Hargadon’s Brown Bread

I made my own soda bread awhile back and it was brilliant. I was amazed that something so simple and easy to make could be so delicious. Then I made it with Odlum’s coarse wholemeal flour.  Predictably, it was even better.

I used a recipe that was given to my brother-in-law by a customer.  The recipe included her personal baking notes. I followed the recipe as altered by the notes.  Except that I didn’t bake it in a loaf pan because I was hungry and thought that it would be done quicker if I just shaped and baked it on a sheet pan. It still took 45 minutes but it was so worth it.  It reminded me why most soda bread in Ireland is made from this type of flour. More flavor, better texture.  Although not traditional, I sprinkled the loaf with poppy seeds before putting it in the oven.  

Once the bread was done, I immediately ate a huge hunk for lunch along with some Irish cheddar, a hard boiled egg and some tomato jam. It was the perfect simple lunch. I ate some later with peach-apricot jam from this little gem right across the way from Paddy's, creme fraiche and a cup of tea.  

Of course I had to look up Hargadon’s after tasting this bread credited to it.  According to www.goodfoodireland.ie

 Back in the mid 1800’s, when this pub first opened, Hargadons was a well-loved, local hostelry with a truly unique quality. Despite the prevalence of music bars and the myriad traditional musicians in the country, Hargadons remained a ‘quiet’ bar, devoid of music and dedicated to its position as a genuine sanctuary. This policy remained in situ until fairly recent times and despite it being relaxed in the last years, it remains free of television and devoted to conversation, story telling and of course good food. The pub has been at the heart of Sligo life for over one hundred and fifty years and despite being closed for some of them, has recently returned to its rightful place, close to the heart of Sligo folk and visitors. 

It sounds like the kind of place where this bread must have originated.

If you are baking this, you must make sure to preheat your oven before you start to get your ingredients together.  This bread comes together so fast that if you don’t, you will be waiting for your oven - not the worst problem to have.

Hargadon’s Brown Bread  

• 3 cups coarse wholemeal flour
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon salt
• ⅓ cup sugar
• 1 ¼ cup buttermilk
• 2 large eggs

Preheat your oven to 375F.

Mix all of the dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl.

Beat the eggs and the buttermilk together in a small bowl.

Create a well in your dry ingredients and pour the buttermilk-egg mixture in.

Using a wooden spoon, or your hands (I found it was easiest to use my hands and that no additional buttermilk was necessary) mix the dry and wet ingredients until no dry flour remains.

Shape the dough into a round on a greased sheet pan and cut an X across the top. The X should go about ⅔ of the way deep into the loaf.

Top with poppy seeds (optional).

Bake for about 45 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.

Cut off a hot slice, slather with salted butter and enjoy.

My lunch date. She's getting so big and talkative. 

Rachel Allen’s Brown Scones with Black Treacle

Having four kids under the age of 5 requires a lot of energy in every sense of the word.  This includes energy in the form of calories.  If I wasn’t before, I am now (justifiably, I think) ALWAYS hungry.  Now that the enormous quantities of Christmas cookies, brioche and other forms of simple carbs in my house have been successfully annihilated, I’m turning to something simple and a little more healthy for the energy (and carbs) I both need and crave. A touch more decadent than a simple brown soda bread, I discovered the recipe for these scones by Rachel Allen in her book Bake.

I cannot say enough about the virtues of baking with Coarse Wholemeal Flour. The taste and texture it gives to baked goods is like nothing else. It has a warm, nuttiness, almost like almond flour, though it bakes up lighter and more moist than any nut flour.  The texture is coarse but unlike most other coarse flours, it is unevenly so, which gives it an unmistakable consistency. I got two bags of the good stuff from Paddy’s over the holidays which came in handy when I woke up one morning wanting a warm brown scone.

See what I mean about the texture?

These scones are fabulous.  I made them on a school day in about 30 minutes all in (washing up included)! I love that they only have 2 tablespoons of butter in them and just one tablespoon of sweetener.  I still don’t understand how they taste so good but they do. I probably wouldn’t have tried these if the recipe came from someone other than Rachel Allen, my secret best friend. She proves that time and time again, simple totally works. I didn’t have any sesame seeds but I did add a small amount of cardamom, which I strongly recommend if you like cardamom. I sprinkled them with sea salt and coarse sugar before baking which was also a very good idea, if I do say so myself.  I loved the salty, sweet crunch it gave each one.

Try this! Please! You can find coarse wholemeal flour at Paddy’s on the Square, or you can stop by my house and I’ll give you a couple of cups if that’s what I have to do to convince you that you need this in your pantry. Seriously. You do.

Rachel Allen’s Brown Scones with Black Treacle

Adapted ever so slightly from Rachel Allen's recipe that can be found here

Ingredients

• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting

• 1 ½ cups coarse wholemeal flour

• 1 tsp salt

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 2 tablespoons sesame seeds, plus extra for sprinkling (optional)*

• 2 tablespoons butter, diced

• 1 egg

• 1 ¼  cups buttermilk or soured milk (add 2 tsp vinegar or lemon juice to 1 ¼ cup cow’s milk or soy or rice milk and leave to stand for 10–15 minutes)

• 1 tablespoon black treacle (or dark molasses)

• Sea salt and coarse sugar for sprinkling on top

*I didn’t have any sesame seeds but added a ½ teaspoon of cardamom, because I love it.

Method

• Preheat the oven to 425°F. Dust a baking sheet with flour.

• Put the wholemeal, all-purpose flour and salt into a large bowl. Sift in the baking soda.

• Using your fingertips, rub in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs.

• In a separate bowl, whisk the egg with the buttermilk or soured milk, then stir in the treacle (or molasses) and pour most of the liquid into the dry ingredients. Using one hand with your fingers held out like a claw, mix in full circles to bring the flour and liquid together, adding more liquid if necessary. The dough should be quite soft, but not too sticky.

• Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured work surface and gently bring it together into a ball, but without kneading it, then flatten it slightly to about an inch high. Cut the dough into 10–12 square or round scones. Brush the tops of the scones with any leftover liquid and sprinkle with some sea salt or coarse sugar (I used a combination of the two)

• Put the scones onto the prepared baking sheet and pop in the oven to bake for 15–20 minutes (depending on the size of the scones). Have a look at them after 10 minutes: if they’re already a deep golden brown, then turn the heat  to 400°F, for the remainder of the cooking time. When cooked they should sound hollow when tapped on the base.

• Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

What to do with leftovers: Shepherd's Pie

We’ve been hosting the Holiday’s ever since we moved into our house in 2012. This is mostly because we’ve got the little ones and it’s easier for us not to have to load everyone (and all of the stuff - diapers, wipes, changes of clothes, sippy cups etc.) into the car and try to figure out naps at someone else’s house.  I love having everyone over and the rest of the family does too.  I’m sure I make a better host than a guest, because I’m incapable of sitting down for very long and enjoy being busy in the kitchen, content just listening to the happy squeals of the children playing with our family and friends.

Although I try to send people home with leftovers, hosting means that we end up with most of them.  While I could fix myself the exact same plate over and over again and be in heaven, Paul gets tired of leftovers after about one meal. This presents a problem, since I am the self-proclaimed the food waste police.

Fortunately, probably in anticipation of me forcing the entire family to eat nothing but leftovers for a week, Paul solved this little problem by picking up a packet of Shepherd’s pie mix when we were at Paddy’s the day before Christmas. I had actually never made a Shepherd’s pie before, but sure enough, after a lunch of leftovers, Paul mentioned that we might want to use the rest of the leftover mashed potatoes to make one that night. At first I resisted, feeling like it was too early not to eat another few plates of Christmas dinner.  But, after realizing what short work the kids had already made of the leftover Irish bacon, I acquiesced.  Marriage is, after all, about compromise (and Paul was at least willing to eat the leftover potatoes again).

I thought there was a pound of ground beef in the freezer but we only had half a pound. This actually worked out perfectly because we were working with a limited amount of leftover mashed potatoes anyway. I added a bit of volume to the filling but throwing in some celery, garlic, carrots and peas to supplement the meager about of beef we had.

I’ve never made Shepherd’s pie before.  Granted, this one was made with leftovers and a mix, but boy was it simple. Here’s how we did it: 

• First we preheated the oven to 400F.
• Then we sauteed garlic, an onion, carrots and celery in a pan until they were soft but not browned.  

• Then we added the ground beef, breaking it up into small bits until the meat was cooked through.
• To this we added some frozen peas, tossing them with the meat and other vegetables until they just warmed through.
• Because we were using a small amount of meat, we added approximately half of the Shepherd’s pie packet to about ⅔ cup of water and stirred.
• We then added the water and seasoning mix to our meat mixture and brought the whole thing to a simmer before turning the heat off.  
• We poured the mixture to an oven proof dish and covered it with a layer of our leftover mashed potatoes.

• I decorated the top with the tines of a fork, per Paul’s instructions, dotted the top with some butter and put into the oven for 30 minutes.
• By then it was all bubbly and starting to make the house smell delicious.

The only thing I would do over again is broil the top for a few minutes to brown it a bit more.

I’m already thinking about how to make an another version of this with leftover turkey, green beans, carrots and bechamel.

 Who knew compromise, and leftovers, could taste so good?