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Bread

Irish Bread

A quick loaf made from flour, salt, baking soda, sugar, and buttermilk, baked until golden and hollow-sounding.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and buttermilk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,721 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Irish Bread

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Make and shape the dough

  1. In a large bowl, mix the flour, salt, baking soda, and sugar.

  2. Make a well in the center and pour in the buttermilk.

  3. Stir until a dough forms, then knead gently on a floured surface.

  4. Divide the dough into two equal pieces and shape into loaves.

Bake

  1. Place the loaves side by side on a baking sheet, ensuring they touch slightly.

  2. Bake for 30-35 minutes until golden brown and hollow sounding when tapped.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + buttermilktop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Sugar + buttermilktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

All-purpose flour
Forms the structure of the dough as its proteins hydrate and develop gluten.
Baking soda
Reacts with the buttermilk's acid to produce carbon dioxide, which leavens the loaves.
Buttermilk
Its acidity activates the baking soda and adds moisture and tang to the dough.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness and helps the crust brown during baking.

The step that matters

Knead gently. Overworking wheat dough develops too much gluten, making the bread tough and dense. Light handling keeps the crumb tender while still holding the loaf together.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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