Apple Quick Bread

This apple quick bread was good. It was really good. Too good to eat just one slice at a time. Too good to keep to myself, so I shared it with co-workers. Too good for there to be much left by the time I remembered that I hadn’t photographed it yet.

I based this recipe on the basic quick bread method with variations published in Fine Cooking magazine in last year’s October/November issue. (I know. It took me a whole year to get to it. It’s how I am.) This is how I want all my cooking and baking to be: a basic recipe or template with some mix and match substitutions for different flavors and seasonal ingredients. And so, I finally got around to using this idea to make something good. Something that I had had a difficult time finding a satisfactory recipe for in the past.

This quick bread is flavored with both applesauce (homemade!) and finely chopped apple. I think it was particularly delicious because the apples that I had on hand and therefore the applesauce I made with them were delicious. The bread turned out nicely moist, not quite crumbly, even though I used some whole wheat pastry flour in the mix, pleasantly sweet, and, most important, apple-y. The warm spiciness of cinnamon and nutmeg is a great accompaniment for the apples, of course, and the whole wheat pastry flour I mentioned gave the bread a bit of a nutty background.

Speaking of nuts, you could add some finely chopped walnuts or pecans to this recipe if you like. And speaking of finely chopped, I really think that’s the way the apple has to be in this bread. Apples chopped too coarsely may make the bread slices fall apart. (I think this is what went wrong with a similar recipe I tried years ago.)

I also think that if you wanted to fiddle with the baking time of this batter, you could distribute it into muffin cups to make muffins, or bake it in a cake pan and have coffee cake. Even more variations. Now, that’s my kind of recipe.

Apple Quick Bread

Based on a recipe in Fine Cooking magazine, Oct/Nov 2013

I highly recommend using an apple that is “a good baking apple,” that is, one that softens as it bakes. I also recommend using homemade applesauce if you can!

½ cup (4 ounces or 1 stick) unsalted butter

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour

½ cup whole wheat pastry flour

¾ cup granulated sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

¾ teaspoon fine salt

1 ½ teaspoons cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg, preferably freshly grated

1 cup finely chopped peeled apple

2 eggs

½ cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

½ cup applesauce

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray an 8 x 5-inch bread pan with nonstick cooking spray or grease it as desired. Set aside. Melt the butter over medium-low heat in a small saucepan. Set aside to cool.

2. In a medium-size bowl, combine the all-purpose flour, whole wheat pastry flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Whisk together to combine well. Stir in the chopped apple. Set aside.

3. In another medium-size bowl, beat the eggs lightly with a whisk. Slowly pour in the melted, cooled butter and beat until well-combined. Whisk in the milk, vanilla extract and applesauce.

4. Pour the egg mixture into the flour mixture and stir just until no dry spots remain. Pour into the prepared bread pan.

5. Bake at 350 F for 50-55 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out with just a few moist crumbs attached, but no wet batter. Carefully remove from the pan and cool on a wire rack. Cool completely or enjoy slightly warm. Bread can be wrapped well and frozen.

Makes 1 8-inch loaf, about 12-15 servings.

Other recipes like this one: Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake, Apple Cinnamon Pancakes

One year ago: Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake

Making Applesauce

 

I recently got my hands on such a large and lovely crate of apples that I had to do something other than just eat them all. A friend generously handed them over to me after doing the work of harvesting them from her neighbor’s personal, noncommercial orchard. I’m convinced that if we all had friends and neighbors like this, the world would be a much, much better place.

Anyway, these apples are very large and a bit tart: pretty good for eating out of hand, but my friend said they cook down beautifully for applesauce. Applesauce it would be, then, and, wow! that has been just about the best decision I’ve made this year! I added some sugar, but kept things a bit tart. I added some great apple cider, but also some water to the apples as I saw that they needed more moisture as they cooked. I made some delicious applesauce. Really. And I’m not patting myself on the back here. It’s all about the apples.

 

That concept became even more apparent when I compared what I did to the write-up I produced for this pumpkin applesauce. I had a totally different type of apple that required a longer cooking time and more vigorous mashing to make sauce. My more recent haul of fruit cooked down to sauce in just a few minutes.

And so, instead of writing an exact recipe given precise quantities and cooking times and demanding a particular type of apple (which doesn’t guarantee against variations anyway), I thought I’d just give you a step-wise narrative of how I make applesauce. You really shouldn’t be afraid of it. It’s easy!

First, I peel, core and roughly chop my apples. For these photos, I used about 5 large apples, which fit nicely in my largest skillet. You could make less in a smaller skillet, or lots more in a big pot. 

  

Step 2: Place the apples in a large skillet (or a pot if you want to go that way) with about half a cup of liquid, either water or apple cider, and a generous squeeze of lemon juice. (Really, if you don’t happen to have a lemon on hand, you could skip that, too. It just brightens the flavors a bit, which might not be necessary if you have good apples, and prevents browning.) Stir in some sugar. Here, you want to taste your apples and guess whether they need a lot of sugar, a little, or none at all. I used brown sugar. Heat this all over medium heat.

Step 3: Let things cook. The apples will start to break down and give off some liquid. Add more liquid if the mixture seems to be spattering too much or if you’re concerned it will scorch. Turn down the heat and let the mixture simmer away. You can begin mashing the apples with a spoon or spatula as they begin to soften.

Step 4. Decide if it’s done. Some apples will take much longer to cook. Some will cook down right away. Some will never get really, really soft and you’ll have chunky applesauce. The applesauce I made this year took less than a half hour to be really soft and smooth. The one I made a few years ago took more like 45 minutes to an hour.

 

Taste the mixture for sugar and add more if you like. Add some spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves or ginger if you like. If you want your sauce very smooth, you can mash any remaining apple chunks with a potato masher or blitz the whole thing in a food processor (or baby food blender). And there you have it: Applesauce! Exactly how you want it. Or how the apples you get your hands on dictate it anyway. It’ll be really, really good. Really good!

If you want to preserve your applesauce for the months ahead you can freeze it in freezer-safe containers. If you prefer to can your sauce, please refer to a well-tested recipe and procedure for canning. This sketch I give to you above may not make a mixture that is properly safe for canning. It is fun and delicious, though, and the first batch I made didn’t last long enough to even consider preserving some. Good thing I’ve still got some apples!

Another recipe like this one: Applesauce with Pumpkin and Spices

Apple Cinnamon Blondies

This is a simple recipe that will quickly get something cookie-like, cake-like, and apple-y ready for dessert or afternoon snacks or lunchboxes. It makes up a pan of blondies studded with apples and walnuts and spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg. They are moist, but not quite as moist as, say, an apple cake, and, like other forms of brownie or blondie goodness, are cut into neat, slim, hand-held squares that can easily fill a cookie niche.

This pan of goodies mostly involves melting and stirring, plus a little peeling and chopping of an apple. The only extra step is leaving the butter on the stove a little while just to let it brown a bit. That browning adds just a little extra caramel-y, butterscotch-y flavor to the bars. It’s also worth the few extra minutes for the delightful caramel aroma that only the cook gets to experience when the brown sugar and vanilla are whisked into the lightly browned butter.

I think it’s best to cut the apple into a very small dice and to use an apple that’s good for baking, rather than one that tends to stay crisp and firm. The walnuts are, of course, optional, but I really like them here. You might also dry a different nut, like pecans, or add a dried fruit, white chocolate chips, butterscotch chips (as were in the original recipe) or even peanut butter chips.

I’m also thinking that if you don’t have a 9-inch square baking pan as called for in this recipe, you might be able to put this batter into an 8-inch pan instead. The blondies would be slightly thicker and probably require just a bit more baking time. I really wanted to test this theory myself (as an excuse to make these blondies again!), but I have moved on to other apple baked goods! I hope to have more about that in these pages soon. And I hope you’re enjoying apple season as much as I am!

Apple Cinnamon Blondies

Adapted from Food Network Magazine October, 2014

1 cup all-purpose flour

¼ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg, preferably freshly grated

6 tablespoons unsalted butter

¾ cup brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 eggs

1 medium-size peeled, finely chopped apple

½ cup chopped walnuts

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Spray a 9-inch square pan with nonstick cooking spray or prepare similarly as desired.

2. Combine the flour, salt and baking powder in a bowl. Whisk together and set aside.

3. In a medium-size saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Continue cooking until the butter is lightly browned. Remove from the heat and whisk in the brown sugar until smooth. Whisk in the vanilla. Set aside to cool slightly.

4. Whisk the eggs into the cooled butter mixture. Stir in the flour mixture until smooth. Pour into the prepared baking pan, smoothing the batter.

5. Bake at 350 F for 25-30 minutes or until lightly browned and no longer gooey in the middle. Cool in the pan on a wire rack. Cut into squares to serve.

Makes 16 servings.

Other recipes like this one: Apple Cinnamon Oatmeal Cookies, Apple Cinnamon Coffee Cake

One year ago: Nasturtium Vinaigrette

Apple Baked Oatmeal

In August, when I was on a little vacation, I had a lovely baked oatmeal dish for breakfast one day. It was exactly what I hoped it would be and exactly what I wanted for breakfast. I decided it was exactly what I was hoping to be able to make at home.

Well, I didn’t really get a chance to search too hard for a recipe after that, but then I was reading through a copy of The Apple Lover’s Cookbook by Amy Traverso, and found one that looked like what I needed. I finally got a chance to try it out on a lazy Saturday morning, and it was delicious! Still exactly what I want for breakfast!

 

While I went through all the steps of the recipe on the morning I was going to eat it, I think you could do some of the prep work ahead of time to get breakfast on the table a little faster (although this does need to bake for about an hour.) I think you could mix up the dry ingredients, and cover and store them at room temperature, then mix up the wet ingredients and store them in the refrigerator. The next day, while the oven is preheating, you could cut up the apple, mix the wet and dry ingredients together, mix in the apple, pour into your pan and bake.

I used Cortland apples in this dish, a type with which I’ve had mixed results when baking. This time, they kept their shape and much of their firmness, which I didn’t mind. You could use whatever apple you like to bake with, and if it is an apple that cooks down to a softer texture, you would probably get a baked oatmeal that is moister than what I got. The texture of mine was almost cake-like, which, again, I didn’t mind.

This dish isn’t especially sweet, but you could add maple syrup or more brown sugar to your serving if you’d like. My husband threw himself on a second serving to test this concept with maple syrup and gave it the thumbs-up. You could also use different nuts and dried fruits (or none). I quite liked the dried cranberries and walnuts with the apples and cinnamon. I also quite liked that this makes a full 8-inch square baking dish full of breakfast and the leftovers were also great warmed up for a few days after the original baking day. No effort on weekday mornings: now, that’s exactly what I want for breakfast!

Apple Baked Oatmeal with Walnuts and Cranberries

Adapted from The Apple Lover’s Cookbook by Amy Traverso

2 cups old fashioned rolled oats

1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

½ cup chopped walnuts

½ cup craisins

1 ½ cups diced apples, peel if desired

3 large eggs

1 cups milk

1/3 cup brown sugar, firmly packed

1 teaspoon cinnamon

¼ teaspoon nutmeg, preferably freshly grated

1. Preheat oven to 325 F. Spray an 8-inch square baking dish with cooking spray or grease as desired.

2. In a large bowl, combine the oats, baking powder, salt, walnuts and craisins. Toss together to combine. Stir in the apples.

3. In a medium-size bowl, lightly beat the eggs. Add the milk and brown sugar and whisk together until smooth. Whisk in the cinnamon and nutmeg.

4. Pour the egg mixture over the oat mixture and stir to combine. Pour into the prepared baking dish.

5. Bake at 325 F about 50-60 minutes or until the top is brown and the center is no longer liquid.

Makes 6-8 servings.

One year ago: Parsley Hazelnut Pesto