pocket Irish Potato Recipe Book, bestselling author Eveleen Coyle transforms potatoes into delicious dishes for every day or for special occasions. Whether you prefer the classics like Dublin Coddle, Colcannon, Shepherd’s Pie and Winter Soup, or are looking to transform your spuds into something more adventurous like Roasted Butternut Squash and Potato Curry, Potato Pizza and Parmesan Potato Cakes, this pocket guide has something for everyone with easy to follow recipes and full colour photographs.

Potato Soup With Bacon & Vegetables

Ingredients:

85g butter
900g potatoes, peeled and diced
1/4 head celeriac, diced
2 carrots, diced
900ml chicken stock
1 leek, halved and sliced
1 onion, diced
300ml cream or cream and milk
Pinch freshly ground nutmeg
85g smoked bacon lardons
Salt & pepper
Croutons and spring onion strips, to serve

Method:

1. Heat 55g butter in a heavy saucepan, add the potatoes, celeriac and carrots and sauté. Cover with stock, bring to the boil and simmer for 40 minutes. Purée half the soup. Heat the remaining butter in a saucepan, add the leek and onion and sauté lightly, then combine with the purée and remaining soup. Add the cream, seasoning with nutmeg and cook for a further 5 minutes.
2. Dice the bacon and brown in the pan. Serve the soup with croutons and spring onion strips sprinkled on top.

The Irish Pocket Potato Recipe Book is published by Gill & Macmillan and is in all good bookshops now and available from www.gillmacmillanbooks.ie , priced at €4.99.