St. Patrick's Day and the Frugal Easter Feast....AND a New Pattern!!!!

The traditional St. Patrick's Day Feast is Corned Beef and Cabbage.
A tune for the day....."When Irish Eyes are Smilin'"

Here's a recipe for Corned Beef and Cabbage from over at "Mile-High Mamas Blog".

In my DH's Irish family, which settled in Vermont in the 1840's, however, that meal evolved into New England Boiled Dinner, over the years. 

Below, the five Donahue brothers of Vermont, sons of John Donahue of Kerry and Ellen McCarty of Cork. They were cheesemakers in the early days.

Here's the recipe for New England Boiled Dinner from an earlier post on Prairie Cottage Corner.....and a tune for the season, "In Your Easter Bonnet"

This is a favorite meal at our house for an after-picnic-ham-use-of-bones-and-scraps. 

Our favorite Easter Feast is a roasted ham and all the fixings. Here is a recipe for a solid Easter Feast from my Recipes page.

While preparing my grocery list for our monthly trip to the big city (Ephrata, WA), last week, I discussed with the family the proximity of St. Patrick's Day (March 17th) to Easter Sunday (March 27th).

I said, in all wisdom and frugality, "Dear ones, our holidays are upside-down, food-wise."

See, ordinarily, I would buy a ham in March for St. Patrick's Day and one, again, in April, for Easter Sunday. This year, though, our budget wasn't going to handle two hams in one month, nor would our diets. That's a lot of ham in a ten-day period.

So, my suggestion to my loved-ones was, "Let's reverse the meals! We'll have roast ham on St. Patrick's Day and New England Boiled Dinner on Easter Sunday." There was a pregnant pause after I suggested it.

Lo and behold, they agreed. Having left-overs for the Easter Feast was fine with them, because we all dearly love, adore and cherish New England Boiled Dinner. 

Hence our Frugal Easter Feast.

I'll make an old-fashioned Trifle for dessert.

Here's the trifle recipe from "Once Upon a Chef" blog.

St. Patrick's Day Menu

Roast Picnic Ham

Vegetable Medley

Roasted Yukon Gold Potatoes

Hawaiian Rolls

Jello Salad

Assorted Scottish Shortbread Cookies with Vanilla Ice Cream

Martinelli's Fizzy Apple

Easter Sunday Menu

New England Boiled Dinner

Home Baked Rolls

Summer Berry Trifle

Martinelli's Fizzy Cranberry

....And on another note, stay tuned for the release of a new applique' pattern: "Seasons of the Heart" coming soon to online venues.......

When it comes out, we'll have to have a contest and give one or two away, don't you think? Thanks for reading, today. Things are popping here. I hope you're getting ready for Spring, wherever you live.