Brown Soda Bread With Oats
Updated August 15, 2022
Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times
- Total Time
- 1 hour
- Rating
- Comments
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Ingredients
Soft butter for the bread pan
125 grams (approximately 1 cup) whole-wheat flour
62 grams (approximately ½ cup) unbleached all-purpose or bread flour
25 grams (2 rounded tablespoons) steel-cut oats, either regular or quick-cooking
40 grams (approximately ⅓ cup) rolled oats
8 grams (approximately 2 teaspoons, tightly packed) brown sugar
3.5 grams (½ teaspoon) salt
10 grams (2 teaspoons) baking soda, sifted
290 grams (approximately 1 ¼ cups) buttermilk
Nutritional analysis per serving
34 grams carbs; 5 milligrams cholesterol; 182 calories; 1 gram monosaturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 3 grams fat; 3 grams fiber; 530 milligrams sodium; 7 grams protein; 4 grams sugar
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
- Step 1
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter an 8 ½ x 4 ½ x 2 ½-inch bread pan.
- Step 2
In a large bowl, mix together flours, steel-cut oats, rolled oats, brown sugar, salt and sifted baking soda. Mix well with your hands.
- Step 3
Make a well in the center of flour mixture. Pour in buttermilk. Working from the center of the bowl in concentric clockwise circles, with fingers outstretched, stir buttermilk into flour mixture. (You can use a rubber spatula instead if you don’t like getting dough on your hands.) This should take about a half a minute at most. Dough will be quite moist. Use a rubber spatula to scrape into bread pan and smooth out the dough to fill pan evenly ( the pan will be filled only about halfway.)
- Step 4
Place in the oven and bake 40 minutes, until dark brown and a tester inserted comes out clean. Remove from pan and cool on a rack.
Advance preparation: This keeps for about 4 days and can be frozen.
Private Notes
Comments
Made this as friends were coming over—prep was a flash and it slid right out of the pan. Served with tasty local cheeses and the bread became the main event of the meal. Everyone loved it. Not too sweet or soda-tasting for us! *only had quick-cook oats (sigh) so used those for the 65g of steel-cut/tolled oats and it worked just fine. *made ‘buttermilk’ with 280g whole milk and 10g vinegar.
This makes a delicious loaf, very much like the bread I had in Ireland. You do not need to use 2 teaspoons of baking soda. One teaspoon will be enough and you will not get that odd bitter taste from an excess of soda.
Only use 1 teaspoon of baking soda. As per other recipes. 2 teaspoons will give it a really weird after taste. Just made this and had to chuck it. Remaking with 1 teaspoon.
I made this twice in the last week following the recipe. Served with a choice of butter, cream cheese, cheddar cheese, or a combination. Everyone loved it and we ate the first one in two days, so I had to make it again. It literally can be taken from scratch to the oven in five minutes and the results are first rate. We love that there are just two teaspoons of brown sugar.
Subbed 25 g ground flaxseed for 25 g of the whole wheat flour and added 1/2 C walnuts to boost the omega 3s (next time I will add a full C). Decreased the baking soda to 1 t as others have recommended. The bread was soft and delicious. It's so easy it might become a weekly staple.
I toast the oats in a skillet with butter (very good) as betts recommended, and add a heaping 1/4 cup of raisins to a 1.5x recipe. I use 1 tsp baking soda/1 tsp baking powder. Milk with vinegar for buttermilk. Ran the oven on convection (fan) the first couple of times, mistake, edges got hard. I cut in 12 slices then freeze- take a couple out in the morning, after 20 minutes they're perfect for a light toasting, butter, jam. (BTW, I'm not a baker at all)