I live in a pro-beer household. It's not really a choice. As a member of an extremely enthusiastic Irish family, my fiance was raised on tall glasses of dark Guinness — beer is just a way of life.

As St. Patty's approaches I am pleased to push aside red wine and examine the health benefits of the other alcoholic treat. Like wine, beer also has antioxidants. Several studies have found that the antioxidants in beer may protect organs from carcinogenic agents and new research has isolated xanthohumol, one of the primary antioxidants found in beer, as a compound that can slow the proliferation of breast-cancer cells.

Our cookbook collection numbers in the hundreds, yet we don’t own even one Irish cookbook. Is Irish cuisine an oxymoron?

Having once lived in Dublin, I can attest to the fact that the food was fairly forgettable; what I remember most were the Sunday dinners with my Irish boyfriend’s family, where his mother would serve up potatoes cooked six different ways. Well, OK, maybe only two or three. Whatever. It was a lot of potatoes.