Irish Soda Bread - White

Irish Soda bread is a delicious bread very popular in Ireland. It is called this way because its leavening agent is the soda, which in conjunction with the buttermilk and the cream of tartar make the dough raise in the oven.
As the soda gets in contact with buttermilk it starts to react, so it is of vital importance to tray up as quick as possible the bread after mixing and put it straight away in the pre-heat oven. When cooked, the loaf will sound hollow when rapped on the bottom with your knuckle.

Irish flour and Irish buttermilk should be used for this recipe.
Irish flour is a very soft flour with a low gluten content. You can use in the recipe only cream flour (instead of a mix of cream and baker flour) if you wish. I personally recommend using odlums. The bread flour of this brand has a low gluten content.

If you don't live in Ireland any cake flour should do the job.

The buttermilk is kind of difficult to find outside Ireland, and even if you manage to do so, it could have a different degree of acidity than the one you can find in Ireland. For this very reason, you will need to change the proportion of cream tartar to suit the buttermilk that you have.

Ingredients

For 4 x 490gr each

Stage	Ingredients	Gr.	Baker%	Method
1	Cream Flour Strong Flour Salt Cream of Tartar Bread Soda	500 500 15 30 20	50% 50% 1.5% 3% 2%	Sieve flour and salt, cream of tartar and bread soda toghegher
2	Butter	80	8%	Rub butter into Flour
3	Buttermilk Caster Sugar	850 20	85% 20%	Dissolve sugar in buttermilk, add to dry ingredients and mix gently
	Total:	2015	201.5%

For 2 x 490gr each

Stage	Ingredients	Gr.	Baker%	Method
1	Cream Flour Strong Flour Salt Cream of Tartar Bread Soda	250 250 7 15 10	50% 50% 1.5% 3% 2%	Sieve flour and salt, cream of tartar and bread soda toghegher
2	Butter	40	8%	Rub butter into Flour
3	Buttermilk Caster Sugar	425 10	85% 20%	Dissolve sugar in buttermilk, add to dry ingredients and mix gently
	Total:	1007	201.5%

Processing Details

Details	Temp/Time	Instructions
Dough Temperature		Use cold buttermilk
Fermentation Time	none
Scaling Weight	490	4 (2) Pieces Hand up into a roun ball shape
Intermediate Proof	none
Shape		Hand up round (again) Flat them out pushing the palm of your hand on top Dust with flour Cut cross in centre (deep cut with a big knife) Sprikle with flour (or egg wash)
Proof Tim	none
Baking temperature	210 C
Baking time	35 - 40 mins

Ingredients

Dry ingredients mixed and buttermilk

Mixing

Dough after mixing

Tray up

After Baking

Slice to show the texture

Traditional Pan Bread - White

The first bread formula I am going to show you in my blog is the "Traditional Pan Bread -White". This is going to be a straight dough, i.e no pre-ferments, biga or poolish are used.
I would say that this is the perfect bread to make for any beginners, because its dough is very easy to knead.
Despite that, it certainly contains all the steps of the bread making process.

Ingredients

Ingredients for 5x500gr Loafs

Stage	Ingredients	Gr.	Baker%	Method
1	Baker Flour Salt	1500 30	100% 2%	Sieve Salt with flour
2	Butter	30	2%	Rub butter into Flour
3	Yeast (fresh) Water	50 875	3.3% 58.3%	Disperse Yeast in water or rub it in to flour. Add liquid into flour and mix to a dough

Ingredients for 3x500gr Loafs

Stage	Ingredients	Gr.	Baker%	Method
1	Baker Flour Salt	900 18	100% 2%	Sieve Salt with flour
2	Butter	18	2%	Rub butter into Flour
3	Yeast (fresh) Water	30 525	3.3% 58.3%	Disperse Yeast in water or rub it in to flour. Add liquid into flour and mix to a dough

Processing Details

Details	Temp/Time	Instructions
Dough Temperature	26 C
Fermentation Time	60 mins	Knock back after 45 minutes or Folding
Scaling Weight	490	5 (3) Pieces Hand up into a roun ball shape
Intermediate Proof	10 mins.	Keep Covered
Shape		Knuckle out inot a pad Fold in ends to form a rectangle Roll up (Swiss roll fashion) Place individual dough pieces prepared in a baking tin / pan Dress with sieved flour (or egg wash)
Proof Time	45-50 mins	Cut a slit along top using a sharp blade - prior to baking Either one centre or three oblique and parallel
Baking temperature	210 C
Baking time	30-35 mins

The final loafs were very nice but not perfect.



1) Baking pan. It was too large and shallow to bake 490gr of dough. But these are the ones that you can easily find in the baking shops here in Ireland. The ideal ones would be 12x8x9 (LxWxH)

2) Dusting with flour: I forgot to dust the loafs just before scoring

3) Scoring; Scored was not perfect: Should have been a bit shallower on the straight one

4) Baking: I should have baked them few minutes more

Here you can find images for the some of the steps.



Dough after mixing 2 minutes mixing with K-Beater

Dough after 3 minutes mixing with Dough hook. I also hand-kneaded the dough few minutes.

Hamelman Folding Technique (instead of simple knock bak)




Dough after primary fermentation

Scaling

Scaling (round ball)

Shaping

scoring