For the longest time, I thought my mom’s recipe for Irish Soda Bread was one that had been passed down through her (mostly Irish) side of the family. When I asked her about it this year, I was surprised to find out that it isn’t a family recipe. Apparently she picked it up while my dad was in anesthesia school in Kansas City and baked a loaf of this Irish soda bread to share with friends of theirs who had made traditional corned beef and cabbage on St. Patty’s day. It was a hit, and she’s been baking it every year since. I’ve made a few tiny tweaks to ratios and cook temp, and it sure bakes a beautiful loaf.
Despite my misconception about its origins, this is still a very traditional Irish soda bread recipe. A few years back, a friend who saw my bread invited me to join the Society for the Preservation of Irish Soda Bread Facebook group. They are dedicated to preserving the original recipe of 4 ingredients: flour, salt, baking soda, and buttermilk. While my recipe has the addition of some baking powder to make it extra fluffy, everything else is the same.
To make the Irish soda bread, grab a bowl and measure out the dry ingredients. Anytime I’m baking, I always measure out my flour by weight using my kitchen scale and the conversion of 1 US cup= 125 grams. I find that you get a very consistent measure and never run into issues with the wet/dry ingredient ratios that can pop up if you don’t measure by weight. This is not as essential with cakes and cookies, but is crucial with bread dough because texture is key to getting a perfect loaf.
Once you have the dry ingredients measured and mixed, you’ll make a well in the center and starting adding in the buttermilk little by little until the dough as formed and the excess flour is worked in. I suggest flouring your hands and pinching it together with your fingers instead of shoving and kneading as you would a yeast bread dough. Irish soda bread rises due to the bubbling interaction between the baking soda and acid content of the buttermilk. If you knead too much, you’ll end up squishing all the air bubbles out and have a very flat, hard bread. (Ever accidentally made biscuit rocks?)
If you decide to leave out the baking powder and go with the traditional purist recipe, note that you will need to get the bread into the oven as quickly as possible after starting the chemical reaction with the buttermilk and baking soda. Adding the baking powder makes this reaction a bit slower. Baking powder is essentially baking soda mixed with cream of tartar. Both are leavening agents, but the combination makes the reaction happen in two phases: the baking soda reacts immediately with liquids and the cream of tartar reacts in the oven to rise with heat. With this secret ingredient, your bread will rise even if you don’t have fresh baking soda or botch the reaction with the buttermilk. (Or live at high-altitude like me where everything hates rising.)
Your last choice here is to either put the bread into a cast iron dutch oven or set it on a cookie sheet. I have used both methods and find that the dutch oven yields a thick crust that’s great for dunking while the cookie sheet yields a bit thinner (but still crispy) crust that’s better for slicing and eating or using for sandwiches. You should also be sure to sprinkle a bit of extra flour over the top to give it the artisan look and cut a cross in the top of the bread to let the steam out and allow the inside of the bread to get enough heat (and bless the bread of course).
Irish Soda Bread
- Prep Time: 5
- Cook Time: 33
- Total Time: 38
Description
A traditional Irish Soda Bread loaf that bakes up crusty and fluffy in less than an hour
Ingredients
- 4 cups (500g) all-purpose flour
- 1 Tablespoon kosher salt or 2 tsp. regular salt
- 1 level teaspoon baking soda
- 3/4 tsp baking powder
- 1&1/4 to 1&1/2 cups buttermilk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450 degrees (Yes, you do need to preheat it)
- When oven is ready, combine dry ingredients
- Create a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and slowly add the buttermilk, using your hands to tip flour into the center to combine.
- Gradually add more buttermilk until all the flour has been incorporated and dough doesn’t crack when pinched. It will be similar to biscuit dough and should not be sticky.
- Form into a round, flat loaf and place on a lightly greased cookie sheet or into a covered cast iron dutch oven. Cut a cross into the top of the loaf about 1/4″ deep with a floured knife to allow it to vent.
- Bake for 5 minutes at 450, then lower oven temp to 400 degrees (don’t open oven door) and bake for another 35-40 minutes or until top is golden brown and the loaf sounds hollow when you knock on the bottom. (Note: Bread will bake a bit faster in the cast iron dutch oven than on a cookie sheet.)
- Serve warm with a generous amount of Kerrygold irish butter and a maybe even a spoonful of apple butter.
Notes
- No buttermilk in the house? Add 1Tbsp of white or apple cider vinegar per 1 cup of regular milk to get the acid content you need.
- Gluten-Free: Since this is a low-gluten bread, I think gluten-free flour would work well here.
- Vegan: Use non-dairy milk and add 1Tbsp of white or apple cider vinegar per 1 cup of milk
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 5
Recipe Remix: Check out this soda bread, Dubliner Irish cheddar, and pesto grilled cheese sandwich
What are you doing for your St. Patrick’s Day Celebration?
Wait.. soo Soda bread doesn’t have soda soda in it? My mind is blown!
Haha. Nope! It’s named “soda bread” because you use baking soda (also known as bicarb soda or sodium bicarbonate depending on what country you’re in). It’s basically a “poor man’s” table bread because it could be baked in a dutch oven over a fire and didn’t require an oven like most yeast breads. I’ve made this while camping before and it’s awesome. 🙂
I think I’m going to make it right now. Although I have to use coconut milk b/c i have no other dairy free milk. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
P.S. I found a recipe to put vanilla pudding powder in bread/rolls and it looked amazing!!!
Good luck! Soda bread is definitely more pretzel-flavored than anything, so your coconut milk may make it a lot sweeter than normal. If you haven’t put it in the oven yet, taste the dough and if you get sweet, you may want to add a handful of raisins to make a sweeter tea cake instead.
If I get home from work early enough tonight, I am so going to make this. It looks like such a tasty butter delivery method.
Definitely a tasty butter delivery method. 🙂
OMG! That huge pat of butter melting on the slice is killing me! I badly need it!!!!!
It’s Kerrygold butter too. You totally need it. Trader Joe’s had it on sale this week for St. Patty’s Day if you’re near the new one.
Also, that huge pat of butter kept sliding its way down to the plate and I had to replace it twice during the shoot.
I have never made bread at all. but this is making hungry, will probably give it ago over the weekend
This is a really great bread for a first go because you don’t have to worry about yeast. The only “failures” I’ve had with it was not letting it bake long enough and ending up with a slightly gooey middle section. I just stuck it right back into the oven for a few more minutes and the problem was solved!
Great recipe and it looks so good. My grandmother use to make a similar type of bread, but with beer.
I think I remember my mom making something similar as well. We’ve also made bread with ice cream and bread with sausage. Maybe you can make bread out of anything?
You have some great receips and would love for you to share/link up on the first The Yuck Stops Here! link up.
Thanks! I’ll check out your linkup. 🙂
This looks amazing! I will have to give this a try.
I hope you love it!
I love making my own bread – there is nothing like the smell from the oven is there ? Great recipe 🙂
I love it too. If I didn’t work, I’d bake fresh bread all the time just so I could eat it out of the oven with butter all over it. It’s probably good that I don’t have time for that…
I had been searching off and on for a Soda bread recipe that didn’t call for yeast, couldn’t find one until now. Thanks!! Sounds and looks perfect!
My grandma would tell you that traditional soda bread should never have yeast! This one is a hit every time. This reminds me that I should make some for dinner soon. 🙂
This looks soooo good. Bread is my favorite food!!!