Irish Cuisine: Irish Diplomatic Dining

The study of food and power has primarily focused on absolutist courts with powerful monarchs and a wealthy court life, yet contemporary research into the emergent power structures of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries shows that dining remains an important feature in political and state life. Using new archival material, in particular that of the Irish Department of External Affairs, this paper will examine the emergence of Irish diplomatic dining since the foundation of the Irish Free State and explore how the Irish government established state policy for receiving important visitors. The paper will focus on the principal cultural, political and, social trends which have emerged as part of a larger study on Irish diplomatic dining and present them within the context of three state banquets which took place in Dublin between 1922 and 2011.