Irish-American Soda Bread

Foolishly, I signed up to provide snacks for Sophia’s Montessori preschool class on St. Patrick’s Day. My initial thought was to bring something green and easy... zucchini bread, cucumber spears, grapes.

However, Sophia recently reminded me that her teacher, Bridget and Bridget’s mother, Gertie (the afternoon preschool teacher), are actually Irish and have been teaching them Irish dancing at school. In fact, Bridget is a first-generation Irish-American.

Now, the pressure is on! I realized I have to make some sort of quasi-authentic Irish snack for school next week.

So, in preparation, I started experimenting with Irish soda bread. Tonight’s recipe, from the King Arthur Flour Web site, is an Americanized version, calling for raisins, caraway seeds and plenty of sugar, including a milk and sugar glaze. The only change I made to the original recipe is the omission of caraway seeds. Sophia would love them, like everything else, but I doubt they’d have broad appeal among her pickier peers.

The bread is absolutely delicious... sweet, fluffy and moist. My pan was a bit too small (8.5" x 4.5" vs. 9" x 5"), so it overflowed a bit into the oven. I’ll need to buy a few new pans in order to make enough for next Tuesday, but otherwise it was a scrumptious success.