Soda Farls with Killeen and Beetroot

This is the basic soda farl recipe. Delicious as they are served lightly toasted and covered in a truly heroic amount of butter, the recipe is so easy and quick it's perfect for experimentation. One of my favourites is beetroot and goats cheese, but let your imagination run wild. They are also a great way of using up any leftover bits of cheese from a cheeseboard. This quantity would serve 4 (or 1 if you've overindulged and need rescuing) but is easily halved. These are best eaten fresh but this is unlikely to be a problem, I rarely have any leftover.

350g Plain Flour

pinch salt

1 tsp Bread Soda

250-325ml buttermilk*

If Adding:

1 small raw Beetroot, Grated and with the moisture well squeezed out

Killeen Goats Gouda cut into chunks (as much as you want)

*If you cannot get buttermilk then add a decent squeeze of lemon juice to whole milk and let sit to one side until it thickens a bit (will look like runny yoghurt)

Sift the flour and baking soda into a mixing bowl, stir in the beetroot and the cheese. Add about half of the buttermilk to start and continue adding until you have a soft dough. Turn out onto a well-floured board and gently knead. A note on this, you are sort of gently shaping the dough rather than kneading as you would for a yeast dough, so just bring it together rather than punching it about :) this is also an opportunity to work a bit more flour in if you've added too much liquid. Flatten into a round about 3/4 inch thick, depending on the size of your pan you may need to do 2. Cut into quarters.

Heat a heavy skillet to medium temperature, sprinkle a little flour over the base and put in your farls. Allow for about 6-8 minutes each side. They will puff up a little and sound hollow when tapped.

Enjoy :)