Spuds

The Irish obsession with the humble potato. After a winter of peeling boiling champing and chipping what can be nicer than the first new potatoes of the season boiled in their jackets tossed in butter with herbs and sea salt. Sir Walter Raleigh, British explorer and historian known for his expeditions to the Americas, first brought the potato to Ireland in 1589 from South America and planted them at his Irish estate at Myrtle Grove,Youghal, near Cork, Ireland. Legend has it that he made a gift of the potato plant to Queen Elizabeth I . The local gentry were invited to a royal banquet featuring the potato in every course. Unfortunately, the cooks, uneducated in the matter of potatoes, tossed out the lumpy-looking tubers and brought to the royal table a dish of boiled stems and leaves which, being poisonous, promptly made everyone deathly ill. The potatoes were then banned from court. There have been famines and war but the potato remains one of Ireland's treasures and when you see them on your plate with the butter melting over them could you fault it?