Irish soda bread

Irish soda bread

Ingredients/Components

• sugar - 5 Tbsp
• salt - 1 Tbsp
• buttermilk - 2 c
• baking powder - 1 tsp
• baking soda - 1 tsp
• margarine - 4 Tbsp
• caraway seed - 1 Tbsp
• golden raisins - 1 c
• currants - 1/2 c
• unbleached white all-purpose flour - 4 c

How to make irish soda bread:

Preheat oven to 350°. Butter and flour a round glass or tin cake pan. Sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and sugar. Add caraway seed. Using a pastry cutter, two knives or your fingers, cut in the margarine until it is the consistency of fine meal. Add raisins. Pour in the buttermilk; mix well. When the flour is just incorporated, turn the dough out onto a floured board and knead the dough for about 1 to 2 minutes, until it is smooth and no longer sticky. Form into an 8-inch circle.

Put the dough into the cake pan; with a sharp knife, make an X across the top, extending beyond the edges. Bake for 65 to 70 minutes in the lower third of preheated oven. The bread is done when it has shrunk away from the edges of the pan and makes a hollow sound when tapped on the bottom. Let cool out of pan on the rack.

Recipe categories: Breads, Quick breads, Irish.