Itchy Brighton article

Live and let Dai

Take the day off and celebrate St David's Day...

Every March 17th, it’s not unusual to come across gangs of oversized leprechauns roaming the streets of our fair city, piling into the nearest Irish theme pub to celebrate St Patrick’s Day by necking pints of the black stuff and doing piss-poor Riverdance impressions. And few people can claim to have never heard of Scotland’s day of offal and whisky-based homage to their great poet, Rabbie Burns.

But how many of us know that the Welsh also like to indulge in a spot of patriotic fervour once a year? March 1st is St David’s Day, when our Celtic cousins let it all out and get stuck into the best that Wales has to offer. Contrary to popular belief, this doesn’t mean that everyone heads to the hills looking for friendly sheep to spend the evening with. They’re more likely to stick a daffodil in their lapel and take part in an eisteddfodau – a traditional festival of Welsh music and poetry – before sitting down to a plateful of tasty Welsh delicacies.

Ok, so we’re not all desperate to spend the afternoon watching a gang of druids inflicting folk-dances on crowds of bored kids, but being the gannets we are, we’re more than happy to feed it up Welsh-style. So what could we expect to find on plates if we were to find ourselves sitting down to dinner on the other side of Offa’s dyke? When we asked our friends over at Itchy Cardiff what they would be tucking into, they gave us a menu worthy of a prince of Wales.

We suggest you have crack at cooking up some of the below, whack on a Tom Jones Greatest Hits CD and get a few friends round to help you eat your way through it all. And don’t forget that Wales is also home to Brains Bitter, or ‘Skull Attack’ as it’s known locally. Which means that there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have a dragon of a hangover the next day.

Here’s Itchy’s top five Welsh treats to try:

Laverbread – Bread made from seaweed and eaten with bacon for breakfast. Surpisingly good.
Welsh rarebit – Much, much more than cheese on toast
Cawl – A hearty stew made with Welsh lamb and leeks
Faggots – Stop sniggering at the back. We all like to get our mouths round a couple of meaty balls every now and then
Welshcakes – Little sweet cakes that’ll be scone in minutes (ahem)

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