The city itself has a sort of perpetual emotional hangover from The Troubles hovering over it, and to understand what has shaped such a small piece of earth for such a long period of time, there’s really only one way to do it: Through the eyes of a local on a Black Taxi Tour.

1. The Tour
Now, some people will get all worried that, “Oh! They’ll kidnap you! Don’t let them see your cross! You might get a Protestant driver!” (From the eyes of the frightened Catholic, of course), but there is nothing you could do better with your travels in Belfast than take a good two hours of one-on-one time to see the story of The Troubles from both sides, all in a way a tenured college professor couldn’t even deliver.

The heartfelt personal experiences of the driver, or of the people they knew, sometimes giving their own life for their beliefs, is truly soul-shaking. A three-time heightened “Peace Wall” separates the aforementioned Protestant and Catholic sides of town so they wouldn’t be able to sneak over in the middle of the night and bomb each other.

The tour runs by murals depicting scenes ranging from honoring “Catholic Killers” to poems of peace, summing up the seething, bitter, unrelenting hatred the two sides still hold for each other, and the hope that’s on the horizon through new generations.

It will make you question humanitarian, political and religious spheres like you never have before. And for the price of give or take £30, there is nothing in the world you could better spend your money on to experience, to grow, to understand the human experiment first hand.

2. Giant’s Causeway

Besides self-growth exercises in Belfast, there’s natural beauty surrounded you all around Northern Ireland. One cliche, but an extraordinary (by definition) place to visit, is the Giant’s Causeway. The drive up to the tip of the Northern end of the Isle takes you from the rolling green hills of postcard-worthy Ireland to craggy lands that look like they just landed from another planet. It all feels very touristy with the organized bus tours and crowds of people, but it has such a unique presence that none of it will matter.

The oddly-shaped hexagon columns rising from the Irish Sea are a result of lava cooling and compression over thousands of years. While you might wonder, “I drove two hours to look at some rocks?!” there truly is a special aura to the place. Plus, Bushmills distillery is just down the road when you need a little whiskey to warm you up.

3. Gaelic Football

Michael McGonagle

All throughout the lands of Ireland, one sport reigns supreme: Gaelic Football. Imagine the finesse of rugby paired together with the tooth-mashing,

soul-crushing, bone-snapping hardcore devastation of football (re: soccer), throw in a few kegs, years of bitter rivalry, pride and unrelenting emotions, and you have yourself a nice day at the ole’ stadium. Wait…nah, rugby is the soft one. Dumb American tip #2,022: Don’t wear team colors on game day, and don’t wear any uniforms in the bar. But, then again, you can come back from Belfast with the best souvenir of all: your front teeth…in your pocket.

4. Guinness and Mussels

Mussels are a way of life in Northern Ireland. Cold water, rain falling every 22 minutes, goopy seafood that slimes down your throat…it just goes with the territory. Mussels were an export that once put Belfast on the world map, and have become regular pub fare on a menu dominated by deep fried doom. They don’t get any fresher than straight from Belfast Lough, but finding the hidden pubs and restaurants that get them from the docks is half the fun.

5. The Stumble

Ah yes, the Irish. They sing and drink, and, they…drink and drink! While Dublin might have Temple Bar, Belfast has massive amount of pubs with more than a few characters to spare. Bars like the Crown Bar Liquor Saloon built in the late 1800′s are plentiful in Belfast, as is live music, at 4 p.m., on a weekday. In the summer, Hen parties, also known as bachelorette parties, from the all over the Emerald and British Isles swamp the pubs, and make for some pretty entertaining scenes. And costumes. And spills. And, “Hey sweetie, you’re a cutie!” Well imagine that…a British Cougar… Regarding the music, you have traditional Irish folk dancin’ at every other pub, but you also have a brash amount of American pop cover bands. You should probably know Bohemian Rhapsody by heart. And Sweet Home Alabama, which doesn’t even make sense, but singing about the American South in Northern Ireland is all part of the experience. Do go. Do drink.

Satan called. He wants you to visit Ireland.

Before we get into the specifics of each of these fried creations, you should understand one thing: You might feel, even crave the desire to try each one of these delectable, authentic dishes of doom, but we take no responsibility for uncontrolled weight gain, tremors, night terror, or genuine depression and regret, brought on by a body laden with cooking oil and carbs. Shall we start?

Lesson #1: If you can fry it, the British, Irish, Scots, and probably a few stray Americans, will come. Yes, the area that goes through a fair amount (Lets say, 30 percent) of the worlds cooking oil (Well, Americans get fat somehow) have had a large period of trial and error over the years and they’ve come up with a solution to those pesky organic farmers telling you to eat non-processed foods so you can live a little bit longer and see us all slowly start nuking each other for water supplies and delicious corn syrup.

Side note, how many gallons of pure, adulterated high fructose corn syrup are at this very second, being consumed in America? An Olympic-sized swimming vat of sugary diabetes? Nah. Too generous.

The people who brought you slavery and tea have thrown everything from pig feet to Shakespearean criminals into a vat of bubbling, fragrant oil, and the English, along with the Irish, have seemed to of come to a consensus on a few things that are regarded as, “A specialty.”

1. The Ulster Fry/Full/English/Irish Breakfast

Image: adactio

It has many names through the Isles as it comes in many forms. Of course, the Irish would tell you those pesky English totally stole the idea from them and sold it for money, but the unity between a plate of fried everything before you’ve even had a chance to consider if life is really worth living around, say, mid-afternoon, is hard to deny.

The Ulster Fry is a big dish in the six counties of British-occupied Ulster (Three of the other nine counties of historical Ulster lie within the Republic of Ireland). You could probably get it all piled on to a bagel at some fru-fru, New Age, European coffee shop if you really wanted to, but lets get down to it…

Consisting of beef and pork sausages, bacon, eggs, mushrooms, baked beans, tomatoes, pancakes, wheat, soda, and potato breads, The Ulster Fry is something that will have your digestive tract screaming out for an antacid smoothie. Did we mention that it’s all fried?

Yes, even the tomatoes. We’re guessing the baked beans don’t count, but that’s the jam for your toast anyways. Nevertheless, the Full Breakfast is an experience to behold and one to savor as you wither in a sodium-induced seizure and move on to the next specialty, The Scotch Egg.

2. The Scotch Egg

Image: Peter Marheine

Oh, the wee, wee Scotch Egg. It’s so small, so innocent looking, so innocent sounding…like a hardboiled egg grew off a vine in the pastoral Scottish Highlands itself, which then fell through a sausage/meat batter, a cloud of breadcrumbs, and into an Irish deep fryer like an old Marx Brothers dress routine with comical music and Three-Stooges Syndrome for your arteries abound. These aren’t your grandma’s eggs. These are the balls of Satan himself. Die Eier Von Satan. Available at any chip shop that has a portal to cholesterol hell.

3. The Cowboy Supper

Image: Russ Horvath

So, we’ve talked about a few things gracing the deep fryer already, and at some point the Irish figured, “Well hell, lets throw some sausages in there too!” and after said frying, on top of a bed of thick-cut, twice-fried chips, smothered in a layer of baked beans. If you ate a Full Breakfast for breakfast and a Cowboy Supper for supper, you might be dead by the time your heart repulses in anguish, jumping out of you body, screaming, “No more man! No more!” Do you dare add cheese?

4. “Real” Fish and Chips

Image: Russ Horvath

Yes, we have fish and chips here in America. Hell, we even have the vinegar and that awful, plain, and absolutely nothing but filler “Brown Sauce” to go with it. But you can’t get ”real” fish and chips in America. It’d be considered illegal and/or child abuse if you fed it to your kids.

Real “chip shop” fish and chips come in a cardboard box. A fitting end for the Cod that was unlucky enough to be swept into the net of the Northern fisherman.

What the Cod didn’t know is that its flesh would be so dripping with oil after being battered in a prison of beige goo that it would literally be permeating through the cardboard box itself, with a good portion of what was its method of movement and survival hanging out from the sides, exposed to un-suffocating air, void of any volatile fried goodness. Also served on a bed of chips. Mayo mandatory.

5. Chicken Goujons

Image: Fuzz Gerdes

Sailing the same oily seas as the Fish and Chips, chicken goujons are basically the same concept.

Dip, maybe even double-dip, a massive slab of chicken into the goo chamber, drop it into the doom fryer, and watch it brown into a mass of blood-thickening deliciousness as you slowly count off the seconds ticking away from your life.

Sodium content? Certain calcification.

It’s okay though, the chips will soak up a fair amount of the oil secretions from the goujons. In fact, the goujons and the fish are probably frying right next to each other in the same vat of boiling oil. Imagine the chicken thinking “What the?…” as it looks upon its once hopeful offspring being whipped into a garlic-y mayo blend for dipping purposes. Mother and son unite. We’ve surely conquered the world and the Seven Seas by now, haven’t we?

6. Blood Pudding

Image: ctoverdrive

You’ve all heard about blood pudding. You’ve probably even had an “Involuntary personal protein spill,” upon hearing about what blood pudding is, as George Carlin would say, but basically, you’re eating congealed animal blood with some filler. Say…oatmeal, or onions. Mmmm! Soak up that delicious blood!

While blood pudding can also be boiled or grilled, one must figure this is an important part of Isle-fried specialty to mention. Well, we guess you could make a Black Pudding Cowboy Supper, but…oh my…there’s a hole in the floor opening up with a red glare. We better not go any further…

7. And for bonus, if you decide to take the Stena line over to Stranraer for some Scottish delight, The Haggis Supper
Image: hostelmanagement

While not traditionally fried, those bloody Scots have found a way to work their pride and joy into a deep fryer.

Known as the ”Haggis Supper,” not to be confused with the “Burns Supper,” a dinner tradition honoring the great Scottish poet Robert Burns with a Haggis, the Haggis Supper, like the Cowboy Super, comes served on a bed of chips. While your body may be crying out for federal intervention to stop the flow of destruction through your veins (Now conveniently pumping pure crude fat), you can also try out the Haggis Burger, a patty of fried Haggis, served “Mmm, Mmm, Good.”

So…when do you leave?