The ingredients for an American version of Irish soda bread. Traditional soda breads don’t have butter or eggs. Credit: Copyright 2016 Ellie MarkovitchSoda bread is serious stuff. The Irish Heritage Society near me is having a contest, and people can enter in three categories: traditional white, traditional wheaten, and family bread non-specific. The first two can only contain flour, baking soda, salt, and buttermilk; ingredients that would have been available in Ireland when the bread was developed. The third, family bread non-specific, can have anything in it, and might include currants, caraway seeds, eggs and other enrichments.The sweet quick bread common here is decidedly American and reflects the fact that the average Irish cupboard lacked or had limited quantities of sugar and butter. The traditional Irish soda bread is emblematic of other limits, like the way that flour works in bread dough, and how wheat grows.
The moist climate of Ireland is suited to growing soft or pastry wheat, which is better for making pastries and quick breads rather than yeasted or naturally leavened breads. Arid summers, like those in the American wheat belts, grow hard or bread wheats, which have enough gluten to develop the structure that builds tall loaves of bread.
All wheats have gluten, which is a type of protein. The amount and quality of gluten varies in hard and soft wheats. Gliadin and glutenin are two components of gluten, and each wheat style has different proportions of both. That's why flours made from different grains work differently. Hard wheats have more glutenin, and soft wheats have more gliadin, which is sometimes described as having sliding properties. If you cook whole grains, hard wheats really are harder to the tooth.Soft wheats work great for quick breads and things that climb with the aid of chemical leavening. Soda bread, especially if made with purist rules, is a great demonstration of chemical leavening at work. Buttermilk plus baking soda creates an acid-base reaction, and carbon dioxide bubbles throughout the dough; the heat of the oven traps the gases, and voila, there is bread.In praise of baking powderBaking powder is another type of chemical leavening; liquid activates its acid-base reaction. These products of the 19th century simplified baking. Before the birthday of baking powder -- around 1865, depending on whom you salute as its inventor -- people had to use natural yeasts to make baked goods rise. Old cookbooks have lots of instructions for ways to charm leavening out of thin air, or from potato peelings and even milk.Sourdough baking is all the rage, but I am in awe of baking powder. This shelf stable stuff makes my whole wheat pancakes climb sky high. It is a little angel in my pantry, helping flour soar. I am loyal to a single brand, Rumford. It's double-acting baking powder, which means it rises once when liquid hits the dry ingredients, and again in the heat of the oven, or on the griddle.I am also loyal to fresh milled whole-grain flour. I love the way it tastes, sweet and hardy, and the way the food sits in my brain. Stone milling is a process that keeps all the parts of a grain kernel, the bran, germ and endosperm, together. Roller milling is how most flour is made, and the process separates all of these parts, combining parts of them at the end as the mill sees fit. The germ is generally removed because it spoils easily.Luckily, stone milling operations are popping up all over the country as people revive small-scale grain production. The one near me, Farmer Ground Flour, mills a type of soft white wheat that makes great quick breads.I have no family recipe for soda bread, but I've made a beautiful mutt loaf that highlights my kitchen affinities.Soda BreadPrep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 25 minutes
Total time: 40 minutes
Yield: 6 servingsIngredients:2 cups stoneground white whole wheat pastry flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons butter
1 egg
3 tablespoons yogurt
1/2 cup milkDirections:1. Combine dry ingredients with a whisk.2. Cut butter into 1/2-inch cubes.3. With a pastry blender or your fingers, incorporate butter into the flour mixture. The result does not have to be smooth -- some pea-sized pieces are OK, even good.4. Whisk together egg, yogurt and milk. Using a fork, blend until everything is just barely incorporated.5. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead very lightly, just about five times.6. Pat into a round about 8 inches across and transfer to a buttered cookie sheet. Score into six pieces.7. Let dough rest 10 minutes while preheating oven to 400 F.8. Bake for 25 minutes, until golden brown at the edges.Copyright 2016 Amy Halloran via Zester Daily and Reuters Media Express(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
The moist climate of Ireland is suited to growing soft or pastry wheat, which is better for making pastries and quick breads rather than yeasted or naturally leavened breads. Arid summers, like those in the American wheat belts, grow hard or bread wheats, which have enough gluten to develop the structure that builds tall loaves of bread.
All wheats have gluten, which is a type of protein. The amount and quality of gluten varies in hard and soft wheats. Gliadin and glutenin are two components of gluten, and each wheat style has different proportions of both. That's why flours made from different grains work differently. Hard wheats have more glutenin, and soft wheats have more gliadin, which is sometimes described as having sliding properties. If you cook whole grains, hard wheats really are harder to the tooth.Soft wheats work great for quick breads and things that climb with the aid of chemical leavening. Soda bread, especially if made with purist rules, is a great demonstration of chemical leavening at work. Buttermilk plus baking soda creates an acid-base reaction, and carbon dioxide bubbles throughout the dough; the heat of the oven traps the gases, and voila, there is bread.In praise of baking powderBaking powder is another type of chemical leavening; liquid activates its acid-base reaction. These products of the 19th century simplified baking. Before the birthday of baking powder -- around 1865, depending on whom you salute as its inventor -- people had to use natural yeasts to make baked goods rise. Old cookbooks have lots of instructions for ways to charm leavening out of thin air, or from potato peelings and even milk.Sourdough baking is all the rage, but I am in awe of baking powder. This shelf stable stuff makes my whole wheat pancakes climb sky high. It is a little angel in my pantry, helping flour soar. I am loyal to a single brand, Rumford. It's double-acting baking powder, which means it rises once when liquid hits the dry ingredients, and again in the heat of the oven, or on the griddle.I am also loyal to fresh milled whole-grain flour. I love the way it tastes, sweet and hardy, and the way the food sits in my brain. Stone milling is a process that keeps all the parts of a grain kernel, the bran, germ and endosperm, together. Roller milling is how most flour is made, and the process separates all of these parts, combining parts of them at the end as the mill sees fit. The germ is generally removed because it spoils easily.Luckily, stone milling operations are popping up all over the country as people revive small-scale grain production. The one near me, Farmer Ground Flour, mills a type of soft white wheat that makes great quick breads.I have no family recipe for soda bread, but I've made a beautiful mutt loaf that highlights my kitchen affinities.Soda BreadPrep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 25 minutes
Total time: 40 minutes
Yield: 6 servingsIngredients:2 cups stoneground white whole wheat pastry flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons butter
1 egg
3 tablespoons yogurt
1/2 cup milkDirections:1. Combine dry ingredients with a whisk.2. Cut butter into 1/2-inch cubes.3. With a pastry blender or your fingers, incorporate butter into the flour mixture. The result does not have to be smooth -- some pea-sized pieces are OK, even good.4. Whisk together egg, yogurt and milk. Using a fork, blend until everything is just barely incorporated.5. Turn out onto a floured surface and knead very lightly, just about five times.6. Pat into a round about 8 inches across and transfer to a buttered cookie sheet. Score into six pieces.7. Let dough rest 10 minutes while preheating oven to 400 F.8. Bake for 25 minutes, until golden brown at the edges.Copyright 2016 Amy Halloran via Zester Daily and Reuters Media Express(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
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