In the Gender, Sexuality, Feminist, and Social Justice Studies (GSFS) 401 Winter 2020 semester class on Food, Gender, and Environment taught by Dr. Alex Ketchum, students are analyzing the ways that food accessibility and environmental threats are gendered, sexualized, and racialized within the global context. As part of the course, students visited McGill’s archives and special collections to have a hands on experience with historical cookbooks (more on that here: http://www.historicalcookingproject.com/2020/02/field-trip-to-mcgill-rare-books-and.html). The Special Series of Student Posts is a collection of student reflections on what information we can glean from cookbooks.
Through an exploration of John Murphy’s A Little Irish Cookbook, I explore the role scones played in my experience as a second-generation Irish immigrant and the difficulties that come with veganizing foods that carry cultural significance.
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When I first went vegan back in September, I knew there were going to be some foods I’d miss. Twix bars, Annie’s mac & cheese, and Domino’s pizza topped my list. However, as much as I enjoyed eating chocolates, mac & cheese, and pizza, I was able to categorize these foods as unnecessary indulgences rather than painful sacrifices. With this mindset, I assumed leaving behind all non-vegan foods would be a breeze. And for a while, it was.
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Then, only a few weeks later, I came across a journal entry of mine containing a “homework” assignment I had completed for therapy. In the entry, I had to write down a list of things that I loved. Under the category of things that I loved, I found fifteen listings. One of these things included “baking scones with my family”, right below Joni Mitchell, who, I might add, I spent a total of forty eight hours listening to last year (clearly, everything on that list was really important to me).
But unlike Twix bars, Annie’s mac & cheese, and Domino’s pizza, it wasn’t really the taste that I loved in scones. It was instead the very making of scones that carved out their significance to me. Memories like (over)kneading the dough with my brother and sister, watching Sixty Minutes with my parents as the scones sat in the oven, planning my exit strategy when questions of cleaning the kitchen counters arose, and racing to the kitchen to secure the biggest scone for myself formulated my fondness for the little pastries.
After my parents left Ireland in the late eighties for the United States, Irish foods remained a link between us and the country we no longer inhabited but still cared deeply for. However, even as Irish foods like scones circulated around our kitchen, these foods were always so simply prepared the very Irish influence never felt particularly apparent. For this reason, my awareness of Irish cuisine felt both intuitive yet unfamiliar.
In order to learn more about Irish cooking, I checked out John Murphy’s A Little Irish Cookbook out of my university library. Published in 1987, coincidentally the very year my parents left Ireland for the United States, the book explores classic Irish meals.
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The book’s capacity to present these traditional foods in a contemporary context without feeling outdated is itself a testament to Ireland’s impressive preservation of culinary tradition. Simplicity is key in this cookbook. The only information on John Murphy appears to be his name in the title and even the introduction is only a short four sentences. No recipe exceeds seven ingredients and expensive recipes necessitate warnings. For Baked Salmon, Murphy writes “There is no doubt that this is an expensive dish, but it will feed eight to ten people and make a fine party piece” (Murphy 15). Similarly, Murphy notes for the “Dublin Lawyer” that “its expensive ingredients make it a rare treat rather than an everyday affair.” (Murphy 20). The cookbook’s emphasis on basic and cheap ingredients serves to remind us of Ireland’s less affluent past. The Potato Famine hit Ireland between 1845 and 1849, effectively decimating the population from an estimated eight million to four million through a mixture of starvation and high rates of emigration (Leerssen 2006). Following the famine came not only a great distrust of the British, who were at best complicit and at worst responsible for Ireland’s starvation, but also an intensive frugality in regards to food (Miller 2014).
And here the dilemma lies. Vegans, infamously difficult dinner guests and fussy eaters, don’t seem to marry well with the simplicity characteristic of traditional Irish meals. However, just as vegans are more than their stereotypes, Ireland is more than its traditions. After legalizing gay marriage in 2015, legalizing abortion in 2018, and becoming one of the first countries to divest from fossil fuels in 2018, Ireland has recently become a hub for young progressives seeking change (O’Dowd 2019). Vegan restaurants are popping up around major cities such as Dublin and Galway and, despite a relatively low percentage of vegans, a new survey found that almost half of Irish people would consider switching to a vegan diet for environmental and ethical reasons (O’Connor 2019).
Fusing together Irish tradition, modern sensibilities, and my personal beliefs, I decided then to embark on a mission to veganize the Irish scones that characterized my childhood. After setting up my minimal six ingredients, I got to business. Following my sieving of the flour, I used a home-made applesauce to substitute butter as the texture is better suited to baking than typical substitutes. After adding the salt, I mixed in a tablespoon of sugar with two tablespoons of raisins (my father’s favorite) before pouring in my own home-made oat milk to fill in for the milk suggested. When kneading the dough, I added in slightly more oat milk before eventually cutting the scones with my pastry cutters. After twelve minutes passed, I took my scones out of the oven and enjoyed them with a good English Breakfast tea, milk no sugar, just as my mother takes hers. Then, I smiled as I remembered that my mother, an avid tea drinker, now takes her tea only with oat milk, just as I do. Like mother, like daughter and like daughter, like mother.
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As I type on my computer now, I am reminded of the physical distance separating me from my family and my family from Ireland. Yet as I bite into my vegan Irish scone in my Montreal apartment, I feel just a little bit closer to home, wherever that is. And while the scone does taste a little bit different from the scones of my childhood, it was never really the taste that mattered anyway.
Works Cited
Leerssen, Joep. “From Whiskey To Famine: Food And Intercultural Encounters In Irish History.” Food, Drink and Identity in Europe, 2006, doi:10.1163/9789401203494_005.
Miller, Ian. “Anticipating a Second Famine: Consumption, Production and Resistance during the First World War.” Reforming Food in Post-Famine Ireland, 2014, pp. 173– 196., doi:10.7228/manchester/9780719088865.003.0009.
Murphy, John. A Little Irish Cookbook.Macmillan, 1987.
O'Connor, Sorcha. “Almost Half of Irish People Say They Would Try a Vegan Diet as Experts Warn of Health Risks .” The Irish Independent,2019.
O'Dowd, Niall. A New Ireland: How Europe's Most Conservative Country Became Its Most Liberal.Skyhorse Publishing, 2020.
Veganizing Traditional Irish Scones
by Emma Broderick
Through an exploration of John Murphy’s A Little Irish Cookbook, I explore the role scones played in my experience as a second-generation Irish immigrant and the difficulties that come with veganizing foods that carry cultural significance.
When I first went vegan back in September, I knew there were going to be some foods I’d miss. Twix bars, Annie’s mac & cheese, and Domino’s pizza topped my list. However, as much as I enjoyed eating chocolates, mac & cheese, and pizza, I was able to categorize these foods as unnecessary indulgences rather than painful sacrifices. With this mindset, I assumed leaving behind all non-vegan foods would be a breeze. And for a while, it was.
Then, only a few weeks later, I came across a journal entry of mine containing a “homework” assignment I had completed for therapy. In the entry, I had to write down a list of things that I loved. Under the category of things that I loved, I found fifteen listings. One of these things included “baking scones with my family”, right below Joni Mitchell, who, I might add, I spent a total of forty eight hours listening to last year (clearly, everything on that list was really important to me).
 |
| I am very passionate about the things that I love. |
But unlike Twix bars, Annie’s mac & cheese, and Domino’s pizza, it wasn’t really the taste that I loved in scones. It was instead the very making of scones that carved out their significance to me. Memories like (over)kneading the dough with my brother and sister, watching Sixty Minutes with my parents as the scones sat in the oven, planning my exit strategy when questions of cleaning the kitchen counters arose, and racing to the kitchen to secure the biggest scone for myself formulated my fondness for the little pastries.
After my parents left Ireland in the late eighties for the United States, Irish foods remained a link between us and the country we no longer inhabited but still cared deeply for. However, even as Irish foods like scones circulated around our kitchen, these foods were always so simply prepared the very Irish influence never felt particularly apparent. For this reason, my awareness of Irish cuisine felt both intuitive yet unfamiliar.
In order to learn more about Irish cooking, I checked out John Murphy’s A Little Irish Cookbook out of my university library. Published in 1987, coincidentally the very year my parents left Ireland for the United States, the book explores classic Irish meals.
The book’s capacity to present these traditional foods in a contemporary context without feeling outdated is itself a testament to Ireland’s impressive preservation of culinary tradition. Simplicity is key in this cookbook. The only information on John Murphy appears to be his name in the title and even the introduction is only a short four sentences. No recipe exceeds seven ingredients and expensive recipes necessitate warnings. For Baked Salmon, Murphy writes “There is no doubt that this is an expensive dish, but it will feed eight to ten people and make a fine party piece” (Murphy 15). Similarly, Murphy notes for the “Dublin Lawyer” that “its expensive ingredients make it a rare treat rather than an everyday affair.” (Murphy 20). The cookbook’s emphasis on basic and cheap ingredients serves to remind us of Ireland’s less affluent past. The Potato Famine hit Ireland between 1845 and 1849, effectively decimating the population from an estimated eight million to four million through a mixture of starvation and high rates of emigration (Leerssen 2006). Following the famine came not only a great distrust of the British, who were at best complicit and at worst responsible for Ireland’s starvation, but also an intensive frugality in regards to food (Miller 2014).
And here the dilemma lies. Vegans, infamously difficult dinner guests and fussy eaters, don’t seem to marry well with the simplicity characteristic of traditional Irish meals. However, just as vegans are more than their stereotypes, Ireland is more than its traditions. After legalizing gay marriage in 2015, legalizing abortion in 2018, and becoming one of the first countries to divest from fossil fuels in 2018, Ireland has recently become a hub for young progressives seeking change (O’Dowd 2019). Vegan restaurants are popping up around major cities such as Dublin and Galway and, despite a relatively low percentage of vegans, a new survey found that almost half of Irish people would consider switching to a vegan diet for environmental and ethical reasons (O’Connor 2019).
 |
| A text message from my father during a recent visit to Ireland |
Fusing together Irish tradition, modern sensibilities, and my personal beliefs, I decided then to embark on a mission to veganize the Irish scones that characterized my childhood. After setting up my minimal six ingredients, I got to business. Following my sieving of the flour, I used a home-made applesauce to substitute butter as the texture is better suited to baking than typical substitutes. After adding the salt, I mixed in a tablespoon of sugar with two tablespoons of raisins (my father’s favorite) before pouring in my own home-made oat milk to fill in for the milk suggested. When kneading the dough, I added in slightly more oat milk before eventually cutting the scones with my pastry cutters. After twelve minutes passed, I took my scones out of the oven and enjoyed them with a good English Breakfast tea, milk no sugar, just as my mother takes hers. Then, I smiled as I remembered that my mother, an avid tea drinker, now takes her tea only with oat milk, just as I do. Like mother, like daughter and like daughter, like mother.
As I type on my computer now, I am reminded of the physical distance separating me from my family and my family from Ireland. Yet as I bite into my vegan Irish scone in my Montreal apartment, I feel just a little bit closer to home, wherever that is. And while the scone does taste a little bit different from the scones of my childhood, it was never really the taste that mattered anyway.
Works Cited
Leerssen, Joep. “From Whiskey To Famine: Food And Intercultural Encounters In Irish History.” Food, Drink and Identity in Europe, 2006, doi:10.1163/9789401203494_005.
Miller, Ian. “Anticipating a Second Famine: Consumption, Production and Resistance during the First World War.” Reforming Food in Post-Famine Ireland, 2014, pp. 173– 196., doi:10.7228/manchester/9780719088865.003.0009.
Murphy, John. A Little Irish Cookbook.Macmillan, 1987.
O'Connor, Sorcha. “Almost Half of Irish People Say They Would Try a Vegan Diet as Experts Warn of Health Risks .” The Irish Independent,2019.
O'Dowd, Niall. A New Ireland: How Europe's Most Conservative Country Became Its Most Liberal.Skyhorse Publishing, 2020.