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A large pot of freshly made Colcannon

Colcannon recipe on a bag of potatoes: click on thumbnail to read

Colcannon (Irish: cál ceannann, meaning "white headed cabbage") is a traditional Irish dish made from mashed potatoes, kale or cabbage, butter, salt, and pepper. It can contain other ingredients such as milk, cream, leeks, onions, chives, garlic, boiled ham or Irish bacon. At one time it was a cheap, year-round staple food.^[1]

An old Irish Halloween tradition was to serve colcannon with prizes of small coins concealed in it, as the English do with Christmas pudding. This is still done today and small amounts of money are placed in the potato.^[2]

It is similar to the modern version of the English dish, bubble and squeak. In Atlantic Canada (especially Nova Scotia and Newfoundland), a local version of the dish is popular among those raised in rural communities. Brought to the provinces by Irish and Scottish settlers, the recipe consists of potatoes, milk, butter, diced carrots and turnip mashed together. This gives it a distinct orange and white colour (as opposed to the green of the Irish version). Some also add onions, garlic and even chopped up bacon. It is routinely served during large holiday meals like Christmas, New Years Eve, Robbie Burns night and Canadian Thanksgiving.

The Dutch also have a dish that is similar called stamppot boerenkool,^[3] made from potatoes and kale mashed together with milk, butter, salt, and pepper, and often served or cooked with a large sausage. A condiment of pickled pearl onions is common.

The Welsh "cawl cennin", pronounced vaguely like colcannon, means "leek soup", literally "broth (of) leeks", but this is just a coincidence of forms.^[4] The full etymology goes back to Irish cál ceannfhionn (shortened to cál ceannann), literally "cabbage head-white", as indicated above.^[5] Welsh cawl also can mean cabbage, however the usual word is bresych. Irish cál ceannfhionn would be Welsh bresychen benwen.

[edit] Similar dishes

• Bubble and squeak from England
• Rumbledethumps, from Scotland
• Pyttipanna, from Sweden
• Biksemad, from Denmark
• Trinxat, from the Empordà region of Catalonia, northeast Spain, and Andorra
• Roupa Velha (Portuguese for "old clothes"), from Portugal, often made from leftovers from Cozido à Portuguesa
• Stamppot, from the Netherlands
• Stoemp from Belgium
• Hash (food), from the United States
• Also see hash browns and potato cake entries

[edit] References