"Irish food and ingredients is world class / world leading / best in the word". According to who?

Yakov P. Golyadkin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120633927#Comment_120633927

Super pro beef master expert? Who gave that title, North Korea or the UN?

magicbastarder

that's the first north korea reference in this thread which is justified!

thomas 123

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120632218#Comment_120632218

Oh i'm sorry Mr Fancy pants.

Tell us your stuck up your own backside with no ambiguity at all there fair play.

Mass produced or not, its what the average tourist is exposed to here daily - that's what they see as the Irish breakfast sausage and what the vast majority of the Irish people see as Produce(which is the topic of this thread, not artisan butchers sausages).

thomas 123

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120633311#Comment_120633311

A few rich mans pigs do not equal Irish Produce - you are the troll here if anyone is.

Gloomtastic!

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120634125#Comment_120634125

Please post results in this forum. A dedicated home-made Irish cheese thread would be great. 🙏

timmyntc

Yes, focusing on the tiny minority of artisan producers and holding that go is representative of irish ingredients as a whole is dishonest.

In the US you can get fantastic organic grass fed beef, pork, chicken eggs etc. But the majority of ingredients produced in the US are awful, with chlorinated chickens, soy and corn syrup fed beef and pork.. which are far more representative of US food as a whole than the minority of good stuff.

put_the_kettle_on

@Gloomtastic! No worries, I'm happy to post my results. I make my own sausages too, if anyone fancies a go at that I'm only too pleased to walk them through the process. I'm doing 10kg of bratwurst for the freezer next week so I'll take pics just in case anyone is curious.

Space Dog

I'm always surprised Ireland does so little with its supposedly superior dairy.

Who drinks milk on its own (unless you're under 18)? Once you add it to cereal or porridge you won't taste much of it anyway. And yoghurts aren't any better than elsewhere.

Why does Kerrygold produce cheese for the German market, but they don't sell it here? I've tried Kerrygold cheddar and it's actually very nice.

Most of the cheese I like and use is from France, Switzerland and Italy. I don't think St Tola or Cashel Blue are that great. The only Irish cheese that I truly adore is Young Buck from the North.

Irish ice cream is so expensive, it has totally put me off getting a scoop and it doesn't compare to Italian gelato (and 99s are a waste of calories and usually boring anyway).

Btw, Irish butter is very nice, but so is French or Danish butter.

Dave_The_Sheep

I quite enjoy a glass of milk, if I'm honest. Cold. Don't drink tea/coffee/eat cereal so it's the only way I have it.

All my cheese for the Christmas cheeseboard last year was Irish, and it went down a storm with the relations (particularly the Gubbeen and, Young Buck and the Milleens. Carrig Bru I also liked but herself wasn't mad on it).

Not to say there's not cheese as good/better abroad - there is - but I'd not be crying if you told me I had to eat Irish cheese for the rest of my life (bar maybe parmesan which I use a lot of, but I might be able to find a replacement for).

No real point to this post as such. Not really weighing in on the debate, just thinking aloud.

JackieChang

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120635093#Comment_120635093

Exactly, people keep posting about that one artisan product they had.

But if you look at the average Irish person's shopping basket, or if you were a tourist randomly invited into the average Irish person's home to eat, what you'd find is:

Brennan's bread

Carrols sanguige ham

Clonakilty 50% eyelid sausages

Crisps

McDonnels Curry Sauce Powder

Frozen sausage rolls

Donegal catch

I won't lie I've been abroad and have been absolutely dying for a good tayto sanguige. Because it's comfort food. I suspect it's the same feeling behind the phenomenon of people saying we have amazing world class best food. And it's always Irish people saying we have world class food.

As i mentioned in my OP, other than beef (which i disagree with) and butter, you need to work hard to find world class food here.

magicbastarder

Someone who travels a lot should set up a YouTube channel where they go into Aldi or Lidl or their local equivalent, and buy the own brand staples to compare the basics across Europe, and further. It's the only way to settle this.

the beer revolu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120636349#Comment_120636349

I have to admit to being someone who often looks in other people's shopping baskets out of curiosity.

I love French supermarkets and I think the choice and quality of food in them is, generally, vastly superior to what we find here.

But look into the average person's shopping basket and you'll see that most of them, mostly eat crap, too.

BTW there is absolutely nothing wrong with using the entire animal. No problem eating eyelids or toes or any other part of the animal. Better than killing and wasting an animal.