Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Pumpkin Quick Bread with Orange Zest and Maple Butter

My family's been requesting this bread for months. I finally got around to it when I found myself with leftover pumpkin after making pumpkin pizza dough. In all fairness, pumpkin was a bit difficult to come by in late summer. I’m not a total slacker, just a partial one.

If you look closely at the picture you’ll see a frog monster shape in the little bowl of maple butter. Sometimes fun things like this happen when shooting food. It reminds me of 1970s Better Homes and Gardens cookbooks with all the pointless figurines stuffed around plates of food.

James Lileks has deposited many scary crazy food pictures from that era into his books, “The Gallery of Regrettable Food” and “Gastroanomalies”. I tend to read them in the middle of the night when insomnia hits. I try not to wake up Jesse, but it starts with a little snort, then a few giggles, and soon I begin to laugh so loud I startle him awake.

Lileks’ books are also great to hand around the room at parties. They get people talking about all the crazy nasty food they’ve come across in their lives. That’s my kinda fun anyway!

Pumpkin Quick Bread with Orange Zest

Ingredients

2 cups pumpkin puree or a (15 ounce) can of 100% pure pumpkin
2 2/3 cups granulated sugar
1 cup extra light olive oil
2 teaspoons orange zest
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
4 eggs
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
Butter and flour for loaf pans

Instructions
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly butter and flour two 9x5 inch Pyrex loaf pans. Tap off excess flour from the pans.

2. In a stand mixer, beat together the sugar, oil, orange zest, and vanilla extract on medium speed for 1 minute. Add the eggs and beat until combined. Add the pumpkin and mix until combined. Next, add the salt, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger, baking powder, and soda and mix until combined. Then add the flour and mix on low speed until just combined.

3. Divide the batter equally among the two pans. Smooth the surface slightly and then tap the pans on the counter to release any air bubbles.

4. Bake for 60 to 65 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

5. Let the bread cool for 10 minutes in their pans on a cooling rack. Then jiggle to loosen and gently unmold onto parchment or wax paper. Move to a cooling rack to finish cooling.

Maple Butter
½ cup unsalted butter, softened
1/4 cup maple syrup
Pinch of salt

Place in a bowl and beat with a hand mixer until well mixed.

Notes
1. Once cooled, the extra loaf can be wrapped in foil and frozen.
2. Cooking time may need to be adjusted for metal loaf pans.

By Laura Flowers


18 comments:

Jamie said...

You crack me up! Will definitely be checking out those sites. I love the old cookbook pics from the 50s and 60s. I also love your frog faced maple butter. It all looks so delicious!

Federica Simoni said...

aspettami domani per colazione!!!! mmmm....buonissimo!

Patricia @ ButterYum said...

Thanks to commenter Jamie who helped me find the frog monster... I was looking for a green plastic toy somewhere. Oy!

Anyway, I love your bread, really love the photos too. I'm going to try your maple butter. I love to make honey butter in a similar fashion.

:)
ButterYum

Donna-FFW said...

Maple Butter with an orange-y pumpkin bread, that is SO the way to eat, perfect!

Pink Little Cake said...

As always...great pictures and delicious food. Laura, I am so happy that you can share your talent with al of us. I can't wait for you to have a cooking book, please include the vespa somewhere!!!
By the way some girl in a blog copied your candy corn cookie idea and of course didn't give you credit. Wrong choice! I left a comment on her blog that she will remember forever!

Unknown said...

would it be bad of me to have a little bread with that maple butter monster? Believe it or not I haven't made pumpkin bread since I was in middle school. I remember liking it. I bet its 10x better with the orange zest

Coleens Recipes said...

The bread sounds delicious and with maple butter?? Over the top. I can think of a LOT of things I would love maple butter on.

Ginger said...

Chuckling!! Wonderful post and of course you are serving your unbelievable bread with homemade maple butter :-)

Frenchie said...

You had me at pumpkin, and orange zest and maple butter. This combination seems unreal. I am currently on the hunt for some amazing pumpkin recipes, I think this one is a winner.

Mari @ Once Upon a Plate said...

Frog Monster... Laura, you are too funny!

The bread, with THAT spread, irresistible. I adore the combination of flavors. Nice job.

Mary Bergfeld said...

What a marvelous combination of ingredients. This must be delicious. Thanks to Jamie I was also able to see the frog.

Amber said...

YUMMY! This is exactly what I need after cooking up all our halloween pumpkins. I have a huge bowl of pumpkin to use up. Thank you!

Chef E said...

Thanks for the compliment and coming over...I like the frog monster, must be the artist in us to notice, otherwise I believe no one would notice!

I have to make this, I am about to go to the market and get my first pumpkin of the season, yeah me too, late starter LOL

I look forward to keeping up with your site, and glad you were not as lazy as I and found me first :)

Amy J in SC said...

Baking ahead and freezing some stuff right now for the holidays and this will be perfect!

Chef Fresco said...

Oh man this looks so good! Esp. w. that frog-maple butter :)

As for our last post - I did eat the chicken - I'm not a veggie, just like vegetarian food a lot :)

Anonymous said...

This is the best ever pumpkin bread! Thank you!!

The Cooking Photographer said...

Thank-you so much for telling me!! That made me really happy.

Laura

Tiffiny Felix said...

I actually just sighed...mmmmmm :)

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