Flashback Friday - Nutty Bars

This post originally appeared on Minxeats.com on February 3, 2014.

-----------------------------------------

A day off work means free time to play in the kitchen! But first, I spent a few moments thumbing through a copy of Fat Witch Brownies: Brownies, Blondies, and Bars from New York's Legendary Fat Witch Bakery before deciding on the Pecan Bars.

We had about half a pound of pecan pieces in the freezer, but I opted to use half walnuts because they're less-expensive. I also didn't feel like opening the bag of light brown sugar when there was just enough dark brown sugar left to fit the bill. And...the original recipe called for rum. Mr Minx isn't the biggest rum fan in the world, so I used bourbon instead. The results were crunchy, sticky, nutty, and quite fabulous.

Make them. Now. Unless of course you have nut allergies.

Nut Bars adapted from Fat Witch Brownies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup packed dark brown sugar
7 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1/4 cup coarsely chopped nuts (pecans, walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds)
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/3 cup light corn syrup
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon bourbon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 3/4 cups coarsely chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 350°F and grease and flour a 9" x 9" baking pan.

In the bowl of a mixer, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and brown sugar. Add the 7 tablespoons of butter, a few small pieces at a time, and combine until mixture is sandy. Stir in the nuts. Gently press the mixture into the bottom of the prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes.

While crust is baking, melt the 4 tablespoons of butter and allow to cool. Combine brown sugar, corn syrup, vanilla, bourbon, and salt in a bowl. Stir in the cooled butter. Add the egg and mix well.

Pour the filling over the baked crust. Evenly sprinkle the nuts on top. Bake for 20 minutes, or until the filling no longer wobbles when you shake the pan gently.

Allow to cool completely before cutting, about 2 hours.

Makes 12 - 16 bars.

* Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Flashback Friday - Pumpkin Seed Brittle

This post originally appeared on Minxeats.com on January 20, 2014.

-----------------------------------------

In 2012, I made caramels for the first time; they turned out so well, I promised myself I'd try other candies in 2013. I don't know why I drive myself so crazy with making holiday treats, but I do (especially considering how few gift recipients I have). I'm sure cookies and fruitcake would suffice, but even more sweet stuff is better, right? Fudge! Brown sugar caramels! Mini chocolate orange loaf cakes! Bacon jam! And pumpkin seed brittle!

Why pumpkin seeds? Because my dear brother has nut allergies, but can eat seeds. I searched the Interwebs for a fairly simple recipe and came up with this one at Food 52. I didn't have enough allspice on hand, so rewrote the recipe using the amount I used. I also added a bit of cayenne pepper, for a nice kick.

A few days after Christmas, my Dad called and said, "What is this stuff I am eating? It's crunchy and spicy and like heaven in my mouth!" So apparently my alterations were a hit with the parental unit. I thought it was pretty fabulous, myself.

If you try it, don't skimp on the salt.

Pumpkin Seed Brittle (adapted from Food 52)

1 cup shelled pumpkin seeds
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup maple syrup
Kosher or sea salt

Pour the pumpkin seeds into a dry skillet. Turn the heat on to medium-high and toast seeds, shaking pan frequently, until seeds have started to turn from greenish to brownish and are plump. Remove from heat and pour seeds on a plate to cool.

Measure out the spices and toss with cooled pumpkin seeds.

Combine butter, sugar, and maple syrup in a saucepan over medium heat. Using a candy thermometer, boil mixture until it reaches 280°F. Carefully pour in seeds and spices and stir. The mixture may clump up a bit but keep stirring until it smooths out. Continue cooking over medium heat until the thermometer reads 300°F. If the mixture smells like it's burning before it reaches 300°, remove from heat anyway.

Once the candy has reached 300° (or smells like its burning!), pour onto a Silpat-covered cookie sheet and spread out to a thickness of about 1/8" - 1/4". Sprinkle with sea salt while it's still warm.

When completely cook, break into pieces. Store at room temperature in tightly covered containers for a week or two.

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Cracker Toffee Ice Cream

Earlier in the year, I made a cake using flavored tea that I bought on sale from David's Tea. I still have several varieties left from the cute star-shaped gift set and I've decided I'll probably use a few of them to make ice cream this spring and summer. Yes, ice cream. Tea infused milk or cream makes a lovely ice cream with barely any effort--I normally have to heat the cream anyway, so why not let some tea leaves hang around in it for an hour or so before I proceed?

And so it went this particular weekend that after I selected English Toffee flavored tea to make my ice cream base, I decided I also wanted to make some cracker toffee. For completely unrelated reasons. A friend had sent me a video for a matzo toffee sometime before Passover, which put it in my mind. This matzo toffee was left unbaked, instead the caramel was cooked for a longer time. I suppose it was tasty enough, but I prefer a baked version. Not only do the saltines (or matzo, if you prefer) get toasted in the oven, but also the caramel gets a chance to ooze around to the bottom of the crackers and coat that side, too. So the toffee is tasty on both sides. You can choose your method; I've included the one I prefer within the recipe below.

So...toffee ice cream. Cracker toffee. Seemed to me they needed to become one. So I broke up some of the toffee and layered it in the finished ice cream. It's maybe a bit more difficult to scoop, but the end result is very good. The crackers don't get soft in the ice cream, so there's plenty of great texture between them and the nuts and the thin layer of chocolate. I think this ice cream is a winner, and I hope you do, too.

If you can't find English Toffee flavored tea (though several companies, including Celestial Seasonings, do produce it), use a chocolate or caramel flavor instead.

Cracker Toffee Ice Cream

For the toffee:
3/4 cup butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
40 saltines (1 sleeve)
6 ounces chocolate chips
Walnuts or nuts of your choice, chopped

For the ice cream:
2 cups whole milk
1 1/4 cups heavy cream
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons light corn syrup
2 tablespoons loose English toffee-flavored tea, preferable David's Tea
1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon corn starch
1/8 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons cream cheese

To make the toffee. Preheat oven to 400°.

Cover a large rimmed cookie sheet with aluminum foil. Lay out the crackers in one layer, making sure they are touching.

Combine the butter and brown sugar in a saucepan and bring to a boil. Cook 2-3 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from the heat and pour over the crackers. Use an offset spatula to spread the caramel evenly. Place pan into the oven and bake for 5 minutes.

Remove pan to a rack. Sprinkle on the chocolate chips. Wait a minute or so to allow the chocolate to melt, the use an offset spatula to spread the chocolate evenly over the crackers. Sprinkle with nuts.

Allow the chocolate to dry completely before breaking up into pieces.

To make the ice cream: Put the milk, cream, sugar, corn syrup, and tea in a large sauce pot and cook over medium high heat until tiny bubbles start to form around the edges but the milk does not boil. Turn off the heat and cover the pot. Allow to steep for 30 minutes to an hour.

Strain out the tea. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the milk mixture and return the rest to the pot. Mix the 2 tablespoons of milk with the cornstarch to make a slurry. In a separate bowl, whisk the cream cheese and salt together until smooth. Prepare a shallow ice bath: in a large bowl or baking pan, place an inch or two of cold water and several ice cubes. Set aside.

Bring the milk tea mixture to a boil and boil for 4 minutes, watching carefully so it doesn't boil over (stir when it starts to expand), remove from heat, and slowly whisk in the slurry. Bring back to a boil over medium-high heat and cook until slightly thickened, about 1 minute. Blend a few tablespoons of hot milk mixture into the cream cheese to loosen it, then pour the cream cheese mixture into the pan of milk. Whisk well until smooth. Pour into a container with a tight-fitting lid and place the container into the ice bath until cool, ensuring that the water level doesn't come up as far as the lid. When the mixture seems mostly cool, refrigerate until completely cold.

Place ice cream mixture into an ice cream machine and proceed according to manufacturers instructions.

Scoop some of the ice cream into a freezer container. Sprinkle with a layer of the toffee, adding additional nuts if desired. Repeat ice cream and toffee layers twice more. Put a layer of waxed paper over the top of the ice cream and put on the lid. Freeze until desired texture.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Chamomile Honey Tea Gelato

Over the past few years, we've been hearing about the puzzling mass die-off of honey bees. Studies show that 85% of all plants are due to pollinators--like honey bees--so this is an issue that should concern everyone. The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation has instituted special programs to address this issue and have recently entered into a charitable partnership with The Republic of Tea. Their new Biodynamic Chamomile Honey Tea, available exclusively at Whole Foods throughout the Mid-Atlantic, was created to bring attention to this issue. The company was kind enough to send us a can to sample.

The chamomile in this tea, as with other The Republic of Tea chamomile varieties, comes from a small biodynamic farm at the base of the Italian alps, and is highly fragrant. In this particular tea, the flower is infused with a delicate but noticeable honey flavor, and it makes a terrific hot or iced beverage. While sipping it (iced), I thought it would make a lovely ice cream. Indeed, at the Fancy Food Show last summer I had tasted a chamomile tea ice cream that knocked my socks off.

So, after a fruitless search for my own ice cream maker (likely tossed in a fit of pique, as my kitchen is too small to hold such unitasking appliances), I borrowed one from a gracious friend and set to work. Because chamomile is a rather delicate flavor, I thought gelato, made with whole milk rather than tons of heavy cream, would be a better way to show off the flavor of this tea. And it was. The flavor of the chamomile is subtle, but the honey is quite pronounced. There is no vanilla in it at all, but Mr Minx thought there was. It's really very delicious, on its own or scooped over a piece of pound cake. It'd also be dynamite served with a fruit crisp or crumble.

Chamomile Honey Tea Gelato

2 cups whole milk
¾ cup sugar
6 The Republic of Tea Chamomile Honey Tea bags
5 egg yolks
1 cup heavy cream

Put the milk and sugar in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring until the sugar melts. Add the teabags and continue to heat the milk just until tiny bubbles appear around the edges. Remove the pot from the heat and allow the tea to steep for at least one hour. Remove the tea bags from the milk, gently squeezing them dry.

Whisk the egg yolks in a large bowl. Reheat the milk until steaming. Using a ladle, dribble some of the hot milk into the eggs in a thin stream, whisking constantly. After about half the milk has been whisked in, pour the egg and milk mixture back into the pot with the remaining milk. Cook over medium-low heat until thick enough to coat a spoon, whisking all the while.

Strain the custard and stir in the heavy cream. Refrigerate until cold.

Freeze the cold custard in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Gelato has less air than ice cream, so keep it in the machine only until it starts to hold its shape. Once the consistency is like somewhat melted ice cream, scoop it into a covered container and freeze until firm.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Chocolate Nutter Butter Cookie Butter

The first person to toss cookies in a blender with cream or oil or condensed milk to produce a spread was an evil genius. As if cookies aren't fattening enough on their own, this was a way to infuse them with even more fat and calories and create a product that could possibly rival the pumpkin spice latte for popularity with the Uggs-wearing set.

It also happens to be delicious stuff.

As far as I can tell, cookie butter was originally made with speculoos, a traditional spiced Christmas cookie that is probably best known to Americans as the in-flight snack for Delta airlines. But any cookie will do, actually. Peanut butter lovers will enjoy this version of cookie butter made with Nutter Butter cookies. It's not as smooth as commercial cookie butter, but perhaps if you have a more heavy duty food processor than my Cuisinart, or maybe one of those fancy $700 blenders, you could whip yours to a less-coarse consistency. It's still tasty served on bread or eaten right off a spoon.

Chocolate Nutter Butter Cookie Butter
I think this is one of those recipes that works best by feel. Add as much of the sweetener, oil, and cream as you think you require. The cocoa is absolutely optional, but a nice touch.

1/2 pound of Nutter Butter cookies
Agave syrup
Vegetable oil
Heavy cream
Cocoa powder

Separate the two halves of each cookie and scrape the filling into a small bowl. Place the cookies in a plastic bag and crush them with a rolling pin. Place the crumbs in a food processor and pulse until the crumbs are fairly fine. Add a tablespoon of the agave and pulse to combine. Add the veg oil a tablespoon or two at a time until the crumbs start to stick together and form a mass; 6-7 tablespoons should do it. Dribble in some heavy cream and pulse again until the mixture seems spreadable. Add a few tablespoons of the cocoa powder and continue pulsing until combined. When you stop blending, the mixture should visibly relax in the bowl.

Scrape into a lidded container and consume within a week. Keep refrigerated.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Meyer Lemon Muffins

When life gives you lemons...

...make lemon muffins.

I had this great plan to make a simple dessert that a friend taught me some years ago involving oranges and alcohol. I knew there were oranges in the fridge, so I grabbed a couple. I cut into one. It was unusually fragrant for an organic orange, so I tasted a piece only to find it was terribly sour. I tried the other one, and it too was very sour. Then it hit me - they were Meyer lemons. I had received some from a recent CSA delivery, but I thought there had only been two lemons, not four. The two I had in front of me were huge, the size of oranges. Their labels only said "organic" and had a number. I just assumed they were oranges.

You know what you get when you assume, right?

So now I had two precious Meyer lemons that I had to use right away. At first I thought to do a riff on Nigella Lawson's flourless clementine cake, but realized it would need far more than two lemons and more eggs than we had in the fridge. I suppose I could have done math and made a much smaller cake (I do have a set of adorable mini springform pans), but math and I have never gotten along. I didn't want make something that required only the juice or only the rind, because it seemed wasteful, and I had recently made a batch of lemon curd. So I consulted the almighty Internet and found the perfect recipe on the LA Times web site: lemon muffins that used every part of the lemon except the seeds.

I imagine this recipe could be used for oranges or limes or regular lemons. There's a whole cup of sugar in them, which takes care of any sourness issues. The end result is moist and very lemony, and really quite delicious. And they freeze like a dream!

Meyer Lemon Muffins (adapted from the LA Times)

2 Meyer lemons
2 cups flour
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar, divided
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, melted
1/2 teaspoon Ceylon cinnamon

Preheat oven to 400°F.

Cut about 1/3 off of one of the lemons. Cut that small part into 18 tiny wedges. Chop the remaining lemon into pieces and puree them in a blender.

Combine flour, 1 cup of sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients.

In another bowl, beat together the eggs, milk, butter, and pureed lemon. Pour into the well of flour/sugar and stir until just combined.

Grease 18 muffin cups and spoon the batter in.

Combine the remaining 2 tablespoons of sugar and the cinnamon. Sprinkle evenly over each muffin. Top with a wedge of reserved lemon.

Bake until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Remove muffins from pan and cool on a wire rack.

Makes 18 muffins.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

More is More

As they say, less is more. But sometimes more is more.

I was looking for a quick desserty-type thing to whip up on the weekend, and found a one-pan cookie cake recipe on the Joy the Baker site. She tossed bananas, walnuts, and chocolate chips into a batter that was both stirred up and baked in a cast iron skillet. Being cast iron skillet-less myself (heresy, I know), I opted to bake my cake in an 8-inch square glass baking dish. Since the recipe called for melting butter, I decided to go a little further and make brown butter. And in addition to chocolate chips, banana, and nuts, I tossed in some Heath bits, well, because they were there. The chocolate chips and toffee bits melted a bit in the hot pot, turning this cookie cake into a cookie and candy cake. Pretty tasty!

If you don't eat it all in one go (I don't recommend doing that), store it in the fridge. The candy part will harden quite a bit when cold, If you want a chewier, cakier texture, allow your serving to come to room temperature before eating.

Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Banana Almond Toffee Cookie Cake (inspired by Joy the Baker)

1 stick unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 ripe banana
1 large egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup old fashioned oats
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup dark chocolate chunks
1/2 cup coarsely chopped almonds
1/4 cup Heath bar bits

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Melt butter in a large saucepot over medium-high heat. Cook for several minutes, stirring occasionally, until the butter ceases to make sputtering noises and begins to brown and smell nutty. Remove from heat and stir in sugar until completely combined. Mash in banana, then add the egg, stirring well. Whisk in the vanilla, then add the cinnamon, flour, oats, baking soda, and salt. Stir well with a wooden spoon to incorporate all of the flour.

Fold in the chocolate, almonds, and Heath bar bits. The heat from the pot will melt the chocolate and Heath bits a bit. Pour into a greased 8x8 baking pan. Smooth top and bake for 18-20 minutes. Allow to cool before cutting into squares.

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Rocky Road Brownies

My family were never vacation-takers. Once every couple of years or so we'd end up in Atlantic City for a long weekend, and a few summers we went to Willow Valley Farms, in Lancaster. Apart from what I thought was an outstanding buffet at Willow Valley (hey, I was in middle school) and the Planters Peanuts shop on the Boardwalk near the Steel Pier, those trips don't particularly stand out in my mind. But one summer, when I was about 9, my Mom took my brother and me to Ocean City, Maryland, for a week, via Trailways.

The three of us stayed at the Commander Hotel, where we set up a routine pretty quickly. After a full breakfast (included in the price of our room), we hit the swimming pool. After a few hours of splashing around, we went to a place just off the boardwalk for slices of Sicilian-style pizza. We then changed and wandered the boardwalk until dinner (also included).

Every night after dinner we went to the candy store to pick up some TV-time nibbles. My brother always got milk chocolate bark, but I wanted something more exotic, like peanut butter fudge or rocky road. Oh how I loved the textures of rocky road candy, with its squishy marshmallows and crunchy nuts! I still love it today, but I try to stay away from eating it every night, like I did during that summer week in 1975.

I found a recipe for brownies with marshmallows and peanut butter chips in my copy of the Fat Witch Brownie cookbook. The bakery's owner calls them "bumpy highway" brownies, but I prefer "rocky road," and with real nuts instead of chips. Walnuts are my preference, but you can use any nut you like. These are very sweet and gooey, owing to a high sugar-to-flour ratio and of course, to marshmallows. They're also quite chocolatey, and a little goes a long way.

Rocky Road Brownies (adapted from Fat Witch Brownies)

3/4 stick unsalted butter
2 squares unsweetened chocolate
4 tablespoons semi sweet chocolate chips, divided use
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup miniature marshmallows
1/3 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a 9" square baking pan.

In a saucepan, melt the butter and unsweetened chocolate, stirring frequently. Remove from heat and stir in half the semi sweet chips until they are melted.

Beat the sugar and eggs until light and lemon-colored. Blend in the chocolate mixture. Sift the flour and salt together and add to the batter, mixing until well-combined.

Spread half the batter into the prepared pan. Bake 12 minutes.

Stir the remaining semi sweet chips, marshmallows, and walnuts into the remaining batter. Spread as evenly as possible over the partially-baked layer. Bake 15 more minutes.

Allow brownies to cool completely before cutting. Makes 12-16.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Nutty Bars

A day off work means free time to play in the kitchen! But first, I spent a few moments thumbing through a copy of Fat Witch Brownies: Brownies, Blondies, and Bars from New York's Legendary Fat Witch Bakery before deciding on the Pecan Bars.

We had about half a pound of pecan pieces in the freezer, but I opted to use half walnuts because they're less-expensive. I also didn't feel like opening the bag of light brown sugar when there was just enough dark brown sugar left to fit the bill. And...the original recipe called for rum. Mr Minx isn't the biggest rum fan in the world, so I used bourbon instead. The results were crunchy, sticky, nutty, and quite fabulous.

Make them. Now. Unless of course you have nut allergies.

Nut Bars adapted from Fat Witch Brownies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup packed dark brown sugar
7 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1/4 cup coarsely chopped nuts (pecans, walnuts, hazelnuts, almonds)
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/3 cup light corn syrup
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon bourbon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 3/4 cups coarsely chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 350°F and grease and flour a 9" x 9" baking pan.

In the bowl of a mixer, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and brown sugar. Add the 7 tablespoons of butter, a few small pieces at a time, and combine until mixture is sandy. Stir in the nuts. Gently press the mixture into the bottom of the prepared pan and bake for 15 minutes.

While crust is baking, melt the 4 tablespoons of butter and allow to cool. Combine brown sugar, corn syrup, vanilla, bourbon, and salt in a bowl. Stir in the cooled butter. Add the egg and mix well.

Pour the filling over the baked crust. Evenly sprinkle the nuts on top. Bake for 20 minutes, or until the filling no longer wobbles when you shake the pan gently.

Allow to cool completely before cutting, about 2 hours.

Makes 12 - 16 bars.

* Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Pumpkin Seed Brittle

In 2012, I made caramels for the first time; they turned out so well, I promised myself I'd try other candies in 2013. I don't know why I drive myself so crazy with making holiday treats, but I do (especially considering how few gift recipients I have). I'm sure cookies and fruitcake would suffice, but even more sweet stuff is better, right? Fudge! Brown sugar caramels! Mini chocolate orange loaf cakes! Bacon jam! And pumpkin seed brittle!

Why pumpkin seeds? Because my dear brother has nut allergies, but can eat seeds. I searched the Interwebs for a fairly simple recipe and came up with this one at Food 52. I didn't have enough allspice on hand, so rewrote the recipe using the amount I used. I also added a bit of cayenne pepper, for a nice kick.

A few days after Christmas, my Dad called and said, "What is this stuff I am eating? It's crunchy and spicy and like heaven in my mouth!" So apparently my alterations were a hit with the parental unit. I thought it was pretty fabulous, myself.

If you try it, don't skimp on the salt.

Pumpkin Seed Brittle (adapted from Food 52)

1 cup shelled pumpkin seeds
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup maple syrup
Kosher or sea salt

Pour the pumpkin seeds into a dry skillet. Turn the heat on to medium-high and toast seeds, shaking pan frequently, until seeds have started to turn from greenish to brownish and are plump. Remove from heat and pour seeds on a plate to cool.

Measure out the spices and toss with cooled pumpkin seeds.

Combine butter, sugar, and maple syrup in a saucepan over medium heat. Using a candy thermometer, boil mixture until it reaches 280°F. Carefully pour in seeds and spices and stir. The mixture may clump up a bit but keep stirring until it smooths out. Continue cooking over medium heat until the thermometer reads 300°F. If the mixture smells like it's burning before it reaches 300°, remove from heat anyway.

Once the candy has reached 300° (or smells like its burning!), pour onto a Silpat-covered cookie sheet and spread out to a thickness of about 1/8" - 1/4". Sprinkle with sea salt while it's still warm.

When completely cook, break into pieces. Store at room temperature in tightly covered containers for a week or two.



Posted on Minxeats.com.

Pumpkin Bread

The chill in the air and the discovery of a can of pumpkin puree in the cupboard made me want pumpkin bread. I wasn't exactly in a baking mood at the time, but the only other way to satisfy my craving would be to hand over $2.25 to Starbucks for one lousy slice. (Not that their pumpkin bread is lousy--on the contrary, it is quite good.) 

As much as I love sweet treats with pumpkin in them, I rarely, if ever, bake pumpkin bread. I wracked my brain to remember the last time I made one and could only come up with a pumpkin fruitcake that I concocted a couple years ago. (That was pretty tasty, in a fruit-cake-y kind of way.) So I fooled around with a couple of different pumpkin bread recipes until I came up with one that I liked. It's very moist, and nicely spicy, with a bit of nuts and fruit for texture. You can certainly omit them, if you want, or swap the walnuts and cranberries out for pumpkin seeds, pecans, dried apricots, or dried apples. Raisins, too, if you must, but the raisin-hater in me does not approve.

Spicy Pumpkin Bread

2 large eggs
1 cup light brown sugar
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon sweet curry powder
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/4 cup dried cranberries
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 350°F.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs and sugar together until well-combined. Stir in the pumpkin, oil, and vanilla.

In another bowl, soft together the flour, salt, baking soda, and spices. Stir the dry mixture into the wet mixture, making sure there are no lumps. Stir in the pepitas, dried cranberries, and walnuts.

Pour into a greased 9 x 5-inch loaf pan and bake for 50-60 minutes, until a toothpick, when inserted into the cake, comes out without crumbs on it. Alternately, pour batter into (3) 5 3/4 x 3-inch mini loaf pans and bake for 30-35 minutes.

Cool cake in the pan for 10 (5) minutes before turning out onto a rack to cool the rest of the way.

Posted on Minxeats.com.