Ask Mary Gleeson why Irish bakers cut a cross in the top of soda bread and you get a short answer: “You have to cut a cross in the dough to let the fairies out.” Ask her what happens if you skip it, and she laughs: “I don’t know, we’re scared not to.”
Who is Mary Gleeson?
Mary is a master baker and co-owner of Gleeson’s Restaurant & Rooms in Roscommon. She gave those words to BBC Travel’s Kathleen Mangan when asked about the cross, and Good Food Ireland, which counts Gleeson’s as a member, repeats them on its page for Mary Gleeson’s brown soda bread. That page is where we read them.
It opens with a point many of us have heard: that people often assume the cross had a religious meaning. Mary’s answer is simpler and a lot more fun. It is for the fairies, and she is not taking any chances.
Bread nobody wrote down
Soda bread is a staple in most Irish households, and it is made so often that there is rarely a recipe or even a written method. Mary says it is a matter of throwing in the ingredients in the right order and baking it well, and that it takes practice to get it just right. She learned that “throwing-in” method from her granny and admits it took time to perfect.
Her bread is known well beyond Roscommon. At Gleeson’s there are four types of soda bread and five types of scones on offer, and Mary has presented the bread at Embassy events in the United States and at food shows in Europe.
Her three rules for a light loaf
Mary says soda bread is all about a light touch. Lift the flour in the air and let it flutter back into the bowl, and you have the real secret behind a fluffy loaf. Then, in her words: “That’s why you barely mix the buttermilk with the dry ingredients, carefully ease the dough onto the bread board, and never, ever knead it. That pounds the air out of it.”
She adds that these methods are the same whatever the particular ingredients. We have followed all three in the white loaf below.
If you want more on the cross itself, we have looked at it twice before: why every Irish mammy cuts a cross in her soda bread and why the cross has nothing to do with religion. For a wholemeal loaf, try our Irish brown soda bread, and our soda bread guide goes through the whole method.
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How to make white soda bread with a fairy cross (serves 8)
This is our own plain white loaf, made the light-touch way. It takes ten minutes to mix and needs no yeast.
Ingredients
- 450 g plain white flour, plus extra for dusting
- 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 400 g (about 400 ml) buttermilk
Method
- Heat the oven to 220°C (200°C fan). Dust a baking tray with flour.
- Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt into a large bowl. Lift the flour with your fingers to get air into it.
- Make a well in the middle and pour in most of the buttermilk. Mix quickly with one hand, just until the flour is moistened and the dough is soft and slightly sticky. Add more buttermilk only if there is dry flour left.
- Ease the dough onto a floured board and gently round it up to about 4 cm thick. Do not knead it.
- Place on the tray and cut a deep cross in the top, nearly to the edges, to let the fairies out.
- Bake for 15 minutes, then lower the oven to 200°C (180°C fan) and bake for another 25 to 30 minutes, until the loaf sounds hollow when tapped underneath.
- Cool on a wire rack under a clean damp tea towel, then slice and serve with butter.
Do you cut the cross in your soda bread, and did anyone ever tell you why?
Sources
- Mary Gleeson’s Brown Soda Bread, Good Food Ireland (quotes Mary Gleeson speaking to BBC Travel’s Kathleen Mangan)
Checked November 2026.
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