The war on sugar day 2: Ireland’s changing taste

Our diet has expanded since the 1950s, to include exotic dishes and ingredients, but so have our waistlines, says Helen O’Callaghan

FANCY salted herring or corned beef? Or offal or spiced-sausage meatloaf? For dessert, a bowl of semolina or tapioca? These were typical foods until, and beyond, the 1950s. Food historian and Dublin Institute of Technology lecturer, Dr Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire, says there are three differences between our diet and that of our grandparents.

“They didn’t have the same variety as we do. Their food wasn’t so processed and they didn’t have ethnic/international food. It wouldn’t have been unusual for them to have bacon and cabbage five days a week. They killed and brined their own pigs. Potatoes and cabbage came straight out of the garden.”