Irish Soda Bread is a quick bread that does not require any yeast. Instead, all of its leavening comes from baking soda and buttermilk. This Irish soda bread recipe is my grandmother’s and has been cherished in my family for years. It’s dense, yet soft and has the most incredible crusty exterior. Buttermilk and cold butter are the secret to its delicious success!
Welcome to my favorite Irish Soda Bread recipe. I shared this no yeast bread recipe on my blog a few years ago and decided to revisit with fresh new pictures and a video tutorial. This recipe is my grandmother’s. She passed away in 2011, 2 weeks before I started this food blog. I dedicated my 1st cookbook to her. Full of energy and the creator of the best homemade pie crust on earth, she would be in her 90s today. St. Patrick’s Day is her birthday.
Irish Soda Bread is a Quick Bread
Does the thought of homemade bread send you running for the hills? Sometimes homemade bread feels daunting, but you’re in luck today. Irish soda bread is a quick bread made with baking soda, not yeast. Like my easy no yeast bread, this is a shortcut bread that doesn’t skimp on flavor. (If you want a yeast bread, I recommend my sandwich bread recipe!)
- What’s the texture like? The best Irish soda bread, like this recipe, has a golden brown crust with a dense, tight crumb. The bread isn’t heavy, it’s actually quite tender and soft inside. The crust is nice and crisp when it comes out of the oven and becomes a little chewy on day 2 and 3. It’s so good.
My grandmother’s Irish soda bread contains some sugar, but it’s not overly sweet. It’s a wonderful companion for savory dinners like hearty stew or you can serve it with butter, honey butter, jam, and/or cheese. The raisins are optional, but Grandma would never let you skip them.
Video Tutorial: Homemade Irish Soda Bread
Overview: How to Make Irish Soda Bread
The full printable recipe is below. Irish soda bread dough comes together in about 10 minutes. You need buttermilk, egg, flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and butter.
- Whisk buttermilk and 1 egg together. Whisk the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt together in another bowl.
- Cut cold butter into the flour mixture. Like scones and pie crust, cutting cold butter into the flour is a key step. Coating the flour in cold butter guarantees a lovely flaky texture. You can use a fork, your hands, or a pastry cutter. Add the wet ingredients.
- Bring the dough together with your hands. Using a very sharp knife, score the dough. This allows the center to bake.
- Bake until golden brown.
Buttermilk is the Secret
Irish soda bread only requires a few ingredients, including buttermilk. Buttermilk reacts with the baking soda to provide the bread’s leavening. It also adds wonderful flavor! We use buttermilk for the same reasons in my regular no yeast bread, too. If you’re interested, I have plenty more on this topic in my Baking with Buttermilk post (including a DIY buttermilk substitute recipe).
Feel free to Skip the Egg
Irish soda bread can be made with or without an egg. 1 egg adds richness and density. Feel free to skip it to make a slightly lighter loaf. No other changes necessary, simply leave out the egg.
3 Success Tips
- Don’t over-work the dough. It’s supposed to look a little shaggy.
- Score the top of the dough with an “X” before baking. This helps the center bake through.
- You can bake Irish soda bread on a baking sheet, in a baking pan, or in a cast iron skillet. I recommend a cast iron skillet because it helps guarantee a super crispy crust. Here’s how to keep your cast iron cookware seasoned.
If you’re baking for St. Patrick’s Day, you’ll love my Guinness Brownies, Baileys and Coffee Cupcakes, Guinness Chocolate Cake, Guinness Chocolate Cupcakes, Lucky Charms Treats, and shamrock St. Patrick’s Day Cookies, too.
Print
Grandma’s Irish Soda Bread
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 45 minutes
- Total Time: 55 minutes
- Yield: 1 loaf
- Category: Bread
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: Irish
Description
Irish Soda Bread is a quick bread that does not require any yeast. Instead, all of its leavening comes from baking soda and buttermilk. This Irish Soda Bread recipe is my grandmother’s and has been cherished in my family for years. It’s dense, yet soft and has the most incredible crusty exterior.
Ingredients
- 1 and 3/4 cups (420ml) buttermilk*
- 1 large egg (optional, see note)
- 4 and 1/4 cups (531g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled), plus more for your hands and counter
- 3 Tablespoons (38g) granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 5 Tablespoons (71g) unsalted butter, cold and cubed*
- optional: 1 cup (150g) raisins
Instructions
- Preheat oven & pan options: Preheat oven to 400°F (204°C). There are options for the baking pan. Use a regular baking sheet and line with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat (bread spreads a bit more on a baking sheet), or use a seasoned 10-12 inch cast iron skillet (no need to preheat the cast iron unless you want to), or grease a 9-10 inch cake pan or pie dish. You can also use a 5 quart (or higher) dutch oven. Grease or line with parchment paper. If using a dutch oven, bake the bread with the lid off.
- Whisk the buttermilk and egg together. Set aside. Whisk the flour, granulated sugar, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl. Cut in the butter using a pastry cutter, a fork, or your fingers. Mixture is very heavy on the flour, but do your best to cut in the butter until the butter is pea-sized crumbs. Stir in the raisins. Pour in the buttermilk/egg mixture. Gently fold the dough together until dough it is too stiff to stir. Pour crumbly dough onto a lightly floured work surface. With floured hands, work the dough into a ball as best you can, then knead for about 30 seconds or until all the flour is moistened. If the dough is too sticky, add a little more flour.
- Transfer the dough to the prepared skillet/pan. Using a very sharp knife or bread lame, score the dough with a slash or X about 1/2 inch deep. (“Score” = shallow cut.)
- Bake until the bread is golden brown and center appears cooked through, about 45-55 minutes. Loosely tent the bread with aluminum foil if you notice heavy browning on top. For a more accurate test, the bread is done when an instant-read thermometer reads the center of the loaf as 195°F (90°C).
- Remove from the oven and allow bread to cool for 10 minutes, and then transfer to a wire rack. Serve warm, at room temperature, or toasted with desired toppings/spreads.
- Cover and store leftover bread at room temperature for up to 2 days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week. We usually wrap it tightly in aluminum foil for storing.
Notes
- Freezing Instructions: Baked and cooled bread freezes well up to 3 months. Freeze the whole loaf or individual slices. Thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature, then reheat as desired.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Cast Iron Skillet, 9-inch Round Cake Pan, 9-inch Pie Dish, Dutch Oven, or Baking Sheet with Silicone Baking Mat or Parchment Paper | Glass Mixing Bowl | Whisk | Pastry Cutter | Bread Lame | Instant-Read Thermometer
- Baking Pan: There are options for the baking pan (see Special Tools Note above). You can use a lined large baking sheet (with or without a rim), a seasoned 10-12 inch cast iron skillet, or a greased or lined 9-10 inch cake pan or pie dish. I don’t recommend a loaf pan because the loaf may not bake evenly inside. This dough is best as a flatter loaf.
- Buttermilk: Using cold buttermilk is best. Buttermilk is key to the bread’s flavor, texture, and rise. The bread will not rise without it. If you don’t have any buttermilk on hand, you can make a homemade buttermilk substitute. Whole milk or 2% milk is best, though lower fat or nondairy milks work in a pinch. Add 1 Tablespoon of lemon juice or white vinegar to a liquid measuring cup. Add enough cold milk to make 1 and 3/4 cups. Whisk together, then let sit for 5 minutes before using in the recipe.
- Egg: 1 egg adds richness and density. Feel free to skip it to make a slightly lighter loaf. No other changes necessary, simply leave out the egg.
- Cold Butter: The colder the butter, the less sticky the dough will be. Make sure it’s very cold, even frozen cubed butter is great.
- Smaller Loaves: You can divide this dough up to make smaller loaves. The bake time will be shorter, depending how large the loaves are. An instant read thermometer will be especially helpful. Bake the loaves until an instant-read thermometer reads the center of the loaf as 195°F (90°C).
Reader Comments and Reviews
Is it okay to use caraway seeds in this recipe?
Hi Amanda, caraway seeds are a great addition! Enjoy.
Am I the only one who ends up with a very wet dough if all the milk is used? Like almost a batter consistency?
Am I doing something wrong? I use a scale but I’m stumped.
Hi Amanda, The dough can be sticky. If you make it again, make sure the butter is extra cold. However, there are a lot of variables that go into the consistency – there’s nothing wrong with adding a little more flour to bring the dough together. Thank you for giving it a try!
This bread is fantastic. I made it this morning and I made it in 3 6″ round aluminum foil pans. They came out so pretty. I wanted to make some for my 2 brothers. They are going to love them. Thank you for all your great recipes.
I think something is wrong with the metric conversion, it was sooo wet, I added an enormous amount of extra flour.
Hi Michael, The dough can be sticky. If you make it again, make sure the butter is extra cold. However, there are a lot of variables that go into the consistency – there’s nothing wrong with adding a little more flour to bring the dough into a less sticky and knead-able consistency. Thank you for giving it a try!
Hello from Valencia, Spain. Believe it or not, there´s quite a large Irish immigrant community living here. I made the Soda Bread for a St. Patrick´s Day session sponsored by the Valencia Irish Cultural Association (VICA), and it was the first to go. People really loved it. I made both types, with and without egg. The soda bread with egg was denser, almost scone-like in texture.
Since buttermilk is hard to come by at the stores here (as are a lot of items that are taken for granted elsewhere) I made my own buttermilk substitute with lemon juice, using two table-spoons instead of the suggested 1 tablespoon suggested in the notes. I followed the instructions pretty much to the letter, adding about 1 cup extra of flour in the kneading process before all was said and done, since the dough mixture with the given measurements ended up being very moist to the touch, and too sticky to knead properly.
I preheated the oven along with a deep cast iron skillet that had a cast-iron lid, which in that way could be converted to a Dutch oven. I folded a sheet of baker´s paper into squares to make it easier to line the inside of the skillet with it, then opened up the paper within the skillet, using a wooden spoon to tuck the paper into the crevices of the skillet. I then carefully placed the ball of dough within, making sure not to burn myself in the process. I kept the lid off for the first 15-20 minutes of baking time, until the top of the bread was just golden-brown enough to my liking, and then I put the cast iron lid on for the remainder of the time.
It helped that I have baked many times before, since I have discovered over the years that one has to acquire a feel for the dough to determine readiness in the kneading process. But don´t let this scare beginners. This is an extremely easy recipe, and probably one of the easiest to learn how to bake bread by scratch, without using an automatic bread-maker. For one thing, it only requires one kneading and no waiting time for the dough to rise. I do suggest, however, covering the top of the mixture with tinted foil or by some other means after about 15-20 minutes in the oven, so that it doesn´t brown too much. And yes… use the raisins.
Good luck baking. This recipe was excellent. *****
great recipe for a first time person to try. i used one egg white in the recipe for a binder. thank you!
Hi Sally your recipe for the Irish soda bread sounds awesome and I will definitely give it a try. Can You add caraway seeds and if so how much would you recommend ?
One tablespoon of caraway seeds works for me.
Thank you so much, Sally, for sharing your grandmother‘s wonderful recipe! I have some fresh cranberries and I was wondering if I could use those instead of the raisins? Thank you and happy St. Patrick’s Day!
Hi Janet, yes, absolutely!
Delicious! Made it on a whim last night. How many smaller loaves do you think you could get out of this, 4?
Hi Casey, we haven’t tried making this as mini loaves, so are unsure of the bake time. But if you try it, please let us know how it goes!
I look forward to making this. I haven’t made Irish soda bread in years. The only thing I plan to add is caraway seeds, they are an acquired taste, but my hubby and I love them in Irish soda bread with raisins.
Hi,Sally,just wanna know how many hours of cooling before I can wrap the bread in a bag?
Hi Liza, total cooling time will vary slightly for every person. We’d wait until it is cool to the touch then you can wrap it in a bread bag.
This is my grandmother’s Irish Soda Bread recipe, also. I have been baking this for decades. For me, this epitomizes Irish Soda Bread. It’s delicious warm from the oven slathered with Irish butter, or a real treat toasted and buttered in the morning. My grandma always soaked the raisins first, and as she cut the deep X on the top, she would say, “that’s so the devil can escape”.
Looking forward to
making this recipe of Soda Bread, sounds easy & yummy!
Hi! I love all of your recipes.
I am a FACS teacher and I was wondering if you thought we could make these in muffin tins (so they would cook faster)? Would using a paper wrapper be okay? Thanks!
Hi Dianna, We haven’t tested it, but other bakers have reported success baking individual servings in a muffin tin. We’re unsure about using liners, we would try parchment liners. Let us know if you give it a try!
My all time favorite soda bread. I make it every St. Patrick’s Day
Looking forward to baking this..
do you have a glaze suggestion to top it? my family likes a glazed Irish soda bread. Thank you!
Hi Monica, we haven’t added a glaze, but we imagine the glaze from these hot cross buns would be delicious here!
I love this recipe I make it all the time and I have shared it with all my friends
Can you use whole wheat for part of all of the flour?
Hi Nancy, We don’t recommend whole wheat flour, the bread will be extremely heavy. Feel free to use half whole wheat and half all-purpose, but the bread will still be quite dense. Let us know what you decide to try!
Have you ever made this with currants instead of raisins?
Hi Grandma, yes, we make that substitution often!
We replaced our family recipe with this one a few years ago. This is even better than our family Soda Bread! It has just the right amount of everything! Thank you, Sally! You are the best baker and your site is amazingly easy to use.
This bread was rather tasteless in comparison to other Irish soda bread I’ve made. It needed more salt and was too crumbly to slice.
Perfection! Even though I had to make it gluten-free, this still turned out delightful! No raisins because I didn’t have them, but I’m glad I didn’t use them because of the immense versatility without them (ex: meatloaf sandwich). I forgot the kneading part, but it still worked out. I made great french toast with it too! No weird texture after days of storage in a zipper bag. Thank you so much!
Do you add butter because other recipes don’t use butter for Irish soda bread
Yes, there is butter in this recipe.
I have tried different recipes of Irish Soda bread but your recipe is the most delicious tasty and well made version I’ve ever had . Need to share
Good time making bread.
This recipe is a keeper! Perfectly crunchy on the outside, moist and tender on the inside. Delicious!
Followed the instructions step by step down to the gram. Used the cast iron pan minus the raisins since we are pairing with corned beef and cabbage (just personal preference). Best soda bread I’ve ever had… May be unrelates but all they had at the store was the lowfat buttermilk and it still turned out great. Thank you so much!
We’re so glad you loved this Irish Soda Bread, Josee!
I am Irish now living in England but I made this today in memory of my foster mum as she would make soda bread every Sunday and I loved eating it hot from the griddle. Wow! It turned out beautifully and I wolfed it down with butter from brunch. She would have been proud. A great and easy recipe. I used sultanas instead of raisins- love it
Butter and eggs in Soda bread? Rubbish.
I agree – my grandmother never added butter or eggs to her bread, but she did place pats of butter on top of the loaf when it came out of the oven and wrapped it in foil. Always comes out delicious!
I have my husbands Grandma’s recipe which she brought with her when she crossed the pond from Ireland to USA via Ellis Island at age 17……per her recipe ..we plump the raisens…..and do not knead the dough…what does the kneading do to the texture of the bread?…thanks
Hi Fran, we only knead this dough for about 30 seconds or until all the flour is moistened.