When people think of Irish food they often think of the well-known traditional dishes. Well, rather than listing what you know about we want to celebrate what we are proud of. In Ireland we have fantastic raw ingredients and we believe that this list of our top 10 Irish foods and drinks to try when visiting Ireland must be ticked off before you leave this little island. Of course, we can get some of these ticked off on one of Dublin our food tours too!
Butter
Once you have tasted proper Irish butter, you’ll never want to eat anything else. We’re lucky to have milk of incredible quality and have been making butter for thousands of years. Unlike many countries, we love our butter salted. Our most famous brand is Kerrygold butter but make sure to try Glenilen farm butter or Cuinneog butter.
Beef
It’s no secret that Ireland is famous for its exceptional beef and as a matter of fact you can find Irish beef in many countries around the world. Ireland has a very old cattle farming tradition, the cows are grass-fed and thankfully live happily outside most of the year. Irish beef has an incredible taste, you can be sure that you’ll have the best steaks in your life in Ireland.
Lamb
Another meat Ireland is famous for is lamb. It is also very good for the same reasons as our beef: the lambs are grass-fed and outside most of the year thanks to our relatively mild weather. Try Wicklow lamb and Comeragh lamb if you can.
Smoked salmon
Smoked salmon features on many Irish menus, personally we love it with butter, homemade brown bread and cucumber pickle .The perfect appetizer or even picnic food. There are many incredible smokehouses all around the country but we recommend you try Irish smoked salmon from the Burren Smokehouse, the Haven Smokehouse and Shanagarry smoked salmon.
Shellfish
mussels and oysters have been part of the Irish diet for hundreds of centuries and as an island nation we’re lucky to have amazing shellfish. A trip to Ireland is mandatory to any seafood lovers out there. We particularly love oysters from Kelly Oysters who are based on the West coast of Ireland and mussels from Roaring Water Bay in West Cork.
Cheese
We are very proud of our large range of farmhouse cheeses in Ireland. While cheesemaking in Ireland has a long history, artisan cheeses really took of in the late 70s and we now have over 50 cheese producers. We adore the following cheeses: Milleens, Coolea, Durrus, St Tola, Humming bark, Crozier Blue, Gubbeen. There are many more, make sure to try as many as you can while you are here!
Black pudding
A much-loved traditional food, black pudding is a blood sausage made of pork blood. One of the key ingredients of the Irish breakfast and also a staple that chefs love to include on their menus. The most famous brand would be Clonakilty black pudding but we highly recommend Mc Carthys of Kanturk and smoked black pudding from Hugh Maguire.
Breads
You can’t properly experience Irish food culture if you don’t taste some of the traditional breads. From the humble soda bread to the Waterford blaa, from sourdough breads to batch loaves, dig into some delicious Irish breads!
Irish Whiskey
Not only does Irish whiskey has a fascinating history but it also has gone through a true rebirth in the recent years and it is now the fastest growing spirit in the world. Of course you can taste whiskey in pubs but now you can also visit many different distilleries such as Jameson distillery in Midleton, Teeling distillery in Dublin, Slane Whiskey in Slane or Kilbeggan distillery.
Irish craft beer
The Irish craft beer industry has also grown considerably in the last few years and we now have around 100 microbreweries around the country. Visit the Irish craft beer pubs we recommend in Dublin or join a brewery tour to learn about craft beer making. Some of our favourite Irish breweries are Eight Degrees Brewing, Yellow Belly Beer, and Galway Bay Brewery.
What is your favourite Irish food? Let us know in the comments.
