SC - source for Salsify

[Helen]

snowfire at mail.snet.net wrote:
> 
> In and around London there is a popular "Cockney" dish served for
> breakfast which is combined like this also it's called "Bubble and
> Squeak" which is composed of potatoes mashed up with peas and cabbage
> and fried.  Usually it's eaten for breakfast.
> 
> I wonder if anyone has heard of any other cultures with this type of
> traditional "mashed up together" combination dish?

The Irish have colcannon, boiled potatoes, cabbage, and leeks, mashed
with butter and sometimes cream, usually gratineed in a casserole.
Traditionally eaten at Lughnasa, the Irish version of Thanksgiving
(roughly August 1st, I think, and the only festival I can think of with
the eminently civilized custom of speaking a toast with the first bite
of _food_). In Scotland colcannon is sometimes made with kale instead of
green "head" cabbage.   Also in Ireland and Scotland there is champ,
made similarly, but usually of potatoes and scallions or other spring onions.

A small clue as to possible origins below.  
 
> Is it a Celtic thing, whether in Cockney London or Wales?  Is it
> commonly done?  And I wonder where and when it originated - if it's
> possible to sort that out!

One possibility is that it's a Viking thing. In Ireland there is an
expression about doing a thorough job (IIRC), about beetling one's
champ. Apparently a beetle is the pestle of a huge mortar, a tool
apparently introduced all over the British Isles by the Vikings, and one
which, incidentally, is excellent for mashing boiled vegetables.  

I wouldn't want to go and base a master's degree thesis on this, it's
just something Malachi McCormick mentions in one of his books about
Irish foods.

Adamantius
Østgardr, East
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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