History
Stewing is an ancient method of cooking meats that is common throughout the world. However, the Celts did not possess their first bronze cauldrons, copied from Greek models, until the seventh century BC. After the Celtic invasion of Ireland, the cauldron (along with the already established spit) became the dominant cooking tool in ancient Ireland, ovens being practically unknown to the ancient Gaels. The root vegetables and meat (originally goat) for the stew were then all in place, save for the potato. The introduction of the potato, originally a South American crop, did not occur until after the sixteenth century.
In most parts of the province of Ulster, a Northern Irish variant of stew is made using beef in place of mutton or lamb. This variation typically comprises beef, potatoes, carrots and onions. More recent developments in Irish stews have included the adding of stout beer, starting in the twentieth century. In parts of the Irish diaspora where sheep are less common than in Ireland, such as in Canada and the United States, other meats may be substituted to create a new local variant. Primarily this means beef, but also wild or farmed game meats such as moose, wapiti, or bison.
Read more about this topic: Irish Stew
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“There is one great fact, characteristic of this our nineteenth century, a fact which no party dares deny. On the one hand, there have started into life industrial and scientific forces which no epoch of former human history had ever suspected. On the other hand, there exist symptoms of decay, far surpassing the horrors recorded of the latter times of the Roman empire. In our days everything seems pregnant with its contrary.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“If man is reduced to being nothing but a character in history, he has no other choice but to subside into the sound and fury of a completely irrational history or to endow history with the form of human reason.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“Modern Western thought will pass into history and be incorporated in it, will have its influence and its place, just as our body will pass into the composition of grass, of sheep, of cutlets, and of men. We do not like that kind of immortality, but what is to be done about it?”
—Alexander Herzen (1812–1870)