Happy St Patrick’s Day! To celebrate I wanted to make something a little traditional. All week I have been working on this Irish Soda Bread recipe. There were some epic fails and several messes before I got one to be even remotely correct. This one came out pretty good. I adapted the recipe from the Culinary Institute of America’s The Professional Chef. I had to do a lot of math to convert the recipe to one loaf instead of four. It was quite the task but I hope you enjoy it. Have a great day celebrating!
1 cup raisins
1/4 cup whiskey
4 cups of flour
2 tablespoons baking powder
3 tablespoons sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons butter, diced
1 cup milk
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. Soak raisins in the whiskey while you bring the rest of the recipe together. Sift flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt together over a large bowl. Add the butter. Mix with your hands until the butter and flour form small clumps the size of peas (sorry but I forgot to take a picture of this but you can see it in the picture where I add the raisins). Drain the raisins. Add the milk and raisins to the dry ingredients. Stir to combine. When it begins to get hard to stir place the dough on floured cutting board or counter. Knead the dough until it comes together. Form into a disk. Place on a baking sheet. With a sharp knife (I used a paring knife) cut a cross on the top of the bowl. Bake in oven for 45-60 minutes until the crust is golden and when you knock on the top of the bread it sounds hollow. Makes for a great breakfast, Enjoy!
