Work In Progress

Pumpkin Cranberry Bread

My love affair with cranberries started years ago when Trader Joe's was an upstart company and I'd buy dried cranberries every chance my minimum wage job (and poor savings skills) allowed.  Around that time, a friend gave me a recipe from a magazine for pumpkin cranberry bread.  I think I've modified it enough to call it my own.  This is my go-to gift item for friends and collegues at Christmas.  One year I made 18 mini loaves.  I've scaled it back since then.

I've made two double batches this year, the last batch last night, during the Winter Solstice.  We spent the evening with all the lights off and the tv off.  We listened to music and just relaxed in a candle lit house.

This recipe is pretty fast and loose.  The ingredient list is what you need to make two 9x5 inch loaves or four mini loaves.  I've also made a couple notes to help if you want to double it.  My pictures are all of a double batch.

Ingredients:

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1/2 a small jar of pumpkin spice
    * I think this is about 2 TB but I just dump an entire 1.12 oz (31g) jar into my double
       batch
    * I use McCormick spice
2 tsp double acting baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 eggs
    * the three eggs makes it a more moist bread
2 cups granulated sugar
1 3/4 cups (15 oz can) of Libby's Pure pumpkin
        * When I double it, I just use the jumbo 29 oz can... I figure that it's close enough
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 - 2 1/2 cups fresh or frozen unsweetened, natural cranberries
    * I do not used dried cranberries, as the bread is more moist with frozen/fresh berries
    * I do not use sweetened cranberries as this will make it saccharin-sweet
    * I totally eyeball the amount.  For a double batch, I used about 1.5 bags of cranberries. I
      covered the mix in a layer of cranberries in the bowl you see above.

Combine flour, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, and salt in  large bowl.
    * I add half the flour, then the pumpkin spice.  I don't know if this matters, but I imagine
      that this ensures it's mixed better in the final product.

Combine eggs, sugar, pumpkin and vegetable oil in a samll mixer bowl.  Beat just until blended.
    * I use a hand mixer.

Add pumpkin mixture to flour mixture; stir just until moistened. (I used the hand mixer again)

Fold in cranberries.

Spoon batter into greased and floured pans.
    * When I need it, I used the baking spray from Trader Joes that has both combined.
    * If you're gluten intolerant, I recommend stoneware.  I don't grease the stoneware
      and the loaves pop right out.

Sprinkle brown sugar and cinnamon on the top.  It really does taste better to do this before you bake the bread.

Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven.  Bake 55 - 65 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean.
    * In my mini loaf pan, it takes 55 minutes, in the 9x5 pans, it takes 65 minutes.

Let cool 5 minutes, remove and place on wire racks... you know the drill ;~)

I haven't been able to eat the bread because I've been doing a gluten free diet.  Partner claims that this batch was my "best yet."

I'm thinking after we are back from Christmas festivals, I may try to make a single batch with gluten free flour.  I'll let you know how it goes.

I hope you had the chance to enjoy the Winter Solstice.  We missed the full moon and eclipse.  I think it was cloudy and rainy.  I say I think because I thought the eclipse was on the night of the full moon, not realizing it was at 3 a.m. on the 21st.  Oh well, I'll catch the next one in 400 years...

From our solstice living room... I hope you're ready for the holidays!

1 Small Change - March wrapup/April Change

Please excuse the lack of pictures today.  We went skiing this weekend; apparently the camera download cable didn't want to travel and stayed home.  There is not too much to report regarding the March change since my last update.  I had two sub goals from the organization and cleaning change, which was to find everything for taxes and flexible saving account reimbursement.  I'm quite happy to say that both were accomplished and taxes should be done in the next day or two.  The silly thing is that it was all quite easy, once I had the receipts in order.  I have some fun pictures to show, including our fine collection of nail clippers.

Our February and January changes are going quite well also.  And, just a couple days ago, I received four upcycled fabric produce bags that I'd ordered from Gypsy Forest.  Beautiful!  The high thread count of the vintage fabric and the construction look very durable.  I'll get a couple pictures up in a few days.

Our April change, as you may have guessed, was to start our own garden.  We started a few weeks ago when the weather was nice enough to make us think spring had sprung.  The backyard of our rental property was over run with an insideous, grass-choking form of oxalis.  So, the picture from before was the day we started raking up the oxalis (and our yard :( ) that we'd killed and the day that we planted our garden.  I don't know anything about gardening, but partner is an old hand at raised-bed gardening.  We are starting slow, to see what takes, but we have lettuce, cilantro and three varieties of tomatos started.  But, for Easter, partner got me the latest addition of Mother Earth News.  After reading their article Start a Quick and Easy Food Garden, I'm thinking I might want to through some onions in the ground.  I don't know how many beets we'd eat, but now is the time to get those started as well.  Seriously, if you are interested in a garden, but don't know where to start, check it out!  If all goes well, we'll be eating lettuce from our garden by the end of April.

I hope to have pictures for you next time.  Of changes, knitting, and snow!

Our flour, sugar, dairy free Thanksgiving

We are currently doing a modified diet trying to get our digestive systems working better.  Our Naturopath recommended a blood test which results in an intensive 30 day restrictive diet to eliminate foods to which a person is reactive.  As luck would have it, we were both highly reactive to all dairy, refined sugars, and most flours.  My system is apparently really out of whack because there were some bizarre foods that I'm restricted from -- garlic, aspargus, carrots, and pineapple, to name a few. 

Because Thanksgiving falls in the middle of the 30 days, I thought we were just going to have to lose out on all the holiday food.  But we did some research and came up with some modifications.  If you're interested, this is our Turkey Dinner (posted a bit late). It's a bit picture heavy and I haven't figured out how to make small MB pics yet...

Turkey: 

Hurray, no restrictions on turkey!  If you look closely, you can see the knitter's solution to forgetting to buy twine:      (I really must figure out how to crop in Typepad)

But the bread stuffing was out, so I did a couscous stuffing from the Joy of Cooking with dried apricots and pistachios. 

Yum.  Verdict: A+ for the turkey (in a roasting bag) and A for the stuffing.

Mashed Potatoes:  These were a disappointment.  Soymilk is just too thin to make good mashed potatoes.  Vegan butter worked just fine though, with no bizarre separating that you get from margarine. They tasted good, but not without help from gravy and butter.  Grade: C-

Gravy:

This one was hard.  Partner did a modified giblet gravy with flaxseed flour instead of white flour.  I think perhaps for the next turkey, quick gravy with corn starch might be better.  The gravy had a decent flavor, but was very grainy because of the course flour.  It's okay with potatos or turkey, but doesn't have the true gravy consistency or texture.  Verdict: C+

Sweet Potatos: Yummy.  I think, if I had to do it over, I would have skipped mashed potatos and just done sweet potatos/yams.  These were diced and then roasted with cinnamon and a little agave.  Super yummy and this was the first item I stole for lunch. I just realized I didn't grab a picture of this yummy dish. Verdict: A-

Corn Fritters: 

Partner made an assortment of corn fritters with tandoori, hawaiian, and no spices.  As I suspected, I had no room for fritters, but I've loved taking them to work with my leftovers.  Verdict: A

Our homemade cranberry sauce:  1 pound cranberries, 1/2 cup port, 1/2 cup orange juice, zest of an orange, and cloves (when cooking).  Instead of 2 cups of sugar, I used 1 1/2 teaspoons of Stevia.  The stevia is just too bitter/tart for cranberries.  The turkey did mellow the tartness quite a bit, but by itself it was a bit much.  I like sour and I still take this in small doses.  However, I think with agave, this might rise because the port and orange was great. Verdict: B

Add some green beans and Fenestra 2006 Alvarelhao, and this rounded out the full spread (you can see the cranberries in the back and sweet potatos in the right front):

Pumpkin pie was just too hard, so we opted for an apple pie/apple crumble: 

Before:

               and after  

I made a brazil nut crust, but substituted 2 tablespoons of agave nectar for the 3 tablespoons of sugar.  I used a combination of braeburns, granny smiths, red delicious, pink ladies, and red romes. It was going to be a pie but after I realized I hadn't made enough crust to get to the top of the pie pan, it became a crumble. Verdict: A

And because I've become THAT woman, here is the holiday treat for our kitty.  Because you won't see me within a mile of wet food except as a treat:

 

(I'm not quite so bad because I waited until the fifth post to introduce Beckerman, right?)

And now, for Christmas.  And because this is a knitting blog, this is a dishcloth that I knit when I was sucked into a soccer game at 11 p.m.  I was smart enough to realize that working on Seascape (or rav) wasn't a good idea but wanted something to do with my hands.  About 3 hours to knit...

Happy Holidays!