The popular Brown Bread Challenge returns at this year’s National Ploughing Championships in Ratheniska on September 23-25th
The cooking skills of Irishwomen have long been appreciated, and heralded, as being in a league of their own.
This year, therefore, at the National Ploughing Championships, those famous culinary talents are to be put under the microscope, as the National Brown Bread Baking Competition is resurrected after a 23-year absence.
‘We were delighted to come on board when Anna May McHugh approached us and told us that Aldi were going to sponsor the competition,’ says ICA President, Liz Wall.
Wexford woman Liz (who you might recognise if you are a regular on the Country Market circuit) has been in the ICA hot seat for the past two years, and is a dab hand in the kitchen herself. She also knows just what it takes to make the perfect loaf of brown bread.
‘I’m not on the judging panel myself,’ she says with a laugh, ‘but the actual judges tell me that they look closely at such important details as texture, taste, appearance and that very important word – sliceability. No soggy bottoms are allowed!’
