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
Divided dough in half and put chopped prunes in one half per hubby’s request when I found no raisins. Bringing to my 93 year old Irish mom today. First time we can finally visit her!!! ( senior living .)
As an Italian woman born on St Paddy’s Day ( like your grandmother!), I am always searching for the perfect soda bread recipe. Can’t wait to try yours!
This was my first time making Irish Soda Bread and I will ALWAYS use this recipe. So moist and delicious!! My family ate most of it so I will have to make another for St Patrick’s Day!!
Best tasting soda bread recipe I’ve tried and there has been many. Great instructions and it was helpful to see the video to understand the texture of the dough. Thanks Sally and your grandmother. We’re glad to have a delicious and easy soda bread recipe now.
I love a good Irish Soda Bread, but I haven’t found a recipe that I like – most are too dry for my liking. I’m a sucker for a recipe from someone’s Grandma, so I quickly got to work making this recipe. Instructions were clear. I used the egg and baked it in my old cast iron skillet. This is the best recipe I have found for Irish Soda Bread and will treasure it for years to come! Thanks.
So today I made 3! loaves! Yes I was determined to make this recipe. I am sending 2 loaves to my son and his family, fingers crossed via UPS for St Patrick’s day. So we just tasted our loaf…wonderful!!! I was anxious about making this despite the great encouragement Sally provides in the description BUT I am not the most confident baker. However, this recipe is a keeper, delicious, not too sweet, fantastic crust; such a lovely surprise to have it come out great. Thank you Sally and homage to your Grandmother! Chris
Wow, this is fabulous! Just pulled it out of the oven and we’ve already eaten 1/4 of the loaf. It’s delicious. Took me less than 10 minutes to put together & about 40 minutes to bake (used sheet pan & parchment paper). The dough was so easy to work with and came together nicely (I measured by volume). I used the raisins and egg.
My substitutions based on what I have:
– White whole wheat flour for AP (used a few tablespoons less to compensate for the heavier flour)
– Almond milk & 1 T of lime juice for the buttermilk (can’t taste the lime juice).
Thank you for such an easy and tasty recipe!
Yes! All I had was sweetened vanilla almond milk (which I wasn’t sure would be good) but we thought it worked very well & was delicious. It definitely added a touch of sweetness but we liked that.
This is my go to Irish Soda Bread recipe. It’s delicious. Could this be made in muffin tins for individual servings? As a single person, I usually can’t finish the loaf before it gets stale.
Thank you Sally and your Grandmother for this recipe! I’m going to make it this weekend for a small St Patrick’s Day get together. Looks pretty straightforward and the reviews are wonderful! 🙂
Thank you so much for this perfect recipe, I am not a baker and this bread came out perfect..
I made it without raisins because my grand daughter likes it with out raisins lol.. I love them. It was very easy and tastes great !!! Thank you again
I buy this every year but this year I decided to try making it. I love it! I made mine with raisins and added turbinado sugar to the top (cause we like it that way). This recipe is so great!
I love this bread and buy it every year from the store. This is the first time I’ve made it and I don’t think I’ll go back to store bought. I added turbinado suger to the top of mine. Great recipe!!!
OMG! This is delicious and easy! My birthday is St. Patrick’s Day too! Happy early birthday to your grandma, may she forever rest in peace! This is such a wonderful recipe! Thank you so much for all the amazing things you post on this website! I am a loyal follower forever and ever!
Delicious, used 3 and a quarter small mugs of self raising flour, replaced buttermilk with milk mixed with 2 spoonfuls lemon juice, added sultanas in place of raisins, cooked at 180 degrees in fan assisted oven for 50 mins, covered after 40 mins. Absolutely delicious. Thank you for the recipe, will be using it again.
I made this bread today and the texture is perfect! I do like my soda bread on the sweeter side though…do you think I could add sugar to the recipe without it changing up the texture too much?
Hi Mary! Feel free to add extra sugar if you’d like it sweeter.
Just wanted to note that flour is different than most dry ingredients. You must be careful because it packs so easily then you get more than you need in your recipe. That is why the original recipe explained how to measure flour. Do not shake it down; do not pack it; do not dip cup into bag of flour. It will pack the flour down even if just a little. Try it for yourself. Shake 1 cup & see the flour will settle put more in , shake again, may settle again & again. Test all methods I mentioned then weigh them. See the difference. Back in the day we used only dry weight when using flour in our recipes. Very accurate. Especially for bread. It is the pickiest . P.S. Always pack brown sugar.
Absolutely awesome recipe. It is impossible to stop eating this bread. Thank you so much!
Totally fabulous soda bread! I made this without the raisins and it’s was absolutely perfect. It paired well with our St. Patrick’s Day meal and was so tasty with Kerrygold butter and homemade raspberry jam.
Delicious! I rarely follow a recipe exactly, but I guess I’ve been cooking long enough that I recognize when I need to make changes. I followed the recipe, but didn’t use raisins, although I would have loved it. The bread turned out perfectly, and was devoured by my family. It’s so good! I didn’t weigh anything, it just measured it out. I didn’t have buttermilk, so I used milk with lemon juice. I also used a 10 inch cast iron skillet. The bread was crusty on the outside and soft and moist on the inside.
This was excellent! I did exactly as instructed and only added mixed dried fruit instead of raisins because it’s what I had. My whole family loved it.
This bread was scrumptious. I didn’t use all the liquid as the dough was getting too sticky, held back about 90 mls.
It is very simple. I baked it at 205degrees c. and covered the top with silicone baking sheet half way through.
Outstanding in every way .
I followed measurements exactly and measured in grams not cups.
I did not have buttermilk so used suggested lemon juice mixed with milk. Seemed to work well
Great taste and texture and aroma a really authentic Irish recipe and the best keeping quality of any soda bread I have made. This is a keeper.
My mom used to make it all the time. My kids and I were very happy with the recipe and I didn’t have buttermilk the first time so I had to use the milk and vinegar alternative. It was delicious! This batch I am making with buttermilk and can’t wait for the outcome! I have saved this recipe and will continue to use it.
Hi Sally
i made this with 1/2 while meal wheat and 1/2 besan flour plus had to make the DIY buttermilk and used less sugar it was perfect crust ,divine – just like childhood
I’ve made this recipe several times and love it! I cut it down to 1/3 of the recipe and it turns out like a giant scone (perfect for a single family to eat at dinner while it’s still warm).
Made this today to go with my new years corned beef and cabbage dinner. It turned out great and is completely yummy. Thank you.
Great recipe!! Thank you so much for sharing! I did not add the raisins, only because I did not have them on hand. I added wholewheat ground flour 1 1/4 cup to the white flour to make the same total of 4 1/4 cup.
Dear Sally:
Thank you for this wonderful recipe. This is my first time making Irish Soda Bread. I used currants instead of raisins as I am not raisin fan. I baked it in my Italian grandmother’s skillet. The bread turned out perfectly golden brown. The crust was perfect and the bread was not heavy, I don’t know why I thought it would be, but it wasn’t at all. My Irish Grandmother would be pleased.
Hi
I’m not sure why some people are having a problem with this recipe, I’ve just followed the recipe (apart from adding a bit of spelt flour and using sultanas instead of raisins and adding a few chopped walnuts !) and it turned out perfect. The quantities given were absolutely fine. Just wanted to reassure anyone who may have been put off. I’ve book marked it and will definitely use it again. It’s great that people out there are kindly sharing good stuff. Thanks Sally
Hi Sally. Can I use bread flour instead of all purpose flour? I need to use up 2 bags of bread flour within a month and I wanna try a no yeast bread recipe like this.
Hi Cathy! You can. Your bread will be slightly chewier.