An Alternative to Corned Beef
Last March, we invited ourselves along on a friend’s visit home to Ireland. We had been once before, but this time we were fortunate enough to have the lovely and talented Sarah FitzGibbon and her enormous Irish family as guides.
We think about food without cease, so naturally we spent much of the time leading up to the trip pestering Sarah with questions about what we would eat. She informed us that we would be lunching with Darina Allen at the Balleymaloe Cookery School (perhaps Ireland’s equivalent of the CIA), visiting some lovely farmhouse cheesemakers (Gubbeen, Coolea, and Durrus to be precise), and dining at her Uncle’s pub in Youghal (pronounced Y’all). However, the culinary event that seemed to excite Sarah most was to happen right in her kitchen; something to which she referred obliquely as “The Fry.”
We were intrigued. What, we asked, was a Fry? Sarah continued to be vague, “A very large breakfast.” We thought maybe we understood. “Is it like a full English Breakfast, with the beans?”
“No. No beans.” Never confuse something English with something Irish.
On a lazy morning during our trip, Sarah made good on her promise. And it was glorious. The Fry is indeed a very large and we might add, a very meat-heavy, breakfast. Surpassing American brunchtime gluttony with leaps and bounds, the Fry consists of bacon (Irish bacon, or Rashers--more like Canadian Bacon than American, or “Streaky” bacon), sausage, blood pudding (=blood sausage), white pudding (no blood), tomato, fried egg, toast, tea or coffee and orange juice. Typically a weekend breakfast, or a even fortifying meal after night on the town, the Fry is obviously a once-in-while indulgence.
The making of the Fry is as much a ritual as the eating, and with such a lot of food to coordinate on one plate, timing is essential. Everything must be cooked in a particular order; which Sarah tells us is: sausages, then tomatoes, then bacon, puddings, and finally, eggs.
If you’d like make the fry for yourselves here in Seattle, Sarah has some suggestions. To procure the necessary delights, she recommends DeLaurentis, the Spanish Table (which carries a Spanish version of a blood sausage) or even a trusty old Google search for Irish important companies. With her Fry, Sarah drinks Barry’s Tea, brewed strong with milk. Barry’s is available for purchase at the British Pantry or the Perennial Tea Room. In the event that you don’t feel like cooking, several of Seattle’s Irish pub-type establishments serve a Fry for breakfast (though we’re sure it’s nowhere close to Sarah’s).
This year, though we will unfortunately not be vacationing in the land of our ancestors, we have been invited to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day at Sarah’s with a Fry. And since it’s been a year since our last one, we think we might be ready.
