Full Irish

Brunch is a sacred meal around my house. We don’t go out for it as often as we would like on the weekends, and we don’t prepare it in our own kitchen nearly enough. It is one of those meals that we have specific places where we know we’re going to get the best of breakfast and lunch, and it is a special treat when we are able to get up, out of the house, and spend a quiet meal gobbling up some of our favorite dishes. It is rare that we take the time for brunch when we’re at Walt Disney World, but Raglan Road has a brunch dish that I just couldn’t stay away from.

The brunch entree is called the Full Irish, and it certainly lives up to its name. The menu lists the elements on the plate as sausage, black pudding, white pudding, bacon, roasted tomato, mushrooms, fried egg, and roasties. I should clarify a couple of the items listed there. The bacon is true bacon, meaning it is much more akin to country ham than to the typical buffet, breakfast, grocery store bacon. Roasties, meanwhile, is just a simplified term for roasted potatoes. Lastly, as I am not a fan of eggs, you’ll notice this review is sans the fried egg.

Let’s start with the most common elements found on the plate. The sausage is flavored well with savory spices and isn’t thin and floppy like many breakfast sausages. The grilled mushrooms are spot on and tasty, and the same can be said for the juicy grilled tomato, although I think my tomato could have spent a couple of more seconds on the grill just to be safe. The roasties are similar to hasbrowns, but definitely cut thicker. I liked how dry they were, but I can see how the egg would make them more palatable for others. The bacon is thick cut, salty, and wonderful. Seriously, you couldn’t ask for more out of the bacon.

Moving on to the two components that probably confuse or make most Americans a little nervous, the black and white puddings, but let me help ease your trepidation. Actually, I’m probably going to scare a few more of you right at the start, but stick with me. Black and white puddings are very similar in many respects, except that black pudding contains blood as one of its ingredients. The squeamish among guests is probably why they don’t refer to the black pudding by its more common name, blood pudding. These are, for lack of a better description, another form of sausage. The contain pork, sometime beef, oats, and spices that are prepared and then kept for future consumption. They are very savory, especially the white pudding, and are delicious. The black pudding has a bit of a metallic twinge to it, but it isn’t as noticeable as you would think. While these are not traditional American breakfast staples, they date back to medieval times, so you know that chefs have had plenty of time to perfect their recipes.

I am half Irish and my wife is one-hundred percent Irish, and this breakfast hits us in all the right comfort food places! There may be one or two unfamiliar items on Raglan Road’s Full Irish that cause you a bit of hesitation, but I promise the flavors, smells, and satisfaction this meal will bring you should definitely outweigh any hesitation you might have. There are several wonderful brunch spots scattered around Walt Disney World, and Raglan Road has assuredly earned its place at the table.