Grateful For The Irish

So we were supposed to arrive for the party at 5, but I ended up working later than expected and we didn't get there until closer to 8, but what are you gonna do. Unfortunately we were bringing the cheese and I lagged. Oh well.

We started the night with four types of Irish cheese in honor of the occasion. Cashel Blue, Blarney Castle, Dubliner and a Vintage Irish Cheddar. The blue was a very smooth blue. Not being very salty at all, it was really good. It spread very well and was a really creamy blue. The Blarney Castle comes from the castle of that name where the blarney stone resides. It's a very light, but solid cheese. It comes in two varieties and we had the smoked. It was very similar to a light smoked gouda, not overpowering at all. Very nice as well. The Dubliner is described as a cross between a Cheddar and a Parmigiano Reggiano and that pretty well sums it up. It has a slight bite to it like sharp cheddar and finishes off with the classic Reggiano character. Awesome! The Vintage Irish Cheddar is made by Kerrygold the same people who make the Blarney and Dubliner. It gets the "Vintage" designation since the cheese is aged two years. A very easy to eat cheddar. Not too sharp, but sharp enough that you know you've had some cheddar. All four selections were winners and I finished off what was on the plate from last night this morning for breakfast. Mmmmmmm.

A side note on the cheese. I had purchased at igourmet.com for a friend a couple of times and she enjoyed it alot. So I finally decided to try it for myself. Most of the cheeses were probably available locally here, but I ordered all four online and they came well packed in a styrofoam cooler. Inside the cooler were the cheese and three reusable, washable cool/heat packs. Nice bonus. The cheese arrived in two days(2 day shipping) and the cheeses were still cool. Each was individually vaccuum wrapped and we popped them into the fridge until the weekend. If I couldn't find what I wanted locally or just felt like trying something new I would definitely shop there again. Ok back to the main story.

After the cheese we were served the classic Irish fare of corned beef, carrots and cabbage. It was roasted for 4-5 hours during the day in a bath of Guinness, water, onions and assorted seasonings. At the end it was removed from the pot and an Irish Whiskey/brown sugar/mustard glaze was applied and it was baked for about 15 minutes. Holy moly! It was a good tasting corned beef and man was it tender. The sweet glaze added at the end made a perfect match to the flavor of the beef. We also had mashed potatoes with a bit of spinach mixed in. Very nice. A loaf of soda bread and a loaf of brown bread were also freshly baked earlier that day for dinner that night. I was stuffed to say the least. Didn't stop me from having a couple of cupcakes later on though.

Throughout all of this were interspersed many trips to the cooler to retrieve fresh, cool Guinness. We finished off the night with a drink called an Irish Car Bomb. It consists of a pint of Guinness and a combined shot of Irish Whiskey and Baileys. You fill the shot glass with equal parts of first the whiskey and then the Irish Creme. Then you drop the shot glass into the pint and down the pint. Yummy with a capital Yummy. I must say though that after looking up the recipe online we only did Irish M80s. We only went with the Baileys Irish Creme last night. I didn't know until this morning that you're supposed to split the shot equally between the Baileys and the whiskey. Next time we'll do it right, but I must say just using the Baileys and Guinness made for an excellent way to finish the night.

We followed that up with some more chatting and watching crazy skiers and snowboarders and then finally headed off to bed around 3AM. Another successful party thrown at the P&B residence.

I'm really slackin'. Again no pictures. Totally weak.