THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 17, 1996 TAG: 9603190447
SECTION: FLAVOR PAGE: F1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BROWN H. CARPENTER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 121 lines
'TIS THE day to wear the green and celebrate your roots in old Erin.
But you certainly don't have to be Irish to join in today's St. Patrick's Day festivities - just bring a spirit of fun, a love of folk music and an appetite.
In Hampton Roads today, pubs with shamrock names like Kelly's, O'Sullivan's and Paddy's are cooking up corned beef, cabbage, potatoes and kegs of green beer. Irish singers and musicians will entertain at many places.
The more adventurous might want to try shepherd's pie or Irish stew with lamb, the more traditional ingredient. Or an Irish steak with cream sauce, such as that offered by Sarah's Irish Pub in Hampton's Phoebus section.
``It's strictly for St. Patrick's Day,'' says Trisha Cavanaugh, owner of Sarah's, ``and it's an authentic Irish recipe.''
Some people with long Celtic heritages have been known to get their Irish up over those who think food from the Emerald Isle begins and ends with corned beef and cabbage.
``It's a mistaken idea that corned beef and cabbage is the national pastime,'' says Hugh J. Flynn, a native of County Donegal and a member of the St. Patrick's Division of the Ancient Order of Hibernians.
``Cuisine in Ireland been recommended by Michelin,'' says Flynn, who was a caterer before retiring to Virginia Beach.
``The Irish do like fish,'' he says. ``A great favorite is fresh salmon. And Irish ham is not unlike Virginia ham. They frequently cook chicken and ham together. And when you get good Irish soda bread, you never forget it.''
Sylvia Lawler, a reporter with The Allentown Morning Call in Pennsylvania, recently completed a tour of Ireland and wrote that culinary innovation in that country is growing.
``It was an immense satisfaction,'' she wrote, ``to find in a small, not particularly special Killarney restaurant an inventive chef who had converted Colcannon, that most delectable of traditional hearty Irish casseroles, into a chic pancake complementing Kerry lamb and a vegetable trio of steamed fennel, green beans and carrots.''
In Dublin, where restaurants serve Cajun blackened chicken and tiger prawn chimichangas, many chefs are waxing creative with fish and chips and boxty, ``that most traditional of griddled potato pancakce,'' Lawler wrote.
Irish native Mary O'Reilly, now of Virginia Beach, says corned beef and cabbage started in Boston, not Ireland, though she concedes it might have spread through the large Irish immigrant population in that city.
``Maybe it was the closest thing they could get to the tradition of bacon and cabbage,'' she speculates. ``Our bacon and sausage are completely different from what you get here. There's a different way of curing it.
``Bacon and cabbage might be served with turnips or potatoes. Most Irish eat potatoes every day, out in the country, anyway. And beef, lamb and pork were cured by the butcher himself.''
Another daughter of Erin, Antoinette Hurley, grew up in Dublin and now lives in Virginia Beach. She says Irish food is similar to traditional American.
``On St. Patrick's Day, we would go to church, watch a parade, and then go to the pub. It was a social get-together,'' she recalls. ``Some do have corned beef and cabbage, or pot roast with potatoes and carrots.''
But if corned beef does not really date to St. Patrick himself, lamb probably does. It's the meat in real Irish stew and shepherd's pie - but not always in America, where lamb isn't as popular. Local pubs wrestle with the dilemma.
You can try the authentic stew today at O'Sullivan's Wharf Lynnhaven in Virginia Beach or Paddy's Irish Pub on West Little Creek Road in Norfolk. At Sarah's in Phoebus, the concoction is half beef, half lamb. At the Leprechaun Restaurant and Pub in Virginia Beach and Reggie's British Pub at Waterside in Norfolk, it's beef only.
And what about that green beer? A gimmick at best, some Irish proclaim.
``Guinness does not turn green very well,'' concedes Dawn Wheeler, assistant general manager of Reggie's British Pub, which will offer green brew today. Deep brown Guinness is on tap, and Harp beer is available in bottles.
At the White Horse Pub in Virginia Beach's Pembroke Mall, the Guinness will be dark and stout; the food coloring will be applied only to North American brews. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos
LAWRENCE JACKSON/The Virginian-Pilot
For the past five St. Patrick's Days, Bill Eyre has become Lenny the
Leprechaun at Sarah's Pub in Phoebus, where he has been a regular
for 18 years.
At left: A traditional Irish meal: soda bread, steak covered in
gravy, peas and carrots, and a Guinness beer.
Graphic
PUB GRUB
Kelly's Taverns: 1408 Colley Ave., Norfolk, 623-3216; 1412
Greenbrier Parkway, Chesapeake, 523-1781; 1936 Laskin Road, Virginia
Beach, 491-8737. Corned beef and cabbage. Green beer, green
everything.
Leprechaun Restaurant & Pub, 2548 Virginia Beach Blvd., Virginia
Beach, 340-3893., Corned beef and cabbage, Irish beef stew, green
beer. Live Irish music.
O'Sullivan's Wharf, 4300 Colley Ave., Norfolk, 423-3746. Corned
beef and cabbage, green beer.
O'Sullivan's Wharf Lynnhaven, 2701 N. Mall Drive, Virginia Beach,
431-8948. Corned beef and cabbage, green beer, Irish stew with
lamb.
Paddy's Irish Pub, 111 W. Little Creek Road, Norfolk, 489-2342.
Pints of green beer, corned beef and cabbage, Irish stew with lamb,
shepherd's pie. Bagpipers will play, an Irish disc jockey will be on
hand.
Reggie's British Pub, Waterside, Norfolk, 627-3575. Irish music,
free glasses, green hats, corned beef and cabbage, green beer,
Guinness Stout on tap, Harp beer in bottles, Irish beef stew.
Sarah's Irish Pub, 38 Mellen St., Hampton, 722-2373. Irish music
and a leprechaun, corned beef and cabbage, Irish steak with cream
sauce and carrots, Irish stew (half lamb, half beef), Guinness on
tap, green beer, Irish coffee.
White Horse Pub, Pembroke Mall, Virginia Beach, 499-7360. Corned
beef and cabbage, boiled potatoes, sourdough rolls, green beer,
cider on tap and a large variety of British and Irish beers, ales
and stouts. Irish singing.
by CNB