Recipe of the Week: Whole-Wheat Pumpkin Bread
Last Thursday, Halloween had us all trick-or-treating, stuffing our faces with candy, and admiring the numerous carved pumpkins set on doorsteps. Pumpkins are one of my favorite parts of Halloween, not to mention one of my all-time favorite flavor of fall, enhancing breads, cakes, pies, and coffee drinks and lending its seeds to roasting.
To celebrate the Halloween season this week, I wanted to make a festive pumpkin bread recipe. I found this fairly healthy recipe on a new website called 100 Days of Real Food, and it tasted great! The moist, sweet pumpkin bread delivered a perfect combination of pumpkin and spices like nutmeg, ginger, and cinnamon.
One healthy substitution in this recipe is the use of whole wheat versus white flour. Whole-wheat flour provides nutritious dietary fiber, antioxidants, and Vitamin B, unlike white flour. Also, the recipe replaces granulated sugar with honey, which is unprocessed, healthy, and delicious.
I hope you enjoy!
Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bread
Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups of whole-wheat flour
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon cloves
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup honey
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup pumpkin puree
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 350˚F.
- In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (flour, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, baking soda, baking powder, and salt)
- Make a small hole in the center of the dry mixture and pour the eggs, oil, honey, and vanilla into the hole. Stir together thoroughly with a fork, until all ingredients are blended. Do not over-mix.
- Generously grease a large loaf pan to make bread or line a muffin pan with paper liners to make muffins. Pour in the batter.
- Bake a loaf for approximately 30-40 minutes and bake muffins for 18-22 minutes. If a knife or toothpick inserted into the batter comes out clean, it is done.
Serving Size: Either one muffin or one slice of bread
Yield: Serves 10-12 (10-12 muffins or slices of bread)
My Changes:
- Instead of baking muffins or a loaf, I baked the bread in a Pyrex square pan, so they were more like pumpkin bread brownies. They took about 25 minutes to bake.
- I added a whole teaspoon of vanilla instead of just ½ because I love the flavor of vanilla. If you are not a fan of the taste, just keep it at 1/2 teaspoon.
- This recipe was pretty easy to make, but allow at least 25 minutes to baking time.
