Earliest Irish Soda Bread Recipe - 1837

At this time of year the Soda Bread gets a lot of press.  Unusally articles by food experts who are more at home matching a wine with a french entree than dealing with the humble soda bread.  Some accept the fact that this was a simple peasant bread created out of necessity rather than as a side dish to a St Patrick's Day party, but others just can't accept its simplictiy.

They will write about the "controversy" of what a soda bread is and what it should be.  If your palate is used to fine wines and exotic flavored breads, "controversy" explains away the fact that you are pushing a recipe for "Traditional Soda Bread" that has more herbs and spices than a piece of  Col. Sanders Southern Fried Chicken (the COL was born in Indiana).

No, the original Soda Bread contained none of the "extras" we see today, although they are extremely good.  Just don't tell everyone that it is the same bread eaten by the Irish in the 19th and early 20th centuries. 

Soda bread in Ireland had to start somewhere and, so far, it appears to start in Northern Ireland based on a refernce in the Journal of the Franklin Institute (July, 1837) to a news article in the Irish newspaper the Newry Telegraph.  The story gives the suggestion that this is a new way of making bread and, as we know now, it soon would spread to all parts of Ireland and be officially adopted as "Irish Soda Bread."

A correspondent of the Newry Telegraph gives the following receipt for making " soda bread," stating that "there is no bread to be had equal to it for invigorating the body, promoting digestion, strengthening the stomach, and improving the! state of the bowels." He says, "put a pound and a half of good wheaten meal into a large bowl, mix with it two teaspoonfuls of finely-powdered salt, then take a large teaspoonful of super-carbonate of soda,% dissolve it in half a teacupful of cold water, and add it to the meal; rub up all intimately together, then pour into the bowl as much very sour buttermilk as will make the whole into soft dough (it should be as soft as could possibly be handled, and the softer the better,) form it into a cake of about an inch thickness, and put it into a flat Dutch oven or frying-pan, with some metallic cover, such as an oven-lid or griddle, apply a moderate heat underneath for twenty minutes, then lay some clear live coals upon the lid, and keep it so for half an hour longer (the under heat being allowed to fall off gradually for the last fifteen minutes,) taking off the cover occasionally to see that it does not burn. This, he concludes, when somewhat cooled and moderately buttered, is as wholesome as ever entered man's stomach. Wm. Clacker, Esq., of Gosford, has ordered a sample of the bread to be prepared, and a quantity of the meal to be kept for sale at the Markethill Temperance Soup and Coffee Rooms. Farm. Mag

So, there you have an early recipe for Soda Bread that does not contain Raisins, eggs, sugar, garlic, of orange zest.  Tell me about all the ways to may a Quick Bread, but please don't tell me that it's "Traditional Irish Soda Bread."

Have a happy St. Patrick's Day and come visit the site at http://www.sodabread.info/ or on Facebook.

Ed O'Dwyer
sodabreadsociety@gmail.com