In all fairness, in writing this post, I have to point out that no one in our family is a big meat eater. Maybe it comes from having been vegetarian and vegan for so many years in the past. Along with a true concern for the startling conditions in which most commercial farm animals are raised. To be clear, we do eat meat, humanely raised, organic and hormone free, but certainly not very often. However, in the pursuit of wanting to learn more about all facets of Irish food culture, we decided that giving corned beef and cabbage a try at least once, was a necessity. That, and the fact that one of our favorite stores, Trader Joe’s, was sampling  a version of corned beef on our last shopping trip, which is fully cooked, gluten and nitrite free, and actually really delicious and simple to make. So, we took a chance and tried it. Continue reading →