mmm bread

so i've been wanting to make bread lately, but i'm too lazy to go get yeast and then worry about whether or not the yeast is bad if my bread doesn't come out as expected. enter: irish brown bread. apparently the authentic version of irish soda bread, this bread doesn't involve yeast, only requires fifteen minutes to throw together (including pulling ingredients off shelves), and is full of whole wheat goodness. the recipe i used comes from the lovely blog kiss my spatula, and can be found here. it was a good recipe for my first attempt at bread. it came out a little on the crumbly side, but still had great flavor and was very easy (and not time consuming) to make.

my version:

preheat oven to 350.

3 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

4 tbsp cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes

1/2 cup old fashioned oats

1 1/3 cups whole milk

1/3 cup apple-cider vinegar

put the milk and apple cider vinegar together in a bowl and let sit for 10-15 min, until the milk is thickened [you can also use storebought buttermilk. i used low-fat milk and it came out just fine]. mix the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda together in a large bowl. cut in the butter with a pastry cutter or two forks until the mixture resembles coarse meal. stir in oats [the recipe called for finely ground oats, but i only had regular quaker oats. if i had to do it again i'd buy the finely ground oats because i think the size of the oats might have made the bread more crumbly when baked]. pour in the thickened milk and mix until the dough just sticks together. knead the dough 4-5 times on a lightly floured surface. shape the dough gently into a round loaf, roughly 6in in diameter. place on a baking sheet covered in parchment paper, and cut an x into the top of the loaf with a sharp knife. bake, rotating halfway through, until the top is golden brown and a tester inserted in the middle comes out clean, approximately 45-60 min.

a few more tips:

• don't use salted butter. i cut out a half tsp of salt from the recipe, and even using unsalted butter i found the bread a bit salty. (and i like salt.)
• the bread cooked much faster in my oven than the 1 hour stated in the recipe, make sure to monitor your bread starting at 40 min into baking.

it's a very hearty bread, very delicious, and extremely easy to throw together. i'll be making this again soon, and hopefully will be able to correct the crumblyness of the bread.