Autumn Yumminess

Sunday afternoon there was nothing to do - seeing as how the Broncos weren't playing til Monday night. (On which occasion they were taken to the Bret Favre school of football.) Buford was napping therefore I couldn't obsessively run the vacuum over every piece of flooring in my house though I really, really wanted to. So I decided to bake something. I found a pumpkin bread recipe and lo, I had all the ingredients on hand! I was not going to the grocery store, no way, no how - so pumpkin bread it would be. I had thoughts of not having to cook breakfast all week...just slicing off a piece, perhaps slathering it with a bit-o-cream cheese, and pouring a hot cup of coffee! But alas, the yumminess of this pumpkin bread exceeded its size and as of this morning (Tuesday) only a small chunk remains. Even Min has eaten some and has not died from ingesting two fruits at once (pumpkin and apple). He is not allergic or anything, just has an aversion to most anything of the fruit family. He should be Grace's kid, she doesn't like fruit either. Or coffee, but I think I've mentioned that once or ten times.

Anyway, I thought I'd post the recipe and share this wonderful, moist, chunky, and aromatic bread. If fall had a flavor this would be it.

(Oh, and the loaf is so moist you could totally sneak in a few tablespoons of ground flax seed, wheat germ, or whatever other sneak-in type healthy items you have on hand and no one would know!)

Chunky Apple Pumpkin Bread

1 1/2 c sugar
1 c canned pumpkin
1/2 c water
1/3 c vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 2/3 c all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1 c chopped, peeled tart apples
3/4 c chopped walnuts
(2 T. sneak-in healthy ingredient) optional

In a large mixing bowl, combine the sugar, pumpkin, water, oil and eggs; mix well. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking powder, and cloves; add to the pumpkin mixture. Stir just til combined and dry ingredients are moistened. Fold in apples and walnuts. Pour batter into a 9 x 5 x 3 in. loaf pan. Bake at 325 degrees for 1 1/2 hours or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. (My loaf only took 1 hour and 20 minutes.) Cool loaf for 10 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack.


A good use of that 10 minutes of cooling time is to brew a fresh pot of coffee so you can just slice and devour immediately. Which I'm not sayin' that's what I did...I'm just sayin' it might be a good use of the time.