Darn it, I’ve still never tried a Scotch egg—that gut bomb of a sausage-meat–encased, breadcrumb–coated, deep-fried hard-boiled egg. I was reminded of this while researching foods for St. Patrick’s Day.
The Scotch egg is not Irish—London department store Fortnum & Mason claims to have invented it in 1738 as a portable luxury snack (whose original name was “scotched,” or processed, egg), but its origin is up for debate. It eventually fell into disrepute as oft-stale petrol station fare, but is now London’s top street food, popular in Ireland as well. It’s generally found at Irish restaurants here, when one finds it at all.
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The Parlor pocket, in all its gooey goodness. |
A straight-up Scotch egg is a rarity in these parts. Quicker than you can say “gastropub,” it’s been adapted for farm-to-you-know-what and modern tastes. Newly revamped One Twenty One in North Salem has been praised for its version, propped like a Fabergé egg on a bed of potato soufflé, doused with chipotle sauce and flecked with cilantro. Chef David DiBari at The Parlor in Dobbs Ferry has reinvented it as the “Parlor pocket,” a soft-boiled egg poised to ooze out of its pizza-dough shell onto a nest of ricotta drizzled with truffle oil. At The Quiet Man Public House in Peekskill, it takes the stage in Scotch egg salad, served over frisée with tomato jam, picked carrots, and whole grain mustard vinaigrette.
Speaking of St. Patrick’s Day, Quiet Man also has all-day Irish breakfast, Irish spring rolls (made with house-made corned beef and sauerkraut), sausage rolls (with house-made sausage), Guinness mussels, bangers and mash, Shepherd’s pie, and a table where you can pull your own pints of Guinness or Smithwick’s—and that’s a 20-ounce European pint, not your standard measly 16.
