This week is National Bread Week and the perfect time to share this recipe for Guinness Brown Bread. The aim of National Bread Week is to show how bread, real bread, can be part of a healthy low fat diet. We’re not talking about a rubbery sliced pan here. Bread gets a lot of bad press, particularly from ‘lifestyle gurus’. This page aims to dispel some of the myths surrounding bread. Everything in moderation and all that….
I have actually come up with this recipe by adapting the brown bread recipe from Kevin Dundon on that website. I already have a trusty recipe for Brown Soda Bread but I like a richer almost malty brown bread myself. It is a very easy recipe, there is no faffing about with yeast or waiting for dough to rise. The addition of Guinness and black treacle adds a rich sweetness to the bread and make it very moist. It is very adaptable, feel free to leave out the treacle or the porridge oats or to add seeds to the dough. Occasionally I use more Guinness and reduce the amount of buttermilk, the important thing is to keep the liquid to 500ml in total.
It is worth making for the smell alone!
The bread keeps for about 4 days and would freeze well.
Ingredients:
- Butter to grease tin
- 75g plain flour
- 1 tsp salt
- 1.5 tsp bread soda
- 350g wholemeal flour
- 50g porridge oats
- 100ml Guinness
- 400ml buttermilk
- 1 egg, beaten
- 2 tbsp. treacle (optional)
- Seeds and extra oats to top
Method:
- Preheat oven to 170c/ 150c fan/gas mark 3. Grease a 2lb/900g loaf tin with plenty of butter.
- Sieve the plain flour, bread soda and salt into a large bowl. Add in the wholemeal flour and oats and mix well together.
- Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and add the Guinness, buttermilk, egg and treacle. Beat it all together well until completely combined.
- Pour the mix into the buttered loaf tin. Spread it out evenly with a spatula and sprinkle some seeds and extra porridge oats on top if you like.
- Bake in the oven for one hour.
- Remove the bread from the tin and put it back into the oven to bake for another 15 minutes.
- Cool the bread completely on a wire rack before cutting it.
- *Edited to add, if you are having difficulty keeping the crust hard I find allowing it to cool in the oven with the door slightly open will keep it firmer for an extra couple of days.
If you have some leftover Guinness, have a look at this beautiful cake from Kates Kabin
For more information:
23 thoughts on “Guinness Brown Bread”
Excellent looking bread. Very nice indeed.
Thanks Conor!
Would this work in a bread making machine? I guess it would? Thanks for sharing. I was searching for some tasteful bread recipes.
I’ve never used a bread machine but from what I’ve read of other recipes it should work. It is a very simple recipe though so there is prob no need to use a machine. If you make it I hope you like it!
I buy versions of this bread all the time, and despite trying several recipes, had never yet found one for either Guinness or treacle brown bread which hit the mark. Some recipes were lacklustre, some downright lies. Donna, you have just made the top of my People Favoured When I’m President Of The World list 😉
Oh I would like that honour! Is that your goal for 2016? 🙂
I hope you like it Tara and that it doesn’t disappoint.
Gosh, no, be reasonable. 2017 at the earliest.
Can’t wait to try it! I’ll let you know…
I’ve never been reasonable in my life! ? Do let me know how you get on.
Yum that looks fab and am imagining the smell!!
Thanks Jacqui! The smell is amazing, nothing like bread baking in the oven 🙂
Oh wow! Need to try this!
I hope you like it Rachel.
What would be the conversions of the temperatures for Fahrenheit? I have a conduction oven
Hi Vanessa, I’ve never worked with Farenheit to be honest but according to this guide it would be 325f. https://greatfood.ie/recipes-and-how-to-cook-advice/how-to-convert-oven-temperatures-2
This bread is good, really good! After making this once, I’ve moved up to double batches. A bottle of Guinness then top up to 1 liter with buttermilk works well. In the US it is hard / expensive to get Irish style (coarse) wholemeal flour, so we mill it ourselves.
Hi Bruce thank you so much. I love to hear from people who have tried the recipes and I still get surprised when I get feedback from around the globe. I’m so glad you like it. And milling your own flour, wow! That is some serious devotion right there. Donna
After eating brown bread in Ireland, we were very motivated to learn to make it ourselves. Your recipe is the best I’ve tried. Milling your own flour has become something of a “thing” here. You might want to give it a go! Most of the good home mills are from Germany, so I guess it’s a thing there also. Our small mill uses corundum stones and attaches to a stand mixer.
I’m not sure I am ready to mill my own flour, but I am definitely adding it to my list of challenges to set myself!