And the lepers lept about

Happy St. Patrick's Day! We only have what my dad describes as a "very wee bit" of Irish in us, but we still celebrate the holiday with the rest of the world. We all wore a bit o' green today and enjoyed some wonderful Irish Soda Bread, which I baked late last night for a potluck at work. I doubled the batch and brought a loaf to daycare and left one here for DH, too. It was a hit all the way around.

When I picked up the kids from daycare this afternoon, they bounded out the door and nearly knocked me over. They were bubbling and babbling about how the tiny little lepers came during lunch and left green hamhocks all over the house and the lepers are so tiny you can't see them and they do silly things and they are tiny and...

I nearly fell over laughing.

At supper, we talked about ice cream - the girls requested to have white ice cream in pine cones. And then Breanna said she wanted to have some "opie meal" (oatmeal) for breakfast tomorrow. I sometimes wonder about their speech dysfunction, but they're so funny, I'm going to cross my fingers this stage lasts for a while.

Here's my soda bread recipe if you're interested. It's one of my new favorites.

Irish Soda Bread (with a little Finnish Flair)

INGREDIENTS
4 c. all-purpose flour
4 T. white sugar
1 t. baking soda
1 T. baking powder
1 t. cardamom
1/2 t. salt
1 stick margarine, softened
1 c. buttermilk
1 egg
1 c. currants (or dried cranberries or raisins or apricots)
½ stick butter, melted
¼ c. buttermilk
a few pinches of sugar

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a large baking sheet.
2. In a large bowl, mix together flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, cardamom, salt, and margarine.
3. Stir in 1 cup of buttermilk, egg, and dried fruit.
4. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead slightly. Form dough into two rounds and place on opposite ends of a sprayed baking sheet.
5. In a small bowl, combine melted butter with 1/4 cup buttermilk; brush loaves with this mixture. Use a sharp knife to cut an 'X' into the top of the loaf. Sprinkle top with sugar.
6. Bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. You may continue to brush the loaf with the butter mixture and sprinkle with sugar while it bakes.