Irish Soda Bread

In celebration of St. Patrick's Day this week, I thought the recipe of the week should reflect my Irish heritage. But first a brief history:

My mother grew up on Long Island in one of the first little towns off the Long Island Expressway outside of NYC. My mother's neighborhood was not the American melting pot. Here, it was more like vegetable soup! Everyone clung fiercly to their heritage. Many of my mother's neighbors were first generation Americans. I went to her neighborhood full of tiny/closely spaced houses several years ago and my mom and aunts told us cousins the names of all their neighbors and where they were from (Italians, Poles, Swedes, Germans, Irish, etc.)! This seems so funny to me because where I live, the only ethnicity that people know about each other is, "Born in Texas" or "Not born in Texas"!

All of the tiny houses on Mom's street had families full of kids. My mom and aunts joke that all the neighbor kids wanted to go to their house and play because there were only 4 kids in it!

The Sullivans were the Irish family. In fact, all of my mother's 8 paternal great, great grandparents were born in Ireland! Yes, my grandfather, Francis Joseph Sullivan was definitely Irish! His grandfather's last name was O'Sullivan, but they dropped the "O" when he came through Ellis Island. Both my maternal grandmother and grandfather grew up in Rhode Island but moved to Long Island when my grandfather was transferred there by the Navy (Grampy was a captain in the navy during WW2). They originally lived in Pawtucket, RI because many of the Irish and English immigrants at the time were sponsored by textile companies in New England.

Although my grandmother's side of the family were recent immigrants from England (her grandmother, Elizabeth Ann who I am named after, spoke with an English accent!), many of my grandfather's favorite Irish dishes made there way to her table. One of the recipes was for Irish Soda Bread. My grandmother made this frequently and so did my mother. I will be making it on Friday! It is good with coffee in the mornings!

Sidenote: My dad's ancestors came from Edinburgh, Scotland. Dad, and the rest of us, are huge Scotland lovers. There was always a friendly debate in our house on who has done more for the advancement of civilization, the Irish or the Scots! The book, How the Irish saved Civilization helped Mom's cause quite a bit! ;)

This is my great grandmother's recipe. It is called soda bread because bread was traditionally made with soda rather than yeast in Ireland.

Irish Soda Bread

3 3/4 C. flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
2/3 C sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 C raisins
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
Mix dry ingredients

2 beaten eggs
2 T. butter
2 c buttermilk
Mix wet ingredients

Mix wet and dry ingredients until thick batter.

put in 2 loaf pans or iron skillet
Make the sign of the cross in the batter (like any good Irish Catholic!)
bake 45 minutes or until done at 350.

Eat fairly quickly because it tends to dry out. Also good toasted with a little butter!