Awake at the Whisk: Irish-Inspired Vegetarian Recipe Contest

Monday, February 21, 2011

Irish-Inspired Vegetarian Recipe Contest

Butter. Cheese. Cream. These are the reasons I’m not a vegan.

I once tried to be a vegan. I started on a Monday. I gave it my best shot. By Friday I was eating pizza. I just can’t live without my cheese. Or butter. Or cream.

When I was an exchange student in Denmark back in the 90s, my host brother would bring freshly made butter home from the cheese factory where he worked. That was the best butter I’d ever eaten.

How Kerrygold Butter Won My Heart

I recently discovered the next best thing: Kerrygold butter. It now shares a buttery place in my heart right there with that Danish butter—thick, creamy, salty, slightly sweet (must be the clover!,) and soft against my tongue.

You can imagine my joy when I attended Food Blog Camp back in January, and it was tastily sponsored by Kerrygold. We campers vied to take the best butter photo in the hopes of winning a richly filled basket of butters and cheeses from the sponsor.

Taken after getting some food styling tips from legend Adam Pearson, this is my butter photo from camp.

Over the course of five short days, many sticks of butter were unwrapped, spread, and eaten—all for the sake of photography, of course. Bite after bite, we became a little more addicted. Kerrygold makes incredible butter!

In addition to making my camp experience memorable, Kerrygold is a stand-up company. They never use preservatives, hormones, or unnatural additives. That’s important to me.

Let’s Celebrate the Irish!

As St. Patrick’s Day draws near, I thought it would be nice to celebrate all things Irish. My husband celebrates his Irish heritage every March with Guinness ale and a Reuben sandwich. His mom will make corned beef and cabbage and soda bread.

Since marrying him, I have learned to love some of my husband’s Irish foods. As a vegetarian, I don’t eat many of the aforementioned classics. But I have been perfecting my vegetarian version of the Reuben. Mostly, it’s just a sauerkraut and Swiss cheese sandwich. But in my opinion, those are the best parts!

My Vegetarian Reuben Sandwich: rye bread, stone ground mustard, Kerrygold Swiss, and Farmhouse Culture sauerkraut.

What Irish foods do you enjoy making to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day? Do you have any great vegetarian spins on the classics?

Want to Win Some Butter?

In celebration of St. Patrick’s Day, and of Kerrygold’s sustainable dairy practices, I’m holding a recipe contest. Over the next three weeks, I invite you to submit Irish-inspired vegetarian recipes containing Kerrygold Butter or their Dubliner cheddar cheese. (And hello!--they now have a version of their Dubliner that's loaded with Irish stout!)

I’ll randomly select one winner and one runner-up. The winner will receive a prize package gift basket of Kerrygold butter and cheeses and the James Beard best cookbook of the year for 2010, The Country Cooking of Ireland by Colman Andrews. Estimated value of the prize package is $350.

The runner-up and the winner will both have their recipes announced on my blog with a link to their original post. Or, if you don’t have a blog, I’ll post your recipe on my site.

How to Enter:

1) Create an Irish-inspired vegetarian recipe using Kerrygold Butter and/or Dubliner Cheese.

2) If you’re posting the recipe on your blog, you must tag your post using “Irish-Inspired Vegetarian Recipe Contest,” and leave the link in the comments section of this story, below. If you don’t have a blog and want to be part of the contest, you can post your full recipe in the comments section of this story, below.

3) All entries must be submitted by Friday, March 11 at noon.

4) Winners will be announced on my blog the week of March 13.

5) The winner of the prize package must have a U.S.-based mailing address where the package can be shipped. No out of country addresses are acceptable.

Disclosure: As part of our Food Blog Camp butter battle, Kerrygold threw down a challenge: the first 10 campers to submit a recipe contest idea that they liked would receive a small stipend to administer said contest—plus Kerrygold provides the goodie bag to the winner. As you can see, I was among those who won the challenge!

Now, let’s see who will win that butter and cheese-filled basket! Let the contest begin!

Labels: butter, Dubliner cheese, Food Blog Camp, Irish soda bread, Irish-inspired vegetarian recipe contest, Kerrygold, Kerrygold butter, sauerkraut, St. Patrick's Day, vegetarian Reuben sandwich

# posted by Amber @ Monday, February 21, 2011

Comments:

Sounds like a great contest, Amber! I'll have to start thinking about recipes :-)

# posted by

Pinch My Salt : 21/2/11 15:02

Oh, yum! Yes, putting on my thinking cap. :)

# posted by

Leslie : 21/2/11 15:14

Before I went vegan I LOVED Kerrygold! What a great contest!

# posted by

Stephanie Weaver : 21/2/11 17:06

Great contest. My husband is Irish so this is perfect!

Nisrine

# posted by

Anonymous : 21/2/11 17:16

As I am an Irish girl, and one who loves butter (I could never give that up either Amber, or cheese as a matter of fact) will have to put my thinking cap on for a recipe!

# posted by

Chef Sally : 21/2/11 18:14

Yummy yummy! I have an idea, must hit the store for more Kerrygold this week and test it out. ;)

# posted by

Jeni : 22/2/11 07:24

That butter is the best, isn't it? :-)

# posted by

Elise : 22/2/11 08:44

I will humbly remove myself from the official running (and at the same time, vouch that "The Country Cooking of Ireland" is a gorgeous book) but I have passed your post on a to a few chefs I think might be interested! - Aimee

# posted by

Anonymous : 22/2/11 09:06

This is exactly why I could never go vegan as well. I adore dairy in every form. Your veggie rueben looks mouthwatering to say the least! I totally agree with you that those are parts of the sandwich right there.

# posted by

julie : 24/2/11 04:38

Okay, Amber, here you go: http://sacatomato.com/vegetarian-shepherds-pie I'd love to have more of that butter and cheese!

# posted by

Lynn G. : 9/3/11 16:50

Kindof Irish, kind of Italian but 100% vegetarian and it was good! Don't you just love sauerkraut and cheese?! http://sacatomato.com/irish-inspired-stew

# posted by

Lynn G. : 10/3/11 16:15

Hi I would like to submit my Irish Vegetarian inspired recipe using Kerrygold butter. Here it goes kind of nervous this is a first! Cabbage & Apples

one sliced Napa cabbage (coleslaw style)
2 diced apples (I like Granny's & I usually keep the skin on..but that's me)
1/2 cup of shredded carrots
2 tbl of Kerrygold butter
salt to taste

Over medium heat melt the Kerrygold butter in a saucepan.
Add the cabbage & shredded carrots saute 10 minutes.
Add the diced apples and cook 5 minutes longer. Taste and salt accordingly. That's it! It's as easy to make as it is quick to disappear on the table!

Some things we do at home..
add 2 tbl. of orange juice and 1 tsp of zest before serving.

Serve cabbage over buttered potatoes. We boil bite size cut white potatoes. Drain and put in a casserole dish. Pour on some melted butter and eat!
Thanks for posting the contest!

# posted by

Posti4 : 10/3/11 19:42

I've emailed my recipe to you, since I don't have my own blog! Hope you like it!

# posted by

Jezka : 15/3/11 07:41

Ok, boy am I glad I searched for vegetarian Irish recipes! Making your version of reuben & above commenters cabbage and apples!!! Sounds delicious!

# posted by

Aggie : 15/3/11 18:07

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Monday, February 21, 2011

Irish-Inspired Vegetarian Recipe Contest

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