Blog Post
George's Poppyseed Soda Bread
- By Eric Atcheson
- •
- 15 Feb, 2022
My grandfather's recipe, annotated by me
A week or so ago, I posted this image to Facebook and Twitter with the caption, "In keeping up my carbs-but-homemade New Years resolution, I baked my grandfather’s soda bread with eggs, poppyseeds, and cinnamon and other spices tonight. He’s a retired professional chef and this stuff is the genuine article. It almost defies categorization."
It got a few requests for the recipe, which comes from a cookbook my paternal grandfather George first published over thirty years ago, and which he republished with my uncle several years ago. Since they hold the copyright, I got written permission from both of them to share the recipe here on my website!
A note of context: My grandfather, after serving in the Army in World War II, taught college students for many years. He took an early retirement from the professoriate at age 55 to attend culinary school and become a professional chef in his native Canada and then Alaska. I share that to assure you of the quality of this recipe (and, indeed, all his recipes). His side of my family is also Scottish through-and-through, and soda bread is a quintessentially Scotch-Irish creation. I've been experimenting with a few different soda bread recipes as part of my aforementioned carbs-but-homemade New Years resolution, and rest assured that this is the best of the bunch so far. His recipe is faithfully reprinted below as it appears in his cookbook, The Ol' Chef's Favorite Recipes, with my annotations in italics.
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1.5 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon each salt, mace*, cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1.5 teaspoons ginger
1/2 cup poppyseeds**
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup sugar***
1.5 cups buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable shortening, melted***
*If you don't have mace--I know I had a hard time finding it at the grocery store--substitute with nutmeg if you prefer a more aromatic bread, or allspice for a less aromatic final product. While this combination of spices definitely leans in the pumpkin pie direction, I've also experimented with more citrus-y spice combinations in my soda breads, like coriander or anise, and those loaves also turn out extremely well. You do you.
**1/2 cup is what the recipe calls for, but it felt a bit excessive to me. I reduced the amount to 1/4 cup, and there's still plenty of poppyseed character to the bread. As with the spices, I think it's just a matter of personal taste.
***If you want to halve the amount of sugar and shortening/butter for a healthier loaf, you can, and I promise you that the end product will still be delicious.
Mix all dry ingredients together and in another bowl mix the remaining ingredients (eggs, buttermilk, melted shortening/butter). Add dry mix to wet mix and beat until almost smooth. Pour into two greased and floured bread pans. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 45 minutes. A cake tester or toothpick should come out clean. Cool a few minutes and then de-pan.
This recipe yields two medium-sized loaves and depending on your oven they may take closer to 50-55 minutes to fully bake. The bread pans are optional; I like dropping my soda breads onto a parchment paper-lined baking sheet and forming them by hand for that irregular circular shape. This bread is extremely versatile, especially depending on what spices you choose to put in it, and it can easily serve as either a breakfast or dinner bread. Thanks to the eggs and buttermilk enriching the dough, any leftovers can keep for a few days in a sealed container before going stale.
If this gets a good reception, stay tuned for more possible pastor-cook writing projects from me. Happy V-Day, all y'all.
Birmingham, Alabama
February 14, 2022
It got a few requests for the recipe, which comes from a cookbook my paternal grandfather George first published over thirty years ago, and which he republished with my uncle several years ago. Since they hold the copyright, I got written permission from both of them to share the recipe here on my website!
A note of context: My grandfather, after serving in the Army in World War II, taught college students for many years. He took an early retirement from the professoriate at age 55 to attend culinary school and become a professional chef in his native Canada and then Alaska. I share that to assure you of the quality of this recipe (and, indeed, all his recipes). His side of my family is also Scottish through-and-through, and soda bread is a quintessentially Scotch-Irish creation. I've been experimenting with a few different soda bread recipes as part of my aforementioned carbs-but-homemade New Years resolution, and rest assured that this is the best of the bunch so far. His recipe is faithfully reprinted below as it appears in his cookbook, The Ol' Chef's Favorite Recipes, with my annotations in italics.
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1.5 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon each salt, mace*, cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1.5 teaspoons ginger
1/2 cup poppyseeds**
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup sugar***
1.5 cups buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable shortening, melted***
*If you don't have mace--I know I had a hard time finding it at the grocery store--substitute with nutmeg if you prefer a more aromatic bread, or allspice for a less aromatic final product. While this combination of spices definitely leans in the pumpkin pie direction, I've also experimented with more citrus-y spice combinations in my soda breads, like coriander or anise, and those loaves also turn out extremely well. You do you.
**1/2 cup is what the recipe calls for, but it felt a bit excessive to me. I reduced the amount to 1/4 cup, and there's still plenty of poppyseed character to the bread. As with the spices, I think it's just a matter of personal taste.
***If you want to halve the amount of sugar and shortening/butter for a healthier loaf, you can, and I promise you that the end product will still be delicious.
Mix all dry ingredients together and in another bowl mix the remaining ingredients (eggs, buttermilk, melted shortening/butter). Add dry mix to wet mix and beat until almost smooth. Pour into two greased and floured bread pans. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 45 minutes. A cake tester or toothpick should come out clean. Cool a few minutes and then de-pan.
This recipe yields two medium-sized loaves and depending on your oven they may take closer to 50-55 minutes to fully bake. The bread pans are optional; I like dropping my soda breads onto a parchment paper-lined baking sheet and forming them by hand for that irregular circular shape. This bread is extremely versatile, especially depending on what spices you choose to put in it, and it can easily serve as either a breakfast or dinner bread. Thanks to the eggs and buttermilk enriching the dough, any leftovers can keep for a few days in a sealed container before going stale.
If this gets a good reception, stay tuned for more possible pastor-cook writing projects from me. Happy V-Day, all y'all.
Birmingham, Alabama
February 14, 2022