5h • 🍞 Recipes
“Bealtaine Bannock”
Gaelic Celtic Bread Challenge A ritual bread year, one loaf each month
One loaf for each turning of the year, using modern methods to honor ancient ways.Each bake is inspired by:
- An Irish mythological deity, spirit, or persona
- A solar or lunar threshold
- The agricultural and hearth traditions that shaped Irish foodways
Bread is where grain, fire, water, and time meet, and that meeting lies at the heart of the Celtic year.
#GaelicCelticChallenge
My May bake honors:
Bealtaine.
One of the four cross-quarter days in Irish Gaelic Celtic tradition. Bealtaine is an Irish Gaelic festival marking the beginning of summer. It is celebrated on May 1st, halfway between the spring equinox and summer solstice. It traditionally marked the time when flocks were driven to their summer grazing lands and would not return until late autumn.
The Fire & The Fairies:
- On Oíche Bealtaine (May Eve), all domestic hearth fires were traditionally extinguished. They were only relit from the great communal bonfires used to symbolize the sun’s returning power and to purify the cattle and crops.
- This is a "thin" time when the veil between worlds is at its wisest. The deep cross and the "fairy holes" are an ancient superstitious nod to "letting the fairies out," ensuring they don't sour the bread or the household's luck.
- Yellow flowers (Gorse and Primrose) are scattered here because they were once used to protect the family's butter. It was believed that on May morning, "fairies" or "butter witches" would try to steal the "profit" of the milk, and these solar-colored petals kept the dairy safe.
“Bealtaine Bannock”
The Formula & Method are in the comments.
#Gramps_Bread #GrampsBread #IrishBread
Formula:
- Total dough: 1141 g
- Total flour: 500 g
- 60% Wholemeal flour (300 g)
- 30% Plain (AP) flour 150 g
- 10% Wheat bran 50 g
- 100% Buttermilk (500 g)
- 10% Egg (50 g)
- 2% salt (10 g)
- 1% Baking soda 5 g
- 3% Baking powder 15 g
- 4.2% Honey 21 g
- 8% Olive oil 40 g
Method:
1. Preheat the oven to:
205°C/400°F [No-Fan]
2. Grease a 2-pound loaf tin or cast iron Dutch oven.
3. Mix together the flour, bran, salt, baking soda, and baking powder.
4. Mix buttermilk, oil, honey, and eggs together.
5. Pour the wet mixture into the dry and mix until fully combined.
6. Shape into a round loaf and cut a cross and poke each quarter
7. Place in a Dutch oven and bake for 25 minutes with a cover. Remove the cover, lower the oven to 182°C/360°F, and bake for 20 min.
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“Bealtaine Bannock”
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