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Short, card-ready Irish blessings for friends: birthdays, Christmas cards, a friend moving away and the loss of a friend, plus toasts, proverbs and how to say friend in Irish (cara, a chara, mo chara). Every line is marked traditional, seanfhocal or modern Irish-American, so you’ll know which are really Irish.
Irish whiskey history from a fatal Christmas in 1405 to today: what the 1608 Bushmills licence really was, the 1779 still law, Aeneas Coffey, Dublin’s distilling giants, the collapse and the comeback from Cooley. Plus the four styles, how it differs from Scotch and bourbon, and how to drink it.
Why is Irish butter so yellow, and does it really have more fat? Here’s what grass does to butter, why the 82% claim is only half true, how to bake with salted and unsalted Irish butter, plus Cork’s butter roads, 3,500 years of bog butter and the old May Eve fear of butter-stealing neighbours.
A proper Irish scones recipe with buttermilk, cold butter and self-raising flour, in metric and US cups, plus fruit (sultana), brown wholemeal, old-style soda and cheese versions. Then the five rules for tall, light scones (never twist the cutter), a self-raising flour swap for US bakers, freezing baked and unbaked scones, the jam-or-cream question, Irish vs English vs American scones, what 1930s Irish schoolchildren recorded about scones, and how to say scone in English and Irish.
The best Irish Christmas songs and the stories behind them: the Wexford Carol, the Kilmore Carols, Don Oíche Úd i mBeithil, Enya’s Oíche Chiúin, A Spaceman Came Travelling, Band Aid and Fairytale of New York, plus two famous carols with Irish writers and one ‘old Irish carol’ that probably isn’t.
The candle in the window is one of Ireland’s best-loved Christmas customs and one of its most misunderstood. Here’s who really lit it, where the “girl named Mary” rule seems to have come from, what the old accounts say it meant, why the Penal-times priest story is unproven, how it became the emigrant’s light, and how to keep the custom safely today.
A simple Irish porter cake recipe in metric and US measures: fruit soaked overnight in stout, a rubbed-in spiced batter and about 2 hours in the oven, with no marzipan or icing. Plus tin sizes, the skewer test, storing and feeding, alcohol-light and gluten-free swaps, troubleshooting, what porter was, how it became the drink of Dublin, and why the oldest recipes found so far aren’t Irish.
The 12 Pubs of Christmas is Ireland’s December pub crawl: 12 pubs, one drink in each and a new rule at every stop. Here are the 12 classic rules, forfeits that don’t involve more drink, what’s really known about where it began (and why it isn’t ancient), how to plan a route, and the honest sums on halves, water, alcohol-free rounds and getting home safely.
A make-ahead Irish Christmas pudding with stout and Irish whiskey, in metric and US measures, using suet or butter, in a basin or the old cloth. Then how to store and feed it, flame it safely, make brandy butter and whiskey sauce and hide a coin with care, plus where Stir-up Sunday really comes from and the road from plum pottage to the Irish kitchen.
A 5-minute blender recipe for homemade Irish cream, in metric and US measures, plus versions without condensed milk, with eggs (the safe way), without alcohol and as a coffee creamer. Then the honest answer on how long it keeps, how to bottle and label it as a Christmas gift, how Baileys was really invented in a Soho kitchen in 1973, why Irish Cream is a protected name, and the difference between Irish cream and Baileys.
100 Irish blessings for every occasion, in English and Irish with easy pronunciation: the 10 most famous, short ones for cards, everyday blessings in Irish, and blessings for family, friends, a new baby, travel, luck, health, Christmas, weddings, birthdays, St Patrick’s Day, grace and sympathy. Each is labelled with where it really comes from, plus the famous ‘old Irish blessings’ that turn out to be modern.
Irish (Gaeilge) and Scottish Gaelic (Gàidhlig) are sister languages, not the same one. Here’s what to call the language in Ireland and Scotland, why Gaelic football keeps the word, how Irish, Scottish Gaelic and Manx grew apart from medieval Gaelic, everyday phrases side by side, the spelling and sound differences, an honest answer on whether speakers understand each other, the 2021 and 2022 census figures, which is easier to learn and how to check a tattoo or gift.
The Celtic tree zodiac gives you a birth tree instead of a star sign. Here are all 13 signs with their dates, meanings and ogham letters, a find-your-sign table, the real Irish folklore behind each tree, and the honest history: Robert Graves’s 1948 tree calendar and the separate tree horoscope invented for Marie Claire in 1971.
A creamy Irish seafood chowder recipe in metric and US measures: natural smoked haddock, salmon or white fish, mussels and prawns in a leek and potato base with milk and cream, served with brown bread. Plus US shopping notes (finnan haddie, shrimp vs Dublin Bay prawns), a slow cooker method, storage advice, how Irish chowder differs from New England clam chowder, where the word chowder comes from, why chowder never turns up in the 1930s Schools’ Collection, and the fishing heritage of Kinsale and Galway’s Claddagh.
Why is Ireland divided? A balanced, plain-English guide to partition: the Plantation of Ulster, Home Rule and the 1912 Ulster Covenant, the Government of Ireland Act 1920, Northern Ireland’s first parliament in June 1921, the Treaty opt-out of December 1922 and the 1925 Boundary Commission. Plus why Northern Ireland is in the UK but not Great Britain, the Good Friday Agreement’s consent principle, border polls and what crossing the border is like today.