Irish Stew

In is 8:30am on Sunday morning I am sitting in Starbucks having my venti coffee and reading the Chronicle on my tablet. I see Yang's mom walking towards me on her way into our apartment complex. I think for a moment about whether I should call out to her our just make eye contact which is my normal social outreach. She notices me and walks over. She asks me if I'm cooking today and I say yes, I will make something for St. Patrick's Day. She then asks me if I think the kids will like "your food" as she calls it. It is a rhetorical question. Before I can answer, she states that she will make some Chinese food for dinner as well.

I know that I will at least make soda bread and I'm hoping to make corn beef as well. Since you cannot find corn beef here I search for a recipe on how to make it and I find one. It only takes 10 days to marinate in the refrigerator. I then find a few recipes for Irish stew and settle on that.

To most expats I know here St. Patrick's Day is a good excuse to hit the pubs as if an excuse is needed. I've never felt that way even if in past years Yang and I did find ourselves hitting a pub or three. What it is to me is about carrying on a tradition. One that my Grandmother passed on to my mom who passed it on to me and one that my kids will hopefully maintain. I thought about this during my first five mile run in four months (since it got cold) and after my run was over I went an bought the ingredients.

Lydia helped me a bit with the stew by cutting some vegetables and thankfully not cutting herself. Aidan came in to help with the soda bread.

When it came time to eat Elisa didn't want to stop watching TV. I asked her to sit down and try a bit of the stew and the bread and with a little coaxing she did. Aidan and Lydia sat on either side of me and Yang's mom was at the far end of the table. The stew actually tasted really good which is only a 50/50 proposition for anything I cook. I started to tell the story about how the Irish came to America because of the lack of food in Ireland and when their stew might just be a potato or a carrot. How my ancestors, their ancestors came to America. Elisa, who by this time had wandered off had heard me taking about my grandmother and came back to the table. She climbed up on my lap. She asked me what my Grandmother looked like and I told her best I could. She asked if my grandmother made this kind of food and I said that she did. I said that my mom did too. And now I cook it. And someday you will cook it for your kids.