What do you think?
Rate this book
The Country Cooking of Ireland
In The Country Cooking of Ireland, internationally acclaimed food and travel writer Colman Andrews brings to life the people, countryside, and delicious food of Ireland. Fast emerging as one of the world's hottest culinary destinations, Ireland is a country of artisanal bakers, farmers, cheesemakers, and butteries, where farm-to-table dining has been practiced for centuries. Meticulously researched and reported, this sumptuous cookbook includes 250 recipes and more than 100 photographs of the pubs, the people, and the emerald Irish countryside taken by award-winning photographer Christopher Hirsheimer. Rich with stories of the food and people who make Ireland a wonderful place to eat, and laced with charming snippets of song, folklore, and poetry, The Country Cooking of Ireland ushers in a new understanding of Irish food.
392 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
175 people are currently reading
912 people want to read
About the author
Colman Andrews
30 books9 followersCo-founder and former editor of Saveur magazine and the author of Catalan Cuisine, Flavors of the Riviera, and Everything on the Table and co-author and co-editor of three Saveur cookbooks. Now a resident of New York City and Connecticut, a native of Los Angeles and a frequent contributor to the LA Times and Los Angeles Magazine. He won six James Beard Awards for his writing on food and wine, and was one of the first 50 people named to Who's Who of Food and Beverage in America.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
August 6, 2015
This cookbook is beautiful and worthy of your coffee table for a quick dalliance into Irish life and culture. Our group, however, wasn't as enamored of the recipes as we were the prose and photos. While the recipes aren't difficult to execute, we found the size of the book (very large), the multitude of fonts, the lack of information guiding the reader to continued recipes on following pages and the lack of page numbers on pages with photographs to be challenging and frustrating as a useful cookbook. Andrews seems to be asking this book to fulfill too many roles.
We sampled the following recipes...
- Leek Pie - we found this recipe produces a very rich and buttery pie. Reducing this recipe 1-2 tablespoons of butter is recommended.
- Guinness Float - vanilla ice cream and Guinness...a curious combination that no one loved and a couple of us really didn't like.
- Blackberry Mousse - perhaps because blackberries aren't in season at this time, this mousse lacked flavor. No one disliked it, but no one loved it either.
- Baked Beans - the time commitment for this recipe (5-6 hours in a low heat oven)is daunting but well worth it. We really enjoyed the sweet/salty flavor that the molasses, Worcestershire sauce and brown sugar produces.
- Fadge (Potato Cakes) - fried mashed potatoes...literally. Most of us really liked this ultimate comfort food.
- Scones - We all really enjoyed the scones. They had a nice crust with a soft center.
- Soda Bread - We were split on the soda bread between really liking it and thinking it was just okay. No one disliked it. The cook who prepared it was unable to find Irish flour so she used pastry flour with pretty good results.
- Curried Parsnip and Apple Soup - this soup was a crowd pleaser and relatively quick and easy to put together. The parsnips, apples and 1/2 cup cream produce a thick, creamy soup after it is blended.
Andrews shares 250 recipes from the countryside of Ireland that celebrate slow food and seasonal cooking. His enthusiasm for all things Irish is evident in this collection.
We sampled the following recipes...
- Leek Pie - we found this recipe produces a very rich and buttery pie. Reducing this recipe 1-2 tablespoons of butter is recommended.
- Guinness Float - vanilla ice cream and Guinness...a curious combination that no one loved and a couple of us really didn't like.
- Blackberry Mousse - perhaps because blackberries aren't in season at this time, this mousse lacked flavor. No one disliked it, but no one loved it either.
- Baked Beans - the time commitment for this recipe (5-6 hours in a low heat oven)is daunting but well worth it. We really enjoyed the sweet/salty flavor that the molasses, Worcestershire sauce and brown sugar produces.
- Fadge (Potato Cakes) - fried mashed potatoes...literally. Most of us really liked this ultimate comfort food.
- Scones - We all really enjoyed the scones. They had a nice crust with a soft center.
- Soda Bread - We were split on the soda bread between really liking it and thinking it was just okay. No one disliked it. The cook who prepared it was unable to find Irish flour so she used pastry flour with pretty good results.
- Curried Parsnip and Apple Soup - this soup was a crowd pleaser and relatively quick and easy to put together. The parsnips, apples and 1/2 cup cream produce a thick, creamy soup after it is blended.
Andrews shares 250 recipes from the countryside of Ireland that celebrate slow food and seasonal cooking. His enthusiasm for all things Irish is evident in this collection.
April 8, 2010
Perhaps the best Irish cookbook I've seen and just in time for St. Patrick's Day, it's full of all the best Irish basics in simple to follow recipe format. Though it is in the dreaded oversize format (note to publishers - I HATE THIS) it not only provides excellent recipe and food information it's full of excellent cultural and historical information. No revisionist history here, it lays out the story of the so called "famine" in painstaking detail. If you want to cook authentic Irish cuisine this is the only cookbook you'll ever need.
April 24, 2024
Newest edit: I received a copy of this beautiful cookbook (hard to find and out of print) for my birthday today. I am so happy to have my own copy of this one!!
An absolute tome of a cookbook, full of Irish home cooking, stories and history, and lots of beautiful photos. While the recipes in this book are not fancy, they do exude comfort and ease of preparation and cooking. Being of partly Irish heritage (Belfast and Ballymena)I found it interesting to see recipes written down for food we made and ate regularly, like fadge, which was a breakfast staple on the weekends, and Irish soda bread, both white and brown, and with raisins. And my granny’s fruitcake.
The book covers all food groups, including fish and wild game, and although the recipes call for “Irish” ingredients, it is possible to use your local grocery finds. Irish cheese and butter is commonly found now, locally, at least in this area. The stories regarding the different foods are enjoyable to read, as are references to some of the old famous cooks.
Edit: The Guinness Cake was a huge success, which was served with Whiskey Butter {a combo of butter, Tulamore Dew whiskey and sugar). The fadge recipe made a lighter and tastier fadge, and it didn't last long. Actually it didn't make it to the next day's breakfast. The pickled salmon is delicious, and is very much like a pickled herring. The soda Bread was made with the typical whole wheat flour and oatmeal and was tasty. Definitely making all of these again.
An absolute tome of a cookbook, full of Irish home cooking, stories and history, and lots of beautiful photos. While the recipes in this book are not fancy, they do exude comfort and ease of preparation and cooking. Being of partly Irish heritage (Belfast and Ballymena)I found it interesting to see recipes written down for food we made and ate regularly, like fadge, which was a breakfast staple on the weekends, and Irish soda bread, both white and brown, and with raisins. And my granny’s fruitcake.
The book covers all food groups, including fish and wild game, and although the recipes call for “Irish” ingredients, it is possible to use your local grocery finds. Irish cheese and butter is commonly found now, locally, at least in this area. The stories regarding the different foods are enjoyable to read, as are references to some of the old famous cooks.
Edit: The Guinness Cake was a huge success, which was served with Whiskey Butter {a combo of butter, Tulamore Dew whiskey and sugar). The fadge recipe made a lighter and tastier fadge, and it didn't last long. Actually it didn't make it to the next day's breakfast. The pickled salmon is delicious, and is very much like a pickled herring. The soda Bread was made with the typical whole wheat flour and oatmeal and was tasty. Definitely making all of these again.
September 13, 2025
The Country Cooking of Ireland
Colman Andrews, Darina Allen (Foreword), Christopher Hirsheimer (Photographer)
The Irish take on basic ingredients is interesting, bacon for example or Kerrygold butter. And their take on recipes I already know such as Pea Soup, a PQ Habitant specialty.
By its nature this is not a book one reads cover to cover.
The chapter on the lowly pratie is written with reverence. Introduced form South America to Europe the potato like the lobster in PEI was looked down on as food for the poor until it took the country by storm replacing wheat as the country’s staple food.
Every European culture has its take on the potato. German Kartoffel, Jewish Latke, Slavic Pierogi, Swiss Rosti, Scots Scone, British Chips, Acadian Rapi Pie, Irish Boxty; everyone has their favourites. The population of Ireland swelled until the potato fungus wiped it all out.
Simmering the milk and butter you use to mash potatoes and infusing it with parsley and other herbs, steaming the potatoes to keep them dry so they absorb the liquids better are new to me.
Of course the Celts have their unique take on meat and given history recipes for parts of the animal and wildlife many would look down on.
I believe you have to come from Ireland to appreciate Irish Soda Bread. Of course the variety of flour you use and how you handle the baking would make a great difference. Bread baked in a community oven would have its unique quality the oven being far hotter than I’m accustomed to using just as Italian ovens turn out unique pizza. And bread baked in a gas oven experiences a moister heat.
Butter I knew growing up. The breed of cow whose cream is used, the diet she eats, and how the cream is handled and churned all influences how the butter turns out. The amount of water in Canadian Butter is not acknowledged on the packaging.
Pigs fed on pecans yield a unique pork in Texas. And how long the carcass is aged before carving has a vast influence on tenderness and flavour. Freshly slaughtered pork chops are tough and rubbery.
A friend had a career in Race Horse Oats. Why oats so energizes horses is another story but steel cut oats is an Irish thing.
The book not only supplies recipes but the ethos that inspired them.
Colman Andrews, Darina Allen (Foreword), Christopher Hirsheimer (Photographer)
The Irish take on basic ingredients is interesting, bacon for example or Kerrygold butter. And their take on recipes I already know such as Pea Soup, a PQ Habitant specialty.
By its nature this is not a book one reads cover to cover.
The chapter on the lowly pratie is written with reverence. Introduced form South America to Europe the potato like the lobster in PEI was looked down on as food for the poor until it took the country by storm replacing wheat as the country’s staple food.
Every European culture has its take on the potato. German Kartoffel, Jewish Latke, Slavic Pierogi, Swiss Rosti, Scots Scone, British Chips, Acadian Rapi Pie, Irish Boxty; everyone has their favourites. The population of Ireland swelled until the potato fungus wiped it all out.
Simmering the milk and butter you use to mash potatoes and infusing it with parsley and other herbs, steaming the potatoes to keep them dry so they absorb the liquids better are new to me.
Of course the Celts have their unique take on meat and given history recipes for parts of the animal and wildlife many would look down on.
I believe you have to come from Ireland to appreciate Irish Soda Bread. Of course the variety of flour you use and how you handle the baking would make a great difference. Bread baked in a community oven would have its unique quality the oven being far hotter than I’m accustomed to using just as Italian ovens turn out unique pizza. And bread baked in a gas oven experiences a moister heat.
Butter I knew growing up. The breed of cow whose cream is used, the diet she eats, and how the cream is handled and churned all influences how the butter turns out. The amount of water in Canadian Butter is not acknowledged on the packaging.
Pigs fed on pecans yield a unique pork in Texas. And how long the carcass is aged before carving has a vast influence on tenderness and flavour. Freshly slaughtered pork chops are tough and rubbery.
A friend had a career in Race Horse Oats. Why oats so energizes horses is another story but steel cut oats is an Irish thing.
The book not only supplies recipes but the ethos that inspired them.
March 15, 2023
Interesting
I found this cookbook fascinating, not that I will cook any of the dishes but it was the stories behind the dishes. This is quite a culinary history book. I do wish there were more pictures of the food, and that is why it got 4 vs. 5 stars. I am always interested in reading about food, cooking, and culture, and this book has it all.
I found this cookbook fascinating, not that I will cook any of the dishes but it was the stories behind the dishes. This is quite a culinary history book. I do wish there were more pictures of the food, and that is why it got 4 vs. 5 stars. I am always interested in reading about food, cooking, and culture, and this book has it all.
April 20, 2018
I actually didn't have a chance to finish this book before I needed to return it to the library but I think I'll be checking it out again. There are some recipes (including one for pickled salmon) that I'd really like to try. Made me want to visit Ireland.
May 17, 2017
Terrific Soda Bread recipe that uses Irish/Scottish oatmeal. Fabulous.
May 5, 2020
A beautiful and thorough book! I bought it used and have made a few recipes of my heritage.
March 15, 2022
Some really great historical recipes if Ireland. Fun to read the history of these recipes but just not my food taste.
March 7, 2023
I don't quite get all the five star reviews. Pretty much every vegetable recipe called for boiling the veg and serving with butter.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 18, 2017
Well researched recipes
I enjoyed Colman Andrews Country Cooking of Ireland because it was both a well researched reference book and a guide to Irish cookery. The reminisces and historical notes gave an interesting background to the dishes that followed. THe origins of various words and even a guide to faeries were educational and written in a witty style.The photographs illustrated the recipes nicely.
I enjoyed Colman Andrews Country Cooking of Ireland because it was both a well researched reference book and a guide to Irish cookery. The reminisces and historical notes gave an interesting background to the dishes that followed. THe origins of various words and even a guide to faeries were educational and written in a witty style.The photographs illustrated the recipes nicely.
April 13, 2011
‘Country Cooking of Ireland’ contains a comprehensive collection of Irish recipes, with mouth-watering color photos and fascinating bits of history with each section. In my hands, it felt weighty and substantial, as the dimensions of each page are about 8X11 inches and there are more than 350 pages. There are 15 chapters and in the back there is a resource guide, list of recipes, bibliography and an index.
Colman Andrews, one of the founders of Saveur magazine, wrote and compiled this volume, which seems designed to win a James Beard award, if it hasn’t already done so. The author approaches the topic of Irish food with earnestness not usually found in other cookbooks. I particularly enjoyed the wide range of photographs of many of the recipes, but also of raw ingredients and Ireland, past and present (photos by Christopher Hirsheimer).
I tried 3 recipes: boxty, Shephard’s Pie and ‘Sultana Scones’ (though I used dried cranberries instead of raisons). All were easy to understand and to follow. For each of the recipes that I cooked, I could have probably found a similar recipe on the internet. However, each dish was really enhanced by the history and photographs in the book. Overall, I would highly recommend for those interested in Irish cooking.
Buy here:
The Country Cooking of Ireland
Colman Andrews, one of the founders of Saveur magazine, wrote and compiled this volume, which seems designed to win a James Beard award, if it hasn’t already done so. The author approaches the topic of Irish food with earnestness not usually found in other cookbooks. I particularly enjoyed the wide range of photographs of many of the recipes, but also of raw ingredients and Ireland, past and present (photos by Christopher Hirsheimer).
I tried 3 recipes: boxty, Shephard’s Pie and ‘Sultana Scones’ (though I used dried cranberries instead of raisons). All were easy to understand and to follow. For each of the recipes that I cooked, I could have probably found a similar recipe on the internet. However, each dish was really enhanced by the history and photographs in the book. Overall, I would highly recommend for those interested in Irish cooking.
Buy here:
The Country Cooking of Ireland
February 14, 2016
You don't have to be interested in cooking anything or even be of Irish extraction to love this book! It's funny, the pictures are beautiful, and it's chock full of good stories and Irish lore too. You might just end up wishing for a big dish of colcannan though. Maybe a "pint
You don't have to be Irish or interested in cooking up a storm to love this book! It's charming and funny and the pictures are just beautiful. Irish country lore and little anecdotes about the typical foods might just make you be wishing for a "pint" and a big dish of colcannon all swimming in the famous butter. Now I know there is a butter museum in Ireland if I ever go to Cork.
You don't have to be Irish or interested in cooking up a storm to love this book! It's charming and funny and the pictures are just beautiful. Irish country lore and little anecdotes about the typical foods might just make you be wishing for a "pint" and a big dish of colcannon all swimming in the famous butter. Now I know there is a butter museum in Ireland if I ever go to Cork.
Read
July 29, 2011Opulent and gorgeously put together, great rcipes, great stories, great cultural underpinnings for the food (and photos to match) and great pictures of how the recipes should look. It will make you want to plan your next trip to Ireland
July 28, 2014
Excellent recipe book with history and background for the recipes. Dessert recipes seem interesting. I have copied the soda bread recipes to try.
A good book for Maryan to peruse.Available at the public library.
A good book for Maryan to peruse.Available at the public library.
March 20, 2010
I agree with Maureen Flatley's review.
May 27, 2010
I don't really like irish food (one word: mutton), but this won a cookbook award so I'll give it a try
UPDATE: A surprising lack of mutton. AND plethora of yummy root veggies (note I <3 parsnips)
UPDATE: A surprising lack of mutton. AND plethora of yummy root veggies (note I <3 parsnips)
Want to read
May 27, 2010Boxty!
October 23, 2010
Gorgeous pictures and interesting historical anecdotes. I can appreciate the spirit of the cooking, but I'll probably never use a recipe from the book. I *must* find Irish butter now, though.
June 3, 2013
There is a TON of great research in this book. Though I didn't find any recipes I wanted to try, it's a great resource about Irish culture and food.
June 3, 2012
Saveur master chronicler of food - essays on people and places, interspersed with the best Irish recipes...
November 8, 2012
Great cook book. Lots of awesome classic dishes to try out. I'd recommend this to anyone who enjoys good ol' home cooking.
January 9, 2015
Notes:
a huge and heavy book
only found a few recipes
full of photos and history
a huge and heavy book
only found a few recipes
full of photos and history
April 8, 2015
Excellent cookbook filled with simple home recipes, complex fancy recipes and a ton of stories and information about Ireland.
June 8, 2015
way too big to be a functional kitchen cookbook. fun vignettes of irish food history and current trends. most recipes seem simple with common ingredients.
September 5, 2016
Some recipes. Country Cooking? Supermarket country cooking maybe. At times I enjoyed the pictures better. Because the typography of this book is wonderful.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews