¡El Día de San Patricio! (St. Paddy’s Day!)

In honor of the Emerald Isle, we decided to invite some friends over for a traditional St. Paddy’s Day dinner. Once the invitations were out and we had a rough idea of how many would be coming, the next step was to try to track down the necessary ingredients. Dan, in his infinite wisdom, managed to chip a tooth – not to worry, it didn’t hurt – by chewing on sugar cane, warranting a trip to the dentist in Tegucigalpa. I decided to accompany him, and while Dan had his tooth worked on, I embarked on an epic search for corned beef and Irish whiskey. Much to my dismay, while there were infinite options of Scotch Whiskey and at least one Tennessee Whiskey, there was no Irish whiskey to be found. I did find Carolan’s Irish Cream – a product of Ireland, no less – which would serve for Irish coffee. My search for corned beef was equally disappointing as the only corned beef to be found was in a SPAM-shaped can and a product of Brazil (and also far more expensive than I was willing to spend on such a product)! We decided not to take our chances with the canned variety and to go with plan B: an Irish beef stew.

After being thwarted by the grocery stores of Teguc, we returned to Siguatepeque to prepare for the dinner. Since our guests were traveling from far and wide, some of them came in on Friday for the festivities on Saturday. We dined at the best restaurant Siguat has to offer: Pizzeria Venezia, which is owned by an Italian family and is a true sight for sore eyes for volunteers from smaller sites. Saturday morning, the Siguatepeque baseball team had a game, so Dan fulfilled his coaching duties, Erik, a visiting friend from the South, umpped, and the rest of our guests were able to watch the glory and splendor that is little-league baseball, Honduran style (Siguatepeque won both games, by the way).

The menu for the evening was as follows:

Appetizers:
Green M&Ms (peanut and regular)
Lime and Chili Almonds
Key Lime Bars
Guacamole and Chips (going with the green theme)

Dinner:
Colcannon (traditional mashed potatoes with cabbage)
Irish Soda Bread
Irish Beef Stew

Dessert:
Irish Bread Pudding
Irish Coffee

Table decorations and appetizers, thanks to Mary Casey

Everyone enjoying the food wherever there was room (Right to left: Emily, Mark, Nathan, Daniel, Erik, Lauren, Not pictured: Jessica, Ana, David)

Emily eating in the hammock

We had a fun evening of good food, great company, and plenty of toasting the Irish. Our guests even tolerated a couple of my Irish jokes. It was a fun cultural exchange of a different sort (normally we are learning about Honduran culture and foods) in which I got to explain that the big X on the soda bread comes from the tradition of blessing the bread and everyone discovered how wonderfully potatoes and cabbage go together in Colcannon. David, one of our site mates, even came in a kilt, so what more could we ask for?! We hope you had a wonderful St. Paddy’s Day, wherever you were and that you drank a Guinness for us (we were stuck with one of the Honduran macro-brews). Thanks for all the emails and letters; please keep them coming. And as said in Ireland, Erin Go Braugh!


P.S. We have long been thinking that what our pila needed most was a boat, but it was not until the arrival of the little Irish flags that my mom sent that Dan started making the worthy craft. With some duck lips from the Kellers at the stern, the Irish flag at the helm, and a halved bottle of shampoo as the hull, a more fearsome ship there never was! So here is a picture of the first launch of the most dreaded ship on the high seas, La Pata Irlandesa or The Irish Duck.