…While I live I shall not forget her potato cakes. They came in hot, and hot from the pot oven, they were speckled with caraway seed, they swam in salt butter, and we ate them shamelessly and greasily, and washed them down with hot whiskey and water.
‘The Holy Island’, Experiences of an Irish R.M.
When baked, stampy has a lovely flavour, and used hot with butter rubbed of it, it was food fit for a King. The old people used to say, “You would ate your fingers after it.”
Mrs. Catherine Sexton, Knockanalban, Co. Clare (NFCS 0625:260)
Stampy, or Steaimpí, what Regina Sexton calls a “deluxe version of boxty bread,” was a common 19th and 20th century potato-based dish considered a special treat. It is essentially sweet potato bread, usually with caraway seeds.
Cuardóifidh mé bean agus spré duit […] Is déanfaidh sí stampy is té duit. (I’ll find you a wife and a dowry [. . .] And she’ll make stampy and tea for you.) (Traditional ‘coaxing’ sung to a child)
Caitriona Clear, Social Change and Everyday Life in Ireland, 1850-1922
Stampy was made on special occasions and feast days, like St. Patrick’s Eve, Easter, St. John’s Eve, and St. Martin’s Eve (North Kerry), called “stampy nights.” It was particularly enjoyed at the end of the potato harvest, which was also known as “stampy day.” Everyone would gather to enjoy the meal, for which particularly large potatoes were selected, and a dance. One source calls this “Cappa na deireadh” (NFCS 0047:0294). “Cappa” or “cappagh” is a tillage plot, and deireadh is “close.” Another calls it “Cloushure” (NFCS 0857:103), which I take for “Coshering,” from cóisir, which means banqueting and feasting.
Stampy was generally made in the evening when the farmer had a “mihul**” digging potatoes and the boys were very glad to get a stiall of it. After that they had a dance when the boys “flinged” around the flour in their nailed boots, corduroy breeches, and frieze coats, and the girls in their heavy flannel dresses and nailed boots.And they enjoyed themselves as well as those who attend jazz dances in the grand halls of the present day.
Mrs. Catherine Sexton, Knockanalban, Co. Clare (NFCS 0625:260)
**”Mihul or mehul [i and e short]; a number of men engaged in any farm-work, especially corn-reaping, still used in the South and West. It is the very old Irish word meithel, same sound and meaning.” (English as We Speak it in Ireland, P.W. Joyce).
“When a friend or visitor came to the house it was of the greatest respect to make stampy for him” (NFCS 0461:595).
In “Food as ‘Motif’ in the Irish Song Tradition” Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire identifies “Amhrán an Steaimpí,” or “Raithneach a Bhean Bheag,” written in the 1830s by Roderick Ó Dálaigh of Úibh Ráthach, Co. Kerry. It “tells of a big house in Barra na hAoine which had plenty of food but where the ladies of the house were too full of airs and graces to ever make stampy.” Although Mac Con Iomaire interprets the actual text as describing boxty, the overall theme remains unchanged.
Raithneach a bhean bheag,
Cipíneacha a bhean bheag,
Raithneach a bhean bheag,
Agus déanfhaimíd anís é.
Prátaí bana is fearr cun na císte,
Greadadh chugat a stampy,
Is maith a raghadh an t-ím ort. (NFCS 0275:188)
Like boxty, the starch that would settle after wringing the potatoes would be used for laundry.
Do chuir Righ Gréige sgéalta go Lúndain
go dtiocfadh sé go hÉirinn go bhfeiceadh sé an iongnadh
go raibh a staimpí cake ann, le déanamh go flúirseach
Is go ró bhreágh an béile do bhlackanna dubha éRag a duddle al dom dom dom deedle dom dum
Rag a duddle al dom dom staimpí cake air.Bhí beirt ghá fásgadh, triúr ghá scríobadh
bean na súl ndearg á tarrac tríd an
[n]gríosaighRag — air
Pádraig Ó Súilleabháin, Milleens, Co. Kerry (NFCS 0461:182)
According to Hasia Diner, stampy was brought to the United States by Irish women who went into domestic service.
Stampy Recipe
From Regina Sexton’s A Little History of Irish Food. Heed the serving suggestion, as “a stampy cake was very appetising when eaten hot with butter but when cold it would be stiff and hard and could be scarcely be eaten at all” (NFCS 0627:072).
INGREDIENTS
225g (8oz) raw potato
225g (8oz) cooked potato, mashed
25g (1oz) butter
55ml (2fl oz) double cream
2 tsp caraway seeds
110g (4oz) sugar
225g (8oz) self raising flour
optional : egg
METHOD
1. Preheat oven to 200°C/400°F/Gas Mark 6.
2. Peel and grate raw potatoes, place in towel and wring over a bowl. Leave liquid to settle until starch separates, at least 2 hours.
3. Transfer grated potatoes another bowl. Mash cooked potatoes, cream and butter, then place over grated potatoes so they don’t brown.
4. After starch settles, discard liquid and add to potatoes; mix and season.
5. Mix sugar and caraway seeds, add to potatoes, and mix in sifted flour until it forms a dough. Knead lightly.
6. Cut into farls and bake 35-40 minutes.
cleite agus cnámh 