Irish oatmeal soda bread
A lucky dip from Delia.
According to Delia this is 'the real thing - proper Irish bread.' So I investigated a bit to see if she is right and I don't think she is really. Would you believe there is an entire website dedicated to Irish soda bread - The Society for the Preservation of Irish Soda Bread no less. And they will tell you absolutely everything you wanted to know about Irish soda bread. They have several recipes but none of them has oatmeal in them, though there are indeed several recipes out there in the net which contain oatmeal. The main thing it seems is that the flour should be 'soft' - not the fancy 'hard' flour that you're supposed to use for pasta and proper bread. The other thing is that you should use buttermilk, even though, apparently the buttermilk we get today is much creamier than the poor Irish would have used. They say it's just flour, buttermilk and bicarbonate of soda. Delia adds an egg as well as the oatmeal. And as always Felicity Cloake gives a pretty good rundown of the various approaches that people take. I have to say that Delia's picture looks rather more tempting than the Guardian one though.
The poor Irish would, of course, have cooked it in a cast iron pot like this one over the fire in the hearth. And it is, of course, more or less exactly the same as damper, which was cooked in a pot over a camp fire - or, alternatively, actually in the ashes of the fire - which is perhaps what distinguished it from Irish soda bread. I'm guessing it came from the Irish anyway, though they probably are not the only ones to make soda bread.
As Nigel Slater points out, soda bread is a really good way for a novice cook to start into making bread, because it is so quick, so easy and basically so delicious. I must say I love it -and all the derivatives like savoury scones.
My lucky dip turned up the first volume of Delia's How to Cook series of three volumes.
A little bit like Jamie Oliver, though more quietly, Delia Smith has been trying to persuade people to cook their own food - to get back into the kitchen. If you go to her website you will find an online cookery course which takes you through the very simple to the complicated with video demonstrations. And this three volume set of books is equally simple, tempting and clear. In her introduction she reasons that, "we may be in danger of losing something very precious, and that is a reverence for simple, everyday life. We are not talking about spending masses of time in the kitchen, either. We need to be reminded that, after a hard day, a perfectly made moist, fluffy omelette - which is so easy to make - is not only more satisfying but quicker than the average ready-meal." Her aim in writing the books was to "reintroduce people to the pleasure of basic, staple ingredients, and ... to to provide a first-time cookbook, something that will be a good grounding in the simple basics and provide a springboard for a lifetime of learning - not just in how to cook but in how to experience the sheer joy and pleasure of eating good food every single day." And I personally say 'hear, hear' and congratulate her on doing just that. For the recipes are simple but sufficiently different to tempt you to try them. So go out and buy these books now! Or, alternatively just bookmark her website and browse it when you are looking for ideas. She very generously has most of her recipes there for anyone to use.
Anyway - here is her recipe for Irish oatmeal soda bread, which, interestingly is not on her website, though a recipe for ordinary soda bread is.
IRISH OATMEAL SODA BREAD
125g, wholemeal flour, 50g plain flour, 50g pinhead oatmeal, 25g wheatgerm, 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda, 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, 1 teaspoon sugar, 1 large egg, 275 ml buttermilk, a little extra flour for dusting.
Preheat the oven to 190ºC.
Begin by placing the dry ingredients in a large, roomy bowl, mix to combine, then beat the egg and buttermilk together and add them to the dry ingredients. Start mixing, first with a fork, then finish off with your hands to form a smooth dough. All you do now is transfer the dough to a greased loaf tin and level the top. Alternatively, shape into a round about 15cm across and make a deep cut across it three times, but don't cut all the way through. Sprinkle with flour and bake in the centre of the oven for 50-60 minutes, then turn it straight out on to a wire rack to cool. This is best eaten fresh, but fear not, because the next day or the the day after, it makes wonderful toast.
On the opposite page she has a recipe for a variation which sounds absolutely scrumptious - Parsnip, Parmesan and Sage Bread. This recipe is available on her website. I thought I would stick to the Irish one as there was a little bit more opportunity to dig into the history of it all. The other recipe, though, is, I think, a good demonstration of how she takes something simple and basic and just gives it a bit of a delicious and sufficiently different tweak to make it really tempting.
