Loafing Off — What The Farm?

Our farm kitchen is a wide-open space, built to handle crowds, to welcome folks in to cook and eat together. A few years ago, just before St. Patrick’s Day, it was covered in flour, butter and raisins and laughter, for I had invited my three sisters and cousin down to make Irish Soda Bread together.

For those who are not familiar, Irish Soda Bread is like a raisin scone in loaf form. It is best enjoyed right out of the oven, smothered with butter and honey and eaten with a steaming cup of tea. Of course, a turd would taste great covered in melted butter and honey, but this smells way better and feels like an Irish nana’s hug.

My cousin has “the recipe,” handed down to her from her mother, who found it in a parish cookbook eons ago. I imagine it was probably originally penned by a square handed, strong backed Irish mother with a heart shaped, porcelain face and fair, sparkly eyes.

So, there we all were, soaking our raisins, buttering our pans when my one sister wandered away and decided to crack open our favorite beer, Conway’s Irish Ale. After a few sips, she decided to jump in to help. The kitchen soon turned into a snow globe of flour as she ripped open bags of flour willy nilly, darting this way and that, spilling buttermilk across the counter, sending cascades of it onto the floor. We giggled and reprimanded her, cleaning up after her mishaps. “Stop fussing with the flour!” “Leave the bloody raisins alone, for the love of God.” I remember looking at my sister, blinking away the powdery cloud that enveloped us, thinking, “What in the world is going on?” She finally drifted away to finish her beer on the couch, as we continued to putter about it the kitchen, cleaning up her mess as we baked.

It turns out that, unbeknownst to us, my dear sister was in the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s. I look back on that day with bittersweet tears. In its ridiculous comedy and tragedy rolled together, it was so very Irish.

The following year, I tried to continue the “Loaf Off” as Soda Bread Sunday, inviting family to bake soda bread together and donate the loaves to St. Colman Church in Cleveland, my parents’ and grandparents’ parish, home to baptisms, First Communions, marriages, funerals, prayers of thanksgiving and please for help of my large Irish clan for over one hundred years. When one of my many nieces heard about the event, she gushed, “Of course I’m coming! I wouldn’t miss this tradition for anything!” One year in, it was hardly a “tradition,” but I had to loved her enthusiasm.

My esteemed cousin, we’ll call her “Mary” (because every Irish Catholic family has at least one of those), owner of “the recipe” taught us the key to baking a successful loaf involves soaking the raisins beforehand, cutting the butter into the flour, and paying attention not to overfill the loaf pans. That last point is important. Just ask my local fire department. They were unanticipated visitors to our Loaf Off a couple of years ago after a few loaves were inadvertently overfilled. As they rose, gewy wet batter spilled over onto the bottom of the oven and quickly burned, sending billows of smoke out of the oven as we peeked in to check on their progress. The kitchen full of women scattered into action, screaming, hurriedly opening windows, turning on the exhaust fan, swatting the smoke away from the smoke alarm, shouting expletives and obscenities that would make a leprechaun blush ... to no avail. In no time at all, we were visited by a hook and ladder with full-suited, handsome firefighters. “No worries, gentlemen!” my sister shouted out the front door. “It’s just Irish cooking!” We tried to pay them for their troubles with fresh soda bread loaves, but after taking in the scene of middle aged, pasty-faced screaming women covered in flour, they declined.

This March of 2020, just before the whole world turned upside down and then stopped still, my kitchen was full to the brim with sisters, nieces, grand-nieces, a grand-nephew, cousins, a nephew and a dear friend. At one point there were about fifteen people in the kitchen, soaking raisins, filling loaf pans, stirring wet mix into dry mix, cracking eggs ... it was chaos. Not “controlled chaos,” just straight-up chaos. I was cleaning layers of butter and flour off my counter for days.

We ended up with eighty-five soda bread loaves, wrapped and ready to sell at the church charity. I know legions of cousins across Cleveland who have dozens in their freezers as well. While I gave away some of ours to neighbors and friends, most remain frozen until further notice.

In these coming days of stillness, that freezer full of soda bread baked with love, laughter, butter, buttermilk and yes, chaos, is comforting. As my daughters stream home from the east coast to join in the “hunkering down,” that soda bread will hold down the house, like ballast in a grand Irish ship steaming through the choppy waters ahead.

I am already making plans for next year, but rethinking it. Yes, we will have Soda Bread Sunday, but everyone will make their own loaves at home. No Loaf Off. We will gather with a few loaves, make a pot of hot tea. I’ll cut the loaves, slather the slices in butter and honey and we’ll all sit down for a good Irish visit. No flying flour, no sticky countertops ... we will just be together. In these days of stillness and isolation, I realize that just that – being together -- is an Irish blessing fit for the season.

Slainte!

MARIE CONWAY BEIRNE’S RECIPE FOR IRISH SODA BREAD

The recipe makes 2-3 loaves, depending on pan size.

Preheat oven 350 degrees

6 cups flour

1/2 to 3/4 cup of sugar

3 tsp baking powder

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 tsp salt

4 TBSP of butter... cut into flour or work in with your fingers

1 box (2 1/2 cups) raisins....be sure to soak them first in warm water and drain well.

4 cups of buttermilk