Recipe For Irish “Soda” Bread
Ingredients:
- 5 cups of all-purpose flour
- 1 cup of sugar
- 3 heaping teaspoons of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of salt
- 3/4 tablespoon of caraway seed
- 1-1/2 cups of buttermilk
- 3 eggs
- 1-1/2 cups of dried currants
- 1 cube of butter
- 1 “heaping” 1/4 cup of cooking oil (best)
or 1 cube margarine (well ...)
or 1 cup solid crisco (if you must)
Equipment:
- Oven
- 12” cast-iron frying pan
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.
- Un-clump the currants a little.
- Stroke the caraway with mortar and pestle for about a dozen strokes -- to
release the flavor.
- Separate the eggs and put them in a mixing bowl, break them and mix with a
fork, then mix in the buttermilk.
- Add the currants to the buttermilk and eggs and try to un-clump as much as
possible.
- Using low heat, melt the butter in the frying pan. Then add the cooking oil
and mix.
- Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and caraway in a large
bowl.
- Make a hole in the center of the dry mixture and pour in the mixture of butter
milk, eggs, and currants.
- Gently fold just to get an initial mixing. If necessary, add a dash more of
buttermilk to wet any large areas that are still completely dry.
- Add the melted butter and oil from the frying pan and then continue gentle
folding just until the ingredients are mixed and all the dry ingredients have
been reached by the moisture. (The less extra mixing, the better the texture
of the cake.)
- Place into the frying pan. Spread so that the sides are slightly higher than
the center and all the surface is pretty smooth.
- Bake for about 45-50 minutes or until the top is slightly browned and there is
some spring-back when the top center is pushed slightly.
- Cool for 1/2 hour and then pop the cake out of the pan and transfer to a
serving plate.
- Let the cake have ventilation for a while, or the crust may get a bit
soggy.