Cookbook talk:Cuisine of Ireland

Being vegetarian, it's hard to come across good examples of local specialities that I can eat on my travels, since most local specialities seem to involve pigs in some way or another. However, when on a trip to Bath, in a lovely café, a very nice chap made me a plate of mashed potatoes with spring onions chopped up on it, which he said hailed from Ireland. It was the best plate of mash I've ever had. Doesn't sound much, but the quality of the potatoes, spring onions, and the massive pools of butter in which it seemed to be drowning all came together to provide something that was almost Italian in its quality and simplicity, and which went down beautifully with a good beer. The best simple lunch I've ever had; am not going to attempt its recreation, to avoid dissapointment.

My Girlfriend wouldn't kiss me for the rest of the holiday, because she said my breath stank of onions.

Mashed potato with scallion (spring onions) and butter is know as 'champ', and is, as far as I know, particular to the North of Ireland.

Black pudding is not Irish
I'm from Northern Ireland, and here black pudding is just short of being dispised. It's very much a British thing.