I'm super glad to have my first reader! The lovely Emily from http://www.52mantels.com/ I am so honored that you have joined my blog! My aim is to create a great, informative blog as yours :) a long, long way to go I know!
I have spent today baking and preparing little Christmas treats, which I originally wanted to give as gifts to my loved ones but I changed my mind since I could not find the appropriate packaging to do so. Instead, I will be placing each item into platters, which will be ready to be serve.Obviously except for the loaves which I will be wrapping up in plastic and labeling.
For today's installment I am going to share the recipe to one of my favorite loaves ever! Pumpkin and Apple Spice Loaves. Here is how to make these delicious, flavorful loaves, which will have everyone 'oohhh' and 'ahhh' at every morsel! And the wonderful smell you will have while baking these, will have the neighbors knocking at your door!
Pumpkin and Apple Spice Loaves.
Wet ingredients:
3 cups pumpkin puree (I make mine from scratch by chopping finely and boiling fresh pumpkin)
3/4 cup oil
4 large eggs
2 1/4 cup sugar (which will melt nicely with the wet ingredients)
Dry ingredients:
3 cups all purpose flour
3 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground cloves
1 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/4 tsp. all spice
1/4 tsp. ginger
Last but not least about 4 apples peeled and finely chopped.
Crunchy toppings:
5 tbsp. brown sugar
1 tbsp. flour
3 tbsp. oats (optional)
1 tsp. cinnamon
2 tbsp butter
1) Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (I think it should be about 350 in Fahrenheit).
2) Sift all the dry ingredients and make sure that they are well mixed, no one likes to find those pesky patches filled with baking soda :P
3) Mix all the wet ingredients and beat till the sugar is more or less melted. I usually use my hand and very rarely use an electric whisker/mixer but its up to you just make sure you don't over mix as that will make the loaves/cakes tough.
4) Fold the apples into the wet mix. The more apples you use, the more the cake will come out moist but beware as you don't want the apple to overpower everything else. It will turn out as being an apple spice loaf instead! Again, it depends on your personal taste, those who might prefer the pumpkin flavor to be stronger can just omit the apples altogether or reduce to 2 apples.
5) With a wooden spoon, add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture. Stir batter until the mixture is well blended. This is a watery batter so do not worry about it being too loose, it will bake nicely!
6) Spoon the mixture into non stick, well greased little loaf tins or into one large loaf tin or even into muffin cases (depending on your preference).
7) At this point, you can prepare the crunchy topping by mixing all the ingredients together and just sprinkling on top of the loaves before placing them into your oven.
*If you want a healthier alternative you can simply ignore the crunchy topping and use sunflower seeds instead.
These babies bake in about 40-50mins. depending on the size of tin you have used. Remember the smaller the tins and faster the batter will bake so if in doubt just keep and eye on those edges. To be sure that they are well baked, simply insert a toothpick into the middle. The toothpick should come out clean.
That's all for today folks! Until next blog update, may I wish you happiness and peace.
Spicy, warm thoughts heading your way,
Maggie.
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