Massive. Colcannon. Craving.

At first, I thought it was a bout of ADD. I had resolved to work on my tornado book today, and had to go through emails, blog posts, and tweets to compile a comprehensive timeline of everything that’s happened since May 22. Yup – about as much fun as it sounds.

I sat down to my computer, and I thought… “Man, you know what would be awesome now? Colcannon. Just a massive bowl of piping hot colcannon. Mmmmm…”

I tried to turn my attention to what I was doing, but even a few hours later, the craving roared for attention. I decided to cave in and make some. I messaged my husband to let him know, and ask for an opinion on how much to make. That convo:

Me: I have decided that I need to make colcannon. How much?
Me: A little or a shit ton?
Husband: Shit ton!!!!!!!!!!!
Husband: !!!!!!!!!!!

Yep. We kind of adore colcannon here… as you may have guessed from his copious use of exclamation points!

Colcannon is a very traditional Irish dish – and if you search for it online, the recipes you’ll find are pretty much all in the Irish style. Traditional Irish colcannon is essentially mashed potatoes with kale or cabbage mixed in… sometimes with leeks. You add butter and cream, season it a bit… and it’s generally a pretty good thing. It’s very much an autumn thing, and is particularly associated with Halloween.

On Halloween, various small objects are hidden within a batch of caulcannon, intended to discern the future of those who find them. A ring means that the person will marry soon. A button or a thimble means a lifetime of bachelorhood/spinsterism. (I don’t think that’s a word. Oh well, my blog, my rules!). A coin means that the person who finds it will come into wealth soon. A cute tradition – I’ve only ever seen it done with coins, personally!

This recipe is not Irish style. This is one of the many ways that they make caulcannon on the east coast of Canada. I learned it from a friend from Newfoundland, and it’s how I’ve made it since learning of colcannon’s existence, probably a decade ago.

Where the Irish style is fairly simple, with only a couple of ingredients… Newfoundland (and, from what I hear, Nova Scotia!) style incorporates many more kinds of vegetables, sometimes some meat, etc. The friend I learned this from used heavy cream in hers, I prefer to use sour cream.

For me, colcannon is one of those non-recipe recipes, when I make it. I cut up veggies, eyeballing it as I go. When I mash them and add stuff, everything is instinctual. Because “add a glob of sour cream” isn’t very technical, I made a point to measure everything, so I could share the recipe with all of you!

If you don’t like rutabagas, leave them out. Big fan of parsnips? Add more. Feel free to tinker with amounts or proportions of the ingredients, as you see fit. It’s a very free form recipe!

When all is said and done, this recipe is essentially a very rich, very flavorful version of mashed potatoes. I may or may not add photos at some point – as ridiculously tasty as it is, this is NOT a recipe that photographs well.

East-Coast Canadian / Newfoundland Style Colcannon
Makes a LARGE pot worth!

1 green cabbage
1 large rutabaga
1-2 lbs parsnips
2 lbs carrots
5 lbs potatoes (Yukon gold or red)
1 cup butter
1 ½ cups sour cream
2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper

Remove outer leaves from cabbage. Chop into small pieces, discarding center “core”. Peel rutabaga, parsnips, carrots, and potatoes, chop into smallish chunks.

Place all prepared vegetables into a large stock pot, cover with water, and boil on medium heat for about 2 hours, or until each type of vegetable will mash easily.

Working in batches, run vegetables through a food processor, beat in a stand mixer, or mash by hand until mixture is smooth.

Chop butter into smaller cubes, add to still-hot mash of vegetables along with the sour cream. Stir until butter is melted, and cream fully incorporated into the mash. Stir in salt and pepper, check taste. Add more salt and/or pepper if desired.

Serve as-is, or pour into baking pans, cover with foil, and bake for 30 minutes at 350. We usually don’t get this far – the aroma of the colcannon boiling for 2 hours usually has us pretty rabid (and low on patience!) by the time we get to the mashing step – Forget the additional wait of putting it in the oven!

This recipe freezes well. Just pack into containers, cover tightly with plastic wrap, and cover with TIGHT lid.

Edited to add: Ok fine, here’s a crappy cell phone picture. I MAY add a professional shot later

I cannot tell you how amazing this jelly is, you’ll really have to try it for yourself. It’s the perfect balance of flavors – sweet, heat, and just the complex pepper taste in general… without being too hot!

This will make about 6 jam jar’s worth of jelly, but beware – we went through our batch WAY too fast. (Especially when you

consider the fact that there are only 2 of us here!). We like it on crackers, or spread on toast – especially when either has a layer of cream cheese spread on as a base! Breakfast, lunch, dinner, or snacks – Highly addictive.

This is also a really easy recipe, and it’s the first thing I ever tried canning!

Pepper Jelly

1 poblano pepper
1 green bell pepper
2 jalapeno peppers
2 anaheim pepper
1 orange habanero pepper
1.5 cps vinegar
6 cups sugar
1 pouch liquid pectin

Remove stems, cores, and seeds from all peppers, chop into large chunks. Put all peppers in food processor, process till finely chopped.

Put peppers and vinegar into pot, bring to boil. After 1 minute, turn temperature down and simmer another 15 mins.

Strain peppers for juice (I lined a metal colander with a coffee filter). *

In the pot, add sugar to strained pepper juice. Turn heat up to medium-high, and stir constantly while bringing it to a rapid boil.

Remove from heat, add pectin. Stir well.

Pour jelly into sterilized jars, leaving about 1/8″ inch space on top. Wipe rims, place lids on top of each, and affix the rings. Water bath / process for 5 minutes.

Allow jars to cool.

Check each jar to make sure it sealed properly. The middle of the lid should have been sucked down. Jars that haven’t sealed properly should be stored in the fridge and eaten relatively soon (within 2 weeks). This won’t be a problem

Tighten all lids. Jelly should keep for around a year, but it very likely won’t be around that long!

* After straining the juice, I thought it was a shame to have just a plain, clear jelly. I reserved the colorful peppers at this point, and re-added them just before I added the pectin. You can choose to have pepper pieces in your jelly or not! If you want to have them in there, don’t bother straining the juice out.

My husband LOVES corn… I mean in a fanatical, almost absurd way. On one of his birthdays, we went so far as to craft a “day of corn”, where every main dish, side, snack, and even DESSERT (ice cream) was made with corn. He could survive on the stuff.

So of course, when the state fair rolls around.. he looks forward to going for the roasted corn, etc. I just think of all the crazy amounts of people, the heat, and the nasty smell of grease (which he loves)… and the urge to hermit wells up.

This year I was particularly not in the mood to brave the crowds, so I made him a deal. I will come up with a recipe to batter corn on the cob IN a corn based batter and deep fry it.. if we don’t go to the Fair.

I lived up to my end of it, and we were both *very* pleasantly surprised by the results. Here’s how you can make the same at home!

Beer Battered Corn on the Cob

4 ears of corn
1 cup flour
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 bottle beer of your choice
1 egg, beaten

Preheat deep fryer to 375 degrees.

Remove husks and silk from ears of corn. If your deep fryer is small, cut each ear of corn in half. Set aside.

In a large enough bowl to fit your ears of corn, mix together flour, cornmeal, baking powder, and salt. Add egg and beer, whisk until smooth.

Dip corn in batter one at a time, turning til coated. Carefully place in deep fryer, fry for 2-4 minutes, until coating is as dark as you’d like it.

Remove from fryer, and turn out onto paper towels to catch any extra oil.

Serve with dijon mustard, or dipping sauce of your choice.

NB:We happened to have some Kielbasa sausage on hand, which we also battered and fried in the same way. I’m not a big fan of deep fried ANYTHING, but I will admit – it was tasty!