St Patrick's Day

A Cornfree Version

America is known for celebrating its holidays with food.

Thanksgiving has Turkey and stuffing, Christmas has, traditionally, goose and peppermint, Halloween has massive amounts of candy, even fourth of July is known as the hot dog holiday (warning - hot dogs are usually made with Corn Syrup, so check the ingredients before you buy them).

St Patrick's Day is known for its corned beef and cabbage.

Now, in this case, the use of the term “Corned Beef” is a misnomer in today's society. It doesn't actually contain actual corn or corn by-products.

It actually refers to an ancient term for preserving meat, by adding salt, lots of salt, usually to a tub with water in it to help preserve the meat.

I have a feeling, and I could be wrong, but the holiday comes at a time of early defrost where the meat that was stored for the winter by brining it was all that was left before the springtime crops and newly born animals were big enough to start consuming.

Remember, this substack is about avoiding corn, not eating with any other dietary restriction, and in ancient times, without all the corn processing going on in United States cuisine, corn was simply a form of oversized grass.

But there are a few things you need to be aware of when St Patricks day arrives next week.

First, cooking from scratch will help trmenously to help avoid corn. Most bread in America contains a certain amount of corn syrup to aid in the development of the yeast required to leaven bread dough, so check the ingredients before purchasing.

But, more importantly than that, beware of U.S. made beer. Most beer produced in the U.S., unless it's a true craft beer, and not one of those mass marketed as craft beer, like Samuel Adams or Sierra Nevada, contains corn syrup as a yeast developer, so beware.

Unless you can walk into the brewery and speak to the brewmaster directly about their use of corn in the product they brew, you can't be sure it's not being used.

Bonus points if you speak to them, I've often spoken to small manufacturers who not only guided me to small batch products they've made that don't contain corn, but some of them have even been inspired to create a new product without using corn! And I end up being asked to be a tester for those.

There's a small candy manufacturer based in Florida who prides themselves on making candy the oldschool way that decided to make a corn syrup free candy a few years ago just because they viewed it as a challenge, so you never know.

Anyway, back to the St Patricks Day menu.

Over the course of the next few days, I will be publishing some recipes you can use to avoid corn this upcoming holiday, despite, as the name suggests, the main dish doesn't have any actual corn in it.