Tag: raisins

Categories
Bread

These mini Irish loaves are ‘soda’licious

Mini Irish soda bread loaves are easy to make. They feature a crispy crust, pillowy insides and a combo of sweetness from raisins and a light peppery flavor from caraway seeds.
Mini Irish soda bread loaves are easy to make. They feature a crispy crust, pillowy insides and a combo of sweetness from raisins and a light peppery flavor from caraway seeds.

If there was a competition for taking the love of a single recipe to new heights, I think Edward J. O’Dwyer might win.

In doing some quick research about the origins of Irish soda bread, I came upon the website for The Society for the Preservation of Irish Soda Bread, which O’Dwyer runs. It comes complete with links to news references, history and more. If you want to do a really deep dive on Irish soda bread, I highly recommend visiting them at sodabread.info.

As a teaser, soda bread became a staple mostly due to the potato famine in Ireland. Things were really rough for families, and soda bread is cheap to make and doesn’t need yeast, which is why it became increasingly popular.

Most of the time, Irish soda bread is made in large loaves, but I was especially intrigued by a recipe to make mini loaves and decided I had to give it a try.

This comes from Dawn Perry on the Real Simple Magazine website. You can find the original post at https://www.realsimple.com/food-recipes/cooking-tips-techniques/mini-irish-soda-bread. I added extra raisins in my version.

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Mini Irish Soda Bread

Mini Irish soda bread loaves are easy to make. They feature a crispy crust, pillowy insides and a combo of sweetness from raisins and alight peppery flavor from caraway seeds.
Course Side Dish
Cuisine Irish
Keyword caraway seeds, easy bread, Irish bread, mini loaves, no yeast bread, raisins, soda bread

Ingredients

  • 3 cups flour
  • 1/4 cup sugar
  • 3 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 2 cups raisins
  • 1 tablespoon caraway seeds
  • 4 tablespoons butter or margarine melted
  • 1 egg
  • 1 cup buttermilk I used skim milk with a touch of vinegar
  • salted butter softened, for serving

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Line one or two baking sheets with parchment paper, and set them aside.
  • In a large mixing bowl, stir the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt together. Add in the raisins and caraway seeds, and stir to incorporate them into the mix.
  • Add the melted butter, egg and buttermilk. Mix until everything is well combined. (If the dough still has dry spots, even after mixing well, add another cup of buttermilk.)
  • Using a two-inch cookie scoop, scoop out the dough and place the scoops about two inches apart on your prepared baking sheets.
  • Bake for 20 to 25 minute or until the tops of the loaves are golden brown.
  • Serve warm with salted butter and store leftovers in an airtight container.

This is a delicious bread, and the benefit of making the mini, one-serving loaves is that the insides stay pillowy and moist. The outsides are crispy, and the flavor of the bread has a nice combination of sweetness from the raisins and just a light, peppery flavor from the caraway seeds. Adding some salted butter to the warm bread is just the proverbial icing on the cake.

I hope these mini loaves do the traditional recipe justice and would make even Edward J. O’Dwyer a little proud.

According to the society’s website, he is currently working on a history book about the subject. I’ll have to keep that on my radar. I always appreciate someone who takes a good recipe as seriously as I do.

This piece first appeared in print on April 6, 2023.

Spice Up Your Life is a weekly newspaper column written by Lindsey Young in south central Kansas. If you are interested in sponsoring this column, please contact us through the “Contact Lindsey” link at the top of the page.

Categories
Dessert

Vintage recipe will be ‘raisin’ spirits in no time

War cake comes from the era of wartime rationing, when eggs, butter and milk were scarce, but it doesn’t skimp on flavor.
War cake comes from the era of wartime rationing, when eggs, butter and milk were scarce, but it doesn’t skimp on flavor.

Recently, I scrolled through Pinterest—as I often do—looking for recipes that I could try. A picture of a well-worn, yellowed piece of paper caught my eye. It was a handwritten recipe with the words “War Cake” written in a beautiful script across the top of the page.

I was intrigued by it and clicked on the link.

There, on a quilting website, I found a post from Marge Campbell of Littlefield, Texas, who recently used this recipe from her Aunt Almo Duncan Buren.

I’ve always loved history and especially the parts of historical events that don’t end up in textbooks.

War cake is one of those things. Recipes for cake during the World War I and II varied across different communities, but they had the same thing in common: they all use limited fats, limited milk and limited eggs, due to wartime shortages.

Much like depression-era cakes or desserts that people would make when times were rough, war cakes were something people could bake to help make life happier, despite having limited resources.

I read several articles on war cake. Many of the authors mentioned that not only was war cake something to be eaten at home in the States but something that was eaten on the front as well, when families would send care packages to their soldiers overseas.

Considering how dense and moist this cake was when I made it, I could see how it would easily survive the journey to Europe.

That being said, even with no tie to history, this cake is pretty darn good.

I did find it takes a deceivingly long time to make this than other types of cake you may have made before. That is because you make a raisin mixture to start off with that will need to be cooled before you can continue with the rest of the steps. For that reason, some people may have this recipe in their cookbooks as a boiled raisin cake, too.

If you want to see Campbell’s original post and the copy of her aunt’s recipe, you can go to https://www.quiltingboard.com/recipes-f8/war-cake-wwii-recipe-t169745.html. I doubled the spices when I made it and added a lot more raisins.

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War Cake

War cake comes from the era of wartime rationing, when eggs, butter and milk were scarce, but it doesn’t skimp on flavor.
Course Dessert
Keyword brown sugar, cake, cinnamon, raisins, ration recipe

Ingredients

  • 2 cups packed brown sugar
  • 2 cups hot water
  • 2 tablespoons shortening or lard
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 heaping teaspoons cinnamon
  • 2 teaspoons cloves
  • 10 ounces seedless raisins
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda dissolved in 1 teaspoon hot water
  • 3 cups flour

Instructions

  • Begin by bringing the brown sugar, water, shortening, salt, cinnamon, cloves and raisins to a boil. Once it reaches a boil, let it continue to boil for about five minutes, stirring to make sure everything is well combined.
  • Remove the mixture from heat and let it cool completely before continuing to the next step.
  • Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
  • Add the dissolved baking soda and flour to the raisin mixture and stir until completely combined.
  • Divide the mixture evenly between two loaf pans, and bake for about 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
  • Once the cakes are cooled enough to handle, remove them from the pans and cool completely. Cut into squares and store in an airtight container.

I gave quite a bit of this cake away, and it got rave reviews. It’s a simple flavor profile, but I think that’s what makes it so good. It’s one of those desserts that just makes you feel satisfied.

It’s a good reminder that, even in hard times, people find ways to make life happy.

As I enjoyed my first piece of war cake, I imagined all of the different families around the United States who enjoyed the same recipe or ones like it while dealing with so much stress and worry in their lives.

It just goes to show that sometimes a good recipe can make us forget about our troubles for a while.

This piece first appeared in print on Feb. 8, 2018.

Spice Up Your Life is a weekly newspaper column written by Lindsey Young in south central Kansas. If you are interested in sponsoring this column, please contact us through the “Contact Lindsey” link at the top of the page.

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