Anyone Can Make Soda Bread—Especially With a Few Pro Tips

The rustic, yeast-free bread is a cinch even for beginner bakers to make. Here are three ways to try.

Traditional Irish soda bread comes together with only three ingredients. Jennifer McGruther

Like corned beef, cabbage, and stout beer, Irish soda bread is bound to grace many American tables this St. Patrick’s Day. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a dense but tender bread with a texture like a cross between a Southern biscuit and a scone.

Soda bread is a simple, no-frills sort of food, and that’s part of its charm. It is plainly made with flour, buttermilk, baking soda, salt, and not much else.

A Quicker Bake

Soda bread first appeared in Irish kitchens about 200 years ago—as a treat for the wealthy. They could afford the luxury of wheat, while poorer people lived on oat cakes (when anything could be had at all).