Blas Fingal's Food Heritage
In Fingal we have strong tradition of horticultural, farming and fishing. Our food heritage encompasses everything from grandparent’s recipes, cooking and utensils, traditional ways of farming and fishing, to folklore, the famine, and fieldnames.
BLAS, Fingal’s Food Heritage project will explore, record and share traditions, attitudes, beliefs, and practices that surround how we produce and consume food and introduce different food traditions to new audiences.
As part of the project, we’re gathering food memories, photos, and recipes from the community to share on a digital map celebrating food heritage as part of our social history. If you have something to add please contact us at [email protected]
BLAS School Project
We invited primary schools to help us investigate how our favourite meals change by completing a “family food tree” representing favourite childhood meals across the generations. Third Class, at Balscadden National School were first to rise to the challenge by asking parents, and grandparents about their favourite childhood meals and comparing them to their own. The results offer a wonderful insight into our food heritage and how our tastes change from generation to generation. While there may be a shift from bacon and cabbage to pizza, carbonara and lasagne, the humble spud still features in the favourite meals of Third Class.
The ‘Big House’
Fingal’s heritage properties or “the Big Houses” such as Malahide Castle, Ardgillan Castle and Newbridge have an association with the counties food heritage that goes beyond fine dining rooms and elaborate recipes. The story of food at the Big Houses offers an insight not only into what previous generations of the households there were eating, but also the role in historic houses and demesnes played in food production in Fingal, and the associated social history of the people that worked in them.
Join curator Cathal Dowd-Smith for a unique insight into the food heritage of Newbridge House Demesne in the video below.
