Irish soda bread
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
_(cropped).jpg)
Irish soda bread was developed during the early- to mid-1800s shortly after the development of bicarbonate of soda as a leavening agent. The traditional version includes only flour, buttermilk, salt and baking soda. A version using white flour and including sugar and raisins and often butter and eggs, which would have been a special-occasion loaf before the mid-1900s, is often marketed to tourists and thought of in the United States as "traditional Irish soda bread".
The potato reached Ireland by the end of the 16th century and, by providing a cheap source of nutrition, resulted in a large increase in population from around 1 million in the 1590s to over 8 million by the 1840s, making Ireland the most densely populated country in Europe.[1]
In the early to mid-1600s, the potato was used primarily to supplement the traditional diet.[1] Over time the diet of the working class became more and more reliant on the potato until by the early 1800s it was "dangerously reliant" on the potato.[1] Potatoes, an acre of which in a good year could support a family, became the main source of calories for most of the working class.[2] Wheat grown locally was typically exported by English landlords, was expensive, and did not contain enough gluten to produce a reliable rise with yeast; a common bread was a griddled potato bread that used potatoes rather than flour as a main ingredient.[2][3][4][5]
Soda bread was first developed in the early 1800s using bicarbonate of soda rather than yeast as a leavener to allow creation of bread from Ireland's low-gluten wheat.[6][5] Soda bread was known in Ireland from the 1830s and was rapidly adopted because bicarbonate of soda was a reliable and rapid leavener.[6][4]
Adoption
During the Great Famine of the mid-1800s, hard wheat and bicarbonate of soda were shipped from North America to feed the starving Irish population, and Ireland developed a flour-based soda bread.[2] By the 1860s, soda bread was the common homebaked bread across the country.[4] The higher-quality North American wheat also allowed Irish bakers to develop reliable yeasted breads.[5]
By the mid-1900s, soda bread was popularly regarded as a poverty food and a reminder of the famine. Yeast-raised bread was seen as the more modern and sophisticated option, and consumption of soda bread decreased until yeasted bread supplanted it as the staple Irish daily bread.[4][5] Starting in the 1960s the bread began appearing on upscale menus, and it became popular again in the early 2000s with the artisan food movement.[5]
_(cropped).jpg)
