The Aftermath

We are not exactly carousers, My Beloved and I. We are happy to stay home on St. Patrick's Day and let other people do our drinking for us. But, come the dawn, we are very interested in leftovers from our St. Paddy's Day dinner.

I had made Irish soda bread again this year, studded with raisins, accented with caraway seeds, and scented with tangerine zest, but I had to admit that it was, frankly, a little dull. I'm not sure why this is so, but it was a fact. How do you use up a bread that, even when piping hot from the oven, still didn't send us?

For lunch the next day, I had an idea. The bread had been a little denser than normal, more bready than cakey, so I thought to use it in a sandwich. Then it occurred to me that it might be better warmed and the happy concept of a sort of Irish Reuben sandwich leaped into my mind.

I used my meat slicer to slice thin planks of the bread and even thinner slices of the leftover corned beef. Lightly buttering the outsides of each sandwich and spreading the inside with a tangy mustard, I laid a few slices of the beef and a single slice of Swiss cheese in each, then grilled the completed packages in a wide pan over medium heat. The ticket with grilled cheese of any kind is low and slow, so the cheese has time to melt before the bread burns.

The cheese got all runny and the thin layer of fat on the corned beef returned to it's glistening state. The raisins turned to jam and the slumbering caraway seeds woke up in the heat. Each bite had caraway, raisin, meat, mustard and cheese in it, a symphony of sweet, meaty, gooey, and tart. The little sizzle of butter on the outside gave it just that hint of richness that was missing from the soda bread. 

Now, I'm glad I have that other loaf of soda bread in the freezer. Can't wait to see what other interesting sandwiches I can make with that one.