The History of Irish Soda Bread.

If you thought that soda bread was Irish then you would be wrong. It appears that honour belongs to the First Nation Indians on the American continent who used soda ash in baking their bread. Now we have made it our own and it has become known as Irish Soda Bread. This turn of events was brought about by poverty for the use of soft wheat flour and bicarbonate of soda was ideal for making what was then known as ‘Quick bread’ getting it to the table a lot faster than yeast based bread. In1908 2/3rds of the flour used in Ireland was soft wheat from the U.S. 90% of the flour used in Belfast and 80% of the flour used in Dublin was soft wheat

In 1850 it was reported that during the failure of the potato a large amount of bicarbonate of soda was used by the poor in the preparation of bread. This resulted in a shortage of bicarbonate of soda and unscrupulous dealers rose their prices accordingly. Crooked dealers also sold substitutes for bicarbonate of soda that caused many deaths.

In 1835 pre-packed ‘Royal Baking Powder’ was introduced. This combined bicarbonate of soda with cream of tartar to create the acid/alkali combination resulting in the release of carbon dioxide gas this in turn causes the bread to rise. It was introduced in baking around 1840, how it was first introduced is still unsure.

Sour milk was used in the making of soda bread in Ireland in the early years, a great way of using up something that would be normally thrown out.  However, buttermilk is used today. If you wish you can now buy a buttermilk powder that you just add to water.

Before baking your loaf, cut a cross on the top with a sharp knife. This is said to ward off the devil and protect the household , in reality it allows the bread to heat right through.  The shape of the loaf can differ depending on where you live. In the Southern part of Ireland it is shaped and baked as a round loaf with the cross marked on the top. In the Northern part of the Island it is flattened into a round disc and then divided into four equal triangular shapes. Each is then cooked on a flat griddle.

Bread making formed an important part of daily life within an Irish household. Most families lived in isolated farmhouses and with kitchens that had an open fireplace and no oven. Bread was baked on griddles or three legged black iron pots (Dutch ovens), hung on a crane over a turf fire. Due to the fact that the pot had three legs you could place it directly onto the hot embers, place a few hot embers onto its lid and here it would bake. You ended up with a lovely loaf that was tender and dense with a hard crust and a sour, tangy taste.

In our house n south Mayo soda bread was called farl, (pronounced farel).  The word derives from the Gaelic Fardel which literally means ‘four parts’ and this refers to the way you cut the cross into the top and when the bread is cut into four quarters when baked.

When the bread has been cooked it is wrapped in a clean tea towel until it has cooled down and this keeps the crust soft. Unless of course you eat it straight away. All that’s left to add is fresh butter, jam, and a nice mug of tea. On a cold spring equinox day like today, freezing wind and biting cold rain. A nice slice of farl with a hot mug of tea is just right. Keep smiling and don't forget the jam.

Source:www.sodabread.info/sodabreadhistory

 

Thomas Harriot.

THOMAS HARRIOT – THE TRUE DISCOVERER OF THE POTATO

Spare a thought for poor old Thomas Harriot, the sometime Waterford resident who actually brought the first potato back to Europe only to have his thunder stolen by Sir Walter Raleigh.

Born in 1560 in England, Thomas Harriot was considered by his peers to be the most brilliant mathematician of the Elizabethan Age, and in 1577, he went to Oxford University where he met and befriended Raleigh, eight years his senior and already rising steadily through the English hierarchy. The two men hit it off from the outset and Harriot subsequently became Raleigh's most trusted friend and also his accountant.

Over the next six years, Raleigh established his reputation as one of England’s great heroes, principally by stealing large cargos of gold and silver from luckless Spanish ships that came his way. Raleigh’s power base was in Ireland where he first made his name crushing Irish Catholic rebels during the Desmond Wars. By 1586, the Royal favourite had secured ownership of a whopping 42,000 acres of Munster, forfeited by the rebel Earl of Desmond. Much of this vast estate ran along the fertile River Blackwater, culminating in the walled town of Youghal of which Raleigh became Mayor in 1588. His home in Youghal was Myrtle Grove and still stands today.

It is here that he is said to have planted the first potatoes in Europe.

That may well be true but Raleigh would not have had any potato seeds at all were it not for his aforementioned friend, Thomas Hariot.

In 1584, a Raleigh-sponsored expedition returned from North America with two 'lusty savages' on board. These men were called Manteo and Wanchese and came from an island, apparently called 'Wingandacoa', off North Carolina. Harriot spent a phenomenal amount of time with the two Native Americans, learning their ways and mastering their language. One of the first things he learned was that 'Wingandaco’ simply meant 'You have nice clothes' - one of the foremost examples of positive race relations in early American history.

Utterly fascinated by the pair, the following year 25-year-old Harriot decided to brave the journey across the Atlantic and accompany Manteo and Wanchese back to the New World. They sailed with Sir Richard Grenville who was planning to establish England’s first colony at Roanoke in Virginia. Raleigh was longing to go too but his Queen had by now fallen in love with him and insisted he stayed close to hand.

Shortly after arriving at Roanoke, Harriot and his friend John White set off with Manteo deep into Native American territory. They wintered together by Chesapeake Bay for three months, surveying the territory by day, sleeping rough at night. Harriot described the bay as a 'paradise of the world', full of 'merchantable commodities' and edible fruits, fowls and animals, including a 'multitude of bears being an excellent good victual'.

Harriot and White befriended the natives, Iroquois and Algonquin alike. The tribesmen were much impressed with Harriot's game-on attitude and his quick mastery of their language. During his stay, Harriott came upon two particularly interesting ‘merchantable’ goods - openauk and uppowoc, otherwise known as potatoes and tobacco. He later described how the Indians dried and powdered the tobacco leaves, then smoked them in their pipes. Smoking, he suggested, was a perfect way to purge 'superfluous phlegm and other gross humours' from the body.

However, news emanating from Roanoke did not bode well for the Englishmen. Tensions between the English colonists and the indigenous natives had erupted in violence and bloodshed. Grenville was calling off the expedition and heading home. Harriot was furious. Those who spoke loudest of Indian treachery, he maintained, had never even left the fort. Harriot and White reluctantly bade their Chesapeke friends farewell and made it back in time to catch the last ship to England. Of those Englishmen who remained at Roanoke after their departure there is no further record. Nor do we know what became of Manteo or Wanchese.

As their ship bounced across the Atlantic, Harriot wrote notes, juggled potatoes and sniffed tobacco. Once back in London, he went to Raleigh with his findings. Raleigh quickly made his way to Queen Elizabeth and showed her the goods. She tried a puff of tobacco from his trademark silver pipe but the effect made her queasy. The Royal Court ooohed and aaahed at Sir Walter’s amazing finds and so, of course, it passed into legend that he personally ‘discovered’ both the potato and tobacco.

Harriot complied his memories into 'A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia', published in 1588 and swiftly translated into Latin, French and German. The paper was something of a propaganda piece, designed to reassure investors and possible settlers that all was not lost. It was written at Molana Abbey, a stunning abbey which still stands today, albeit crumbling fast, upon the banks of the River Blackwater, close to Raleigh’s home in Youghal. The report was illustrated by a series of evocative drawings by John White, who lived at Newtown, Kilmore, Co. Cork.

Harriott went on to become part of a curious intellectual circle, known as the School of Night, obsessed by the occult. This high-profile group, which included both Marlowe and Shakespeare, occasionally met at Molana. Its chief organizer, the Wizard Earl of Northumberland, was later imprisoned for life for supporting Guy Fawkes. Raleigh was also tried for treason and eventually executed in 1618. In his will, he left Harriot a generous pension and all his 'black suites of apparel'. Harriot himself was condemned as an atheist and homosexual. He narrowly escaped execution and died in 1621.

Harriott passed into historical obscurity. His ghost may take heart, however, from the knowledge that 400 years later, the merchantable good he happened upon in Chesapeke is the world’s number one non-grain food commodity, with annual production exceeding 325 million tons.

Even if Raleigh did get all the credit.


Courtesy of: www.turtlebunbury.com/history/history_irish/history_irish_harriott.

Top image: Sir Walter Raliegh.
Middle image: Thomas Harriot.
Bottom image: An Irish potato.

The rural value of eggs.

Years ago the humble egg was a very valuable part of the rural economy of Ireland.

Every farmyard was home to a few chickens and ducks and maybe a couple of geese and we collected their eggs every day, not to eat but to sell. We would put them into straw baskets usually home made during those long winter evenings and they would be taken to the local shopkeeper who would buy them. This money was then spent in the shop on groceries for the week. Sometimes the eggs would be tested by putting them into a basin of water.

In the bigger towns when all the eggs were tested, sorted and placed into boxes they were loaded into a lorry for transportation to Dublin and from there they would be shipped over the water to England. At one time there were weekly markets in every town in Ireland. Eggs would be taken to the market and sol to the local people. Hen and Duck eggs and sometimes Goose eggs provide a good meal for the breakfast with a slice of soda bread and homemade butter a strong cup of tea and you were set up for the day.

It was always looked upon as the job of the women of the house, with the help of the older children to look after the poultry and if you were lucky enough to have them, calves and pigs as well and any egg money that was saved was used to buy the little extras that may be needed in the household as well as the normal weekly supply’s. In days gone by the selling of eggs belonged to the era when the women of the rural areas would sell not only eggs but any surplus vegetables and butter to the local shop or market in the square and this provided a link between the town people and the country people.

Nowadays more and more people are keeping the backyard hens, ducks and sometimes geese. Growing your own fruit and vegetables and a few herbs is no longer just the play thing of a few as for some it is becoming a way to supplement the family larder. At one time you would only see chickens running round the farmyard but now they can be seen in peoples gardens housed in little arcs, providing a fresh egg every morning.

In some ways its therapy, in other ways a commitment to lifestyle but in every way it is a reconnection to our past and in a small way our heritage.

Here is a recipe for Soda bread or as we call it at home Farl. It used to be baked in a pot oven when hot turf was placed on the lid to help it cook or on a griddle.

You can add in a handful of raisins or seeds to make it a little different on occasion and in some areas people fry it in bacon fat (a little unhealthy these days but it warmed up the visitor).

Soda Bread

(Makes 1 large or 2 small loaves)

Ingredients.

574g/ 4 cups (1.25 lbs. plain flour sieved).

1/2 teaspoon bread soda.

15 fl oz (1/2 to 3/4 pt buttermilk) or sour milk.

1/2 teaspoon salt.

1 egg.

Small drop of fresh milk.

1 rounded teaspoon Bextartar (raising agent).

25g/loz. sugar.

Method.

1. Heat the pot/oven and grease with a little lard.

2. Mix all the dry ingredients in a basin and make a well in the centre.

3. Pour in nearly all the milk and egg; gather in the flour and mix to a loose dough, adding more milk if necessary.

4. With floured hands, knead lightly on a floured board or table and flatten out. Cut a cross on top, this lets out the faeries. It also divides the farl into four.

5. Bake in a greased round tin or pyrex dish with a lid, pre-heat the oven (425f, 220c or Gas mark 7 for 40 minutes).


To keep the bread soft, wrap in a clean damp tea towel when it is taken out of the oven.

Start cooking the rashers , eggs, sausage, white pudding, etc. Now spread a bit of home made butter onto the warm bread add a mug of strong tea and you are set up for the day. Of course the people who are very healthy will say its a heart attack on a plate and have a croissant and a cup of water (god love them) but this is what we call an Irish breakfast. Ye can't cut turf on a French mans croissant.