Taste the Island Buyers Guide 2020

Ireland’s Food Heritage The origins of our Celtic Food Traditions Food and feasts have always played a central role in Irish history, with farming communities developing pagan festivals to reflect the changing seasons, which informed stages of crop production. Celtic Festivals were celebrated with mass, a feast and dancing. This ritual was crucial to farming as future crops would be blessed, with gratitude paid for the harvest sown that year as well as the weather, which helped to produce these crops. Irish Mythology There are many references to food and drink in Irish mythology such as Fionn Mac Cumhaill and the Salmon of Knowledge. The anonymous seventh-century “The Hermit’s Song” (Marbán to Guaire) sings of a rich diet of apples, nuts, herbs and cresses, salmon, trout, eggs, sweet mast, honey and strawberries. Wild garlic was commonly gathered as flavouring for Irish dishes. The common stinging nettle forms the basis of a popular soup; once regarded as a food for the poor, it has made its way onto restaurant menus in recent decades. IrishWhiskey Irish whiskey from the Gaelic term uisce beatha , translates to mean ‘water of life’ As one of Europe’s earliest distilled beverages, the first record of Irish whiskey dates back to 1405, almost 100 years before it was recorded in Scottish history. IrishWhiskey was the most widely consumed spirit globally in the latter part of the 19th century, with over 88 licensed distilleries in Ireland at that time. Following a period of decline during the 20th century, Irish whiskey is returned now to be the fastest growing spirit in the world today. 6 I RELAND’ S FOOD HER I TAGE

RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTQzNDk=