Healthy Pumpkin Bread

Hubs & I have a cruise coming up in two weeks, woohoo!  With that in mind, I was craving a sweet bread for breakfast but didn't want to kill my calorie count for the day.  After a little google searching, I found a pumpkin bread recipe and tweaked it just a bit to make it healthy and incorporate what I had in the house.  I warned J that it may not taste as good as usual due to the health factor, but he loved it just the same.  I did too!  Bonus on this recipe?  It's super easy.  One-bowl-wonder.  Love.

Special thank you to my Auntie Elisa who gave me 2-cup packs of her fresh, homemade pumpkin puree.  Healthy, delicious super food.  Thanks Auntie!!

Healthy Pumpkin Bread (adapted from Kitchen Stewardship)

Need:

• 1 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 tsp. kosher salt
• 1 1/2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/8 cup ground flaxseed meal
• 2/3 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• 1/2 cup cold water
• 1 cup fresh pumpkin puree

Do: 

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Mix all ingredients in a large bowl
3. Grease loaf pan
4. Pour batter into loaf pan
5. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes

We ate ours warm with some light cream cheese dolloped on top.  Happy Sunday!

Almond Grape Tea Cake

For cake three out of four for the Cake for Every Pan challenge, I present you with Martha Stewart's Almond Grape Tea Cake!  Baked in a square loaf pan, everyone will want to call this bread instead of cake.  I am totally on board with that, because it makes it acceptable to eat this sweet treat for breakfast!

I happened to bake this cake up just in time for my family's annual Labor Day camping trip to NH.  One morning with breakfast, we cut up slices and toasted them on the camp stove.  This cake, served warm with a side of hot chocolate is one of the best camping snacks we've tried.  Even if you don't see yourself eating this fire-side, I recommend baking it up next time you're enjoying breakfast or brunch with some of your own sweeties :)

Cake for every Pan Challenge #3 - great success!

     

Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart's Everyday Food:

Need:

• 1 1/4 sticks unsalted butter at room temperature
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups slivered almonds (not salted, totally plain.)
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla
• zest of one whole lemon
• about 15-20 grapes cut in half

Do:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees
• Spray your loaf pan with non-stick spray
• Beat butter and 1/2 cup of the sugar on high for 3 minutes (make sure you time it!)
• Beat in eggs one by one.
• In a food processor, pulse almonds with the remaining 1/4 cup of sugar until you have a fine, home-made flour.  
• Mix your almond flour into the butter mixture until combined, then add your vanilla and lemon zest.
• Pour the batter into your loaf pan and smooth out the top.  
• Arrange your grape halves ontop of the batter, pressing them in gently.  I did a chevron pattern, Martha did polka dots, you can do whatever you like!
• Bake for about 1 hour, and then let cake cool on a wire rack.
• Enjoy!

Flour's Famous Banana Bread with Banana Frosty

I was all hyped up to make coconut macaroons tonight.  I have someone very special who requested them, so they'll be coming soon.  Most likely Thursday-soon.  Tonight though, the hubs was a little disgruntled by the aging bananas on our counter and requested banana bread.  Hubs has some good ideas, and warm banana bread on a cold, rainy Boston night is one of them.

I decided to crack out one of my newer cookbooks, Flour by Joanne Chang.  Flour is an amazing Boston bakery, and I'm lucky to work right near one of the locations.  The banana bread at flour is legendary, so I was excited to try out this recipe.

The image on the left is a picture from the cookbook

The cookbook overall is excellent.  It has beautiful photography, fun anecdotes, sometimes scientific explanations for why you're asked to do certain things.  I love it.  My favorite recipe so far is the one for homemade poptarts.  A friend and I watched Joanne make these at a Williams-Sonoma demo, and of course I had to go right home and try it myself.  They came out awesome.  That was before I started this blog, soooo I'll probably have to make them again soon for you all!

So as this bread was baking up, I was working on a new family budget and J's eyes were glued to the tv- it's Bruins game 2 tonight.  Just as the 30-minute cooling time was coming to an end, the Bruins scored their FIFTH goal in one period!  In a fit of excitement I decided this banana bread needed to become CELEBRATION banana bread.  Inspired by Beantown Baker's recipe for Banana Soft Serve that I read at work today, I whipped up my own topping and call it Banana frosty.  It's a more liquidy version of your favorite fast-food soft-serve treat, and heavy on the banana!

We went from having plain (yet amazing) banana bread to an amazing banana bread sundae in just seconds.  Bananas past their prime = prime time dessert.  Enjoy!


For the banana bread recipe, check out "flour, Spectacular Recipes from Boston's Flour Bakery + Cafe" by Joanne Chang.

To top your favorite banana bread with my Banana Frosty- here's the recipe!

Need:
1 banana - cut into chunks and frozen for about 1 hour or more
2 ice cubes
1 tsp rum extract (if you want, i added this and could barely taste it)
1/4 cup. milk
1 hefty squirt of chocolate syrup

Do:
Put everything in a food processor and pulse until it makes a consistency that you find desirable for topping your banana bread!

*NOTES/Disclaimer- In case you're wondering- flour did NOT ask me to endorse their book, I just love it!  I hope they don't mind the picture of their picture- just wanted to show a glimpse of my night - flour cookbook, mixing bowl and a glass of red wine :)


Banana Bread