It's fun and yet the recipes are amazingly easy to follow. Practical and entertaining. New and old starters, main courses, desserts, drinks -- all told in amusing verse. How about Limerick Ham in a limerick? Recipes suitable for entertaining as well as everyday meals.

An Irish cookbook that takes its food seriously and its words wittily! Old and new recipes, including Salmon Souffle, mackerel with Gooseberry Sauce, Dublin Lawyer, Wildflower Salad, Brown Bread Ice-cream, Rhubarb Fool, Irish Liqueur Souffle.

It's here! And not before its time An Irish Cookbook, all in rhyme: Old favourites from days gone by, And newer dishes you can try.

Potato Soup
You will need:

• 2 lbs/908 g potatoes
• 2 onions
• 1 pint/568 ml/21/2 cups vegetable stock
• 1 pint/568 ml/21/2 cups milk
• 3/8 pint/213 ml/1 cup cream
• Chopped parsley
• Salt and pepper
• 6 streaky bacon rashers

Potato Soup you'll love, and make it often;
Peel onions and potatoes, and slice them small,
And heat in melted butter until they soften,
But make quite sure they do not brown at all.

Now add the milk and stock, with herbs to season,
And bring the mixture quickly to the boil.
Then turn it down at once -- it stands to reason
Unless you heat it gently, it will spoil!

Thirty minutes on low heat is what you give it,
And since it will be rather thick to pour,
At this stage you should liquidise or sieve it,
Then add the cream and heat it up once more.

You'll sure get a lot of praise, and you'll deserve it,
By ensuring your Potato Soup is topped
With a really tasty garnish, when you serve it,
Of bacon rashers, crisply fried and chopped.