Irish Soda Bread Lab · Calculator

Design your own Irish soda bread

The sliders start at the typical loaf: the median of 123 recipes for each ingredient, in grams per 100 g of flour. Move any of them within the range that 90% of recipes use (the 5th to the 95th percentile) and the grams update, with where your choice sits among the recipes and what that ingredient does.

This scales ratios; it is not a tested recipe. Each ingredient moves on its own against the flour, and a combination no recipe uses may not bake the way you expect. For the method, pan and oven, follow the real recipes nearest your numbers.

Flour

Flour weight (g)

500 g, about 4 cups, makes one typical loaf.

Start from a recipe

Load a real recipe's percentages into the sliders. Search by title or site.

Grams per 100 g of flour

Buttermilk
420 g · 84%about 1 3/4 cups
In the middle: 50% of recipes use more, 49% less.
Buttermilk supplies the acid that sets off the baking soda, and the soft, sticky dough.
Baking soda
6 g · 1.2%
Less baking soda than 49% of recipes.
Soda is the only leavening in the traditional loaf; about 1% of the flour.
Butter
28 g · 5.6%about 2 tbsp
In the middle: 48% of recipes use more, 49% less.
Traditional Irish soda bread has none; American versions add butter for a richer, cakier loaf.
Sugar
5 g · 1%about 1 1/4 tsp
In the middle: 49% of recipes use more, 49% less.
None in the Irish original; sweet American loaves with raisins carry a good deal.
Egg
none · 0%
None, like 55% of recipes.
An American addition that makes the loaf more cake-like.
Salt
6 g · 1.2%
In the middle: 41% of recipes use more, 32% less.
About 1 to 1.5%.

Your Irish soda bread

Your Irish soda bread in grams, with approximate volumes
Ingredient	Grams
Flour	500 gabout 4 cups
Buttermilkmilk, buttermilk, yogurt, cream and water	420 gabout 1 3/4 cups
Baking soda	6 g
Butterbutter, oil and shortening	28 gabout 2 tbsp
Sugarwhite sugar, brown sugar, honey and syrups	5 gabout 1 1/4 tsp
Eggwhole eggs, yolks and whites	none
Salt	6 g
Total	965 g

965 g in all from 500 g of flour, counting only the groups above.

Closest real recipe: Simple Spelt Irish Soda Bread (baketotheroots.de).

BakeThe median of 109 recipes is 400°F (205°C), most for 28 to 48 minutes at their own size. A bigger or smaller batch, or a different pan, changes the time.

The 3 real recipes nearest your numbers

Measured on buttermilk, baking soda, butter, sugar, egg and salt at once. These are published, tested recipes: follow one for its method, pan and timing, or load its percentages and adjust from there.

1
Simple Spelt Irish Soda Bread · baketotheroots.de
buttermilk 88% · baking soda 1.1% · butter 5% · sugar 0% · egg 0% · salt 1.3%
2
Dit sodabrood van Paul Hollywood kan iedereen maken - Culy · culy.nl
buttermilk 83% · baking soda 1.2% · butter 0% · sugar 0% · egg 0% · salt 1.2%
3
Paul Hollywood Shared His Unusual Soda Bread Recipe Just… · tasteofhome.com
buttermilk 80% · baking soda 1.2% · butter 0% · sugar 0% · egg 0% · salt 1.2%

How the calculator works

Every recipe is reduced to baker's percentages: grams of each ingredient group per 100 g of flour. The starting point is the median of all 123 recipes for each group separately, so no single recipe is exactly the starting loaf. Grams are your flour weight times each percentage, rounded to the nearest 5 g above 50 g and the nearest gram or half gram below.

“More than 80% of recipes” counts the recipes with strictly less of that ingredient per gram of flour. The nearest recipes are measured on every ingredient at once, each scaled by how much recipes vary on it, so a wide-ranging ingredient does not outweigh a narrow one.

Only the groups listed are counted. Vanilla, spices, mix-ins and toppings are left out unless they have their own slider. Volumes are approximate: flour at 125 g a cup, sugar 200 g, butter or oil 225 g, milk and other liquids 240 g, a large egg 50 g.