This Patrick's Day, remember there's more to Ireland than the stereotypes of potatoes, drink, and leprechauns (all of which we will still happily sell to you). With a population of just about 4.5 million, we also punch well above our weight in terms of musical talent. Here are ten Irish...

Overheard middle-class conversation: "I really want to switch to all organic fruit and veg - it's just so expensive."

"Sometimes I feel really guilty buying non-organic," said the other woman. "It's so bad for the environment."

"Can't be good for your health either. All those toxins."

They're both wrong. Organic...

I've no idea why Cinnamon, a restaurant in south Dublin, is so wildly popular for Sunday brunch. It's jammed with buggies, the food is average and unreliable, and their customer service has been widely slated by bloggers, reviewers, and the public.

I didn't realise quite how...

Sexual abuse of children in Ireland was widespread, systematic, and ignored at all levels of society, from senior government to clergy and laypeople. From the 1930s until at least the 1990s, tens of thousands of children were raped, beaten, neglected and, occasionally, murdered, on an industrial scale. Beyond this, and...

Ireland's far-right are back on the streets again this month. There's two issues provoking their ire.

Firstly, abortion is back in the news. Ireland, along with Andorra, Poland, and Malta, severely restricts access to abortion. The recent opening of a Marie Stopes clinic in Belfast, Northern Ireland,...

The racism was straight out of the traps when Ireland's Olympic boxing heroes won silver and gold in London. It was disheartening, predictable, and widely supported.

Last week, 25-year-old women's boxer Katie Taylor captivated Ireland with a stunning performance in the Olympics' first ever female boxing competition, a competition she...

An Irish hotel group has been caught asking its employees to post fake reviews on TripAdvisor.com, says The Irish Times.

It wasn't the Carlton Group's brightest idea, and it's earned them nothing but opprobrium and bad publicity in Ireland. In July 2010, the chain sent an email...

Ask an outsider for a story about Ireland. Invariably, they'll recite that most Irish of clichés: the tale of the leprechaun, the fairy shoemaker, a trickster character with a large horde of gold at the end of the rainbow who promises it all to the naive man, but evades capture...

What does it take to provoke Martin Sheen's ire? At University College Dublin, Ireland's largest university, the students are finding out.

Last February, the Hollywood actor accepted an invitation to speak at UCD's student Law Society, known as LawSoc. He was there to launch an initiative for humanitarian charity...

Any minute now, Dave Holden - laidback, affable, engaging - could leap from his chair and scream: "I told them all, but they laughed at me - and now look!"

A few years ago, virtually nobody under the age of 40 in Ireland had any interest in bluegrass, old-time,...