This week I am going to share with you my recipe for my Wholemeal Seeded Soda Bread. This is my go to recipe for wholemeal bread. Soda bread made with wholemeal flour has always risen well for me and has a lovely light texture. It also has the advantage of being very quick and easy to make. I have always found wholemeal soda bread to be far more successful than a sour dough wholemeal bread.

High Fibre and Protein Content

Since reading Jessie Inchauspé’s book ‘Glucose Revolution‘ I have been adding seeds to my bread which increases both the fibre and protein content. I use stone ground flour as it retains more of the protein, vitamins, minerals and fat contained in each grain of wheat than flour produced by roller milling.

I added cream of tartar to my recipe as this provides the necessary acid to react with the bicarbonate of soda, so you do not have to use buttermilk or sour milk.

I usually divide my loaf into the four quarters or farls and slice and freeze those I will not use within two days as soda bread does not have the keeping quality of a commercially produced sliced loaf.

Equipment needed to make this Wholemeal Seeded Soda Bread

Apart from the usual kitchen items and tools you will need a cast iron casserole pan – I used an approximately 20cm in diameter / 2 litre / 2 kilograms pan for this recipe but you can use a larger 2.7 litre casserole pan – it will just fill up less of the pan.

Wholemeal Seeded Soda Bread

Recipe by Scones Plus More

0.0 from 0 votes

Course: Breakfast, Brunch, Lunch, SnacksDifficulty: Easy

Prep time

10

minutes

Cooking time

1

hour 

Ingredients

• 1 ½ pounds / 675 grams / 3 cups wholemeal flour

• 1 teaspoon salt

• 1 heaped teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

• 1 heaped teaspoon cream of tartar

• 3 ounces / 85 grams / ⅓ cup pumpkin seeds

• 3 ounces / 85 grams / ⅓ cup sunflower seeds

• 2 ounces / 55 grams / ¼ cup golden linseed

• If you want to use other seeds just use 8 ounces / 225 grams / 1 cup in total of mixed seeds of your choice

• ¾ – 1 pint of full cream milk (or buttermilk or sour milk if you have it)

Directions

• Grease and base line a large cast iron casserole dish and pre-heat your oven to 200°C / 180°C Fan / 390°F / Gas Mark 6.
• Sieve the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and cream of tartar into a large mixing bowl, tipping in any bran left in the sieve.
• Stir in most of the seeds, retaining a handful to sprinkle on the top.
• Mix to a soft dough with the milk.
• Tip out onto a flour working surface and knead very lightly until smooth.
• Shape into a round and place into the casserole. Cut a deep cross in the dough and brush with milk and sprinkle with the remaining seeds.
• Put the lid on the casserole and bake for approximately one hour until well risen and golden brown.
• Remove from the casserole and cool on a wire rack wrapped in a clean tea towel.
• Do not cut until completely cold.
• Slice and spread lavishly with butter and enjoy.

Soda Bread

Memories of my childhood in Northern Ireland have instilled in me a love for soda bread. I remember my grandmother baking White Soda Bread on her old fashioned solid fuel range and going down to breakfast in the morning there would be the delicious smell of fresh soda bread!

If you would like to try some of my other soda bread recipes see below:

As I mentioned above I have tried making sour dough wholemeal bread but gave up due to the brick like texture – if anyone has a wholemeal sour dough recipe that doesn’t produce a hard brick like loaf please let me have it! I have made a wholemeal bread using yeast by the Doris Grant method but found this also rather heavy.

Serving Suggestions for Wholemeal Seeded Soda Bread

My favourite way of serving this bread is spreading a thick layer of cream cheese and topping it with smoked salmon.

It is also excellent toasted – I used it for my Welsh Rarebit recipe. It is also delicious with cheese, cold meats and paté’s and I love it thinly sliced with a boiled egg for breakfast.

Until next time…

Happy baking!

Tanya