I always associate apples as a fall thing, but this year, I got a hold of some early apples from my sour cherry orchard hook-up. So, this late August & early September I was swimming in heritage apple varieties like Wealthy, Sunrise, and King apples, along with the more familiar Gala and Mac varities. I love apples so an early apple glut is a welcome surprise.

I snacked on the crisp and juicy apples for as long as I could, but since I live in a shoebox of an apartment (no cold cellar), I couldn’t keep them crisp for long. So my delicious crunchy apples had transformed from an eating specimen to a cooking one – perfect for apple pancakes, ginger apple pandowdy, baked apple oatmeal, but I settled on trying out an apple cheddar quick bread instead. Good choice!

The bread was delicious and flavourful and worked really well as a side for a vegetable stew I had made for supper. But we ate it toasted for breakfast the next morning and might I say it was even better. Toasted cheese and apple bits? I’m so in.

The only real trick with this recipe was the baking time. I figured that 35-40 minutes should have been enough, but it wasn’t. While it looked lovely and golden on the outside, inside it was still gooey. So I baked it for an extra 15-20 minutes and it turned out fine. The recipe below reflects how long I think it should bake for, however, if you are using a larger loaf pan you might want to reduce the baking time.

elsewhere: Want to see just about the prettiest thing? Click over to Poppytalk where I do a post with a recipe for sea salt caramels with toasted pecans. But that’s not all! I wrap up the caramels using parchment & washi tape so it makes a super cute gift. Adorbz.

apple & cheddar quick bread
1 3/4 c all-purpose flour
2 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
3/4 c milk + 2 T
1/3 c canola oil
1 egg
2 T brown sugar
1 c finely diced apples
1 c strong cheddar cheese, grated

3 T cheddar cheese, grated

Preheat oven to 400F. Prep your 8×4 loaf pan* by lightly greasing it with butter and then use a mixture of cornmeal and flour to dust the insides with – about a spoonful of each should do. Shake out any excess and set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt and whisk everything together. Set aside. In a large bowl, mix together the milk, oil, egg and brown sugar until well blended. Pour in the diced apples and stir in the flour mixture. Add in the cheese in 3 handfuls – stirring between each addition. Dump the batter into your prepared loaf pan and bake for 45-50 minutes. Sprinkle the remaining cheese over top of the bread and cook for 10 minutes longer until the cheese melts and the bread is cooked all the way through – use a wooden skewer in the middle of the loaf to test doneness.

*if your loaf pan is larger, reduce the baking time by 10-15 minutes.

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Despite having eaten only one banana in my entire life (I was nine when my life-long hate started), I do tend to get a bit gooey for banana bread. While my husband might keep the banana brokers in business, he often buys more than he can chew at once. The ones he doesn’t manage to stuff into his maw before they turn brown end up inour freezer where they shrivel, turn black and get baked into banana bread. Not a bad life-cycle, I think. One of the most repeated recipes in my kitchen is this wonderful cinnamon and chocolate banana bread but sometimes one needs to shake it up a little.

This banana bread is a delicious one and it has a wonderful pedigree – it comes from the Baked cookbook which has given my kitchen so much wonderful baked bounty in the past. This recipe is no exception. The original recipe makes muffins but I decided to go with a loaf pan instead. Also, the recipe easily doubles and freezes well in case you want to get all your baking done at once.

Chocolate and espresso? Oh yeah! This is a great banana bread to wake up to in the morning as it pairs so nicely with a good hot coffee. If you are a walnut-hater (and a surprising amount of you are), then just replace the walnuts with more chocolate chips and you can’t go wrong.

banana espresso chocolate chip bread
(adapted from Baked: New Frontiers in Baking)
1 1/2 c mashed, ripe bananas (about 4)
1/4 c sugar
1/4 c brown sugar, firmly packed
1/2 c unsalted butter, melted
1/4 c milk
1 large egg
1 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1 1/2 t instant espresso powder
1 1/2 t baking soda
1 t salt
1/2 c semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 c walnuts, roughly chopped

Preheat oven to 350F. Butter and flour one loaf tin and set aside.

In a large bowl, mix together the bananas, sugars, butter, milk and egg. In another bowl, combine the flour, espresso powder, baking soda and salt. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and stir until just combined. Fold in the chocolate chips & walnuts.

Pour into prepared loaf pan and bake for about 55 minutes, or until the top is golden and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let cool in a pan for 15 minutes and then invert onto a wire rack to cool completely.

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I haven’t really been in a baking mood which is odd since it’s fall and baking should come pretty naturally. Cinnamon, pumpkin, apples…those are all perfect flavours that work well on those wet and cool days. However, even with all that good stuff, I couldn’t dig deep enough to find my baking mo-jo.

So when I did finally feel like I should put my oven through a bit of a work out, I approached it cautiously. I wanted a treat – something gooey and sticky and loaded with butter, but I ended up baking this loaf which sits on the healthy side of the fence. There’s whole wheat flour, not a lot of sugar and not too much fat either. But don’t think this is one of those tasteless, bland quick breads that can easily turn to stone. This loaf is tasty! It’s delicious with a mug of hot tea when you’re curled up on the couch reading a good book. And it’s perfect for breakfast when eating cake seems almost decadent. And it’s got a crumb topping, people! Crumble!!

Yeah, I get excited about a good crumble topping. Don’t you?

cinnamon crumble quick bread
1/3 c brown sugar
4 T coconut oil, melted (most oils should work here, even melted butter)
2 large eggs
1/2 c low fat yogurt
1 t vanilla
1 apple, grated
1 c all-purpose flour
1 c whole wheat flour
2 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
2 t ground cinnamon

crumb topping
2 heaping T brown sugar
2 T flour
1/4 c walnuts, chopped
1/2 t ground cinnamon
2 T cold butter

Preheat oven to 350F. In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, coconut oil, and eggs together. Stir in the yogurt, vanilla and apple. In another bowl, blend together the dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients into the sugar/egg mixture, giving everything a good stir until combined.

In a small bowl, use your fingers to blend together the crumb topping into large pea shaped blobs.

Pour batter into a greased & floured loaf tin. Sprinkle top with crumb topping. Bake for 35-40 minutes.

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Slowly but surely, the zucchini in our CSA share have been growing by the week. It was easy to deal with the cute little patty pans, the small heirloomed striped zucchinis, and the lovely crook-necked yellow squashes. I was adding them to scrambled eggs, sautéing them with garlic, and happily managing the slow-build of summer squash that was entering our kitchen. Then came the big guns: large, unwieldy dark green and bulbous zucchinis….and I was a little bit frightened.

You see, my husband and I aren’t huge fans of summer squash. While I’m coming around to actually starting to like zucchini (a huge step in my personal development), my husband’s smile wavers when there’s some zucchini staring up on his dinner plate. He’ll eat it but he isn’t happy about it. However, he does like zucchini bread. In fact, the loves it. When I made some chocolate zucchini muffins a few years ago, he went crazy for them. So I figured that the easiest way to deal with one of the monster squash was to grate it into a pile and make zucchini bread.

This recipe makes 2 loaves of the quick bread which is perfect. Cornelius is heading out for a two week bike tour next weekend which will take him and a friend up to Nelson and Kaslo and the surrounding area. One of the loaves will be eaten this week and the other one will be frozen so that he can take it with him in one of his panniers. I’m sure he’ll be very happy to tuck into a slice or two of homemade zucchini bread while resting from the hilly ride along the Crows Nest highway.

While I didn’t stray to far from the original recipe posted by Elise, I did make a few changes. I subbed in roasted walnut oil for the melted butter and added a couple tablespoons of molasses because I was worried from the comments on her post that this loaf could be dry. My zucchini yielded just over three cups so instead of saving the small amount of zucchini for another use, I just stirred it all into the batter. I also added in ground cloves since I thought it would go nicely with the rest of the spices in the recipe. No harm done whatsoever. This quick bread had great flavour and I loved the buttery crunch from the walnuts. The loaf was moist without being greasy and despite the added molasses, this bread wasn’t too sweet at all. It was zucchini bread perfection.

And just a reminder to those using the roads and highways to keep an eye out for cyclists and give them plenty of room when you pass! And this goes out especially to those RV drivers who seem to love to hug the shoulder. Thank you.

walnut & cranberry zucchini bread
(recipe adapted from Simply Recipes)
2 large eggs
1 1/3 c sugar
2 T molasses
2 t vanilla
3 1/3 c grated zucchini
2/3 c roasted walnut oil (or melted unsalted butter or another oil)
2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
3 c all-purpose flour
1/2 t nutmeg
2 t cinnamon
1/4 t ground cloves
1 c chopped pecans or walnuts
1 c dried cranberries or raisins

Preheat oven to 350F. Combine the eggs, sugar, molasses and vanilla together until well creamed. Stir in the zucchini, oil, salt and baking soda. Add in the flour, a cup at a time, until well blended. Sprinkle in the spices and fold in the nuts and the cranberries.

Butter and flour 2 loaf pans. Divide the batter between the two pans – each will be about half full which will give the loaves room to rise. Bake for 1 hour or until the done – when a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean. Cool in the pans for 10 minutes and then invert them onto racks until throughly cool. Makes 2 loaves.

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Made with whole wheat flour and wheat germ, they are wholesome and nutty, light even. The rise on these however is not high, but these are not leaden lumps of dough by any means. I found the recipe on The Oyster Evangelist and Joy calls for them to be made in a cast iron skillet. Most of the biscuits managed to fit into the pan, but the leftovers I just baked on a cookie sheet and I couldn’t tell the difference between the two.

whole wheat biscuits
(recipe adapted from The Oyster Evangelist)
1 1/2 c whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 c wheat germ
2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t kosher salt
6 T unsalted butter, cold
1/2 c yogurt
1/2 c milk

Preheat oven to 450F with a cast iron skillet inside the oven.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, wheat germ, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together. Add in small cubes of cold butter and use your fingers to work through the mixture until you have pea-sized lumps of dough. In a measuring cup, whisk together the yogurt and milk and add it to the flour mixture, using a wooden spoon to stir it all up into a sticky mass of dough.

Transfer the dough to a floured surface, dusting additional flour over top and flatten with your hands until it’s about an inch thick. Use biscuit cutters to cut out rounds, shaping out any leftover dough into discs and placing them on the hot cast iron skillet (or use a regular old cookie sheet). Bake for 15-20 minutes until the edges are dark.

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This bread is a quick bread, meaning there’s no yeast to bother with. It’s a snap to put together…if you can make a biscuit or a scone, this is no different. Plus, there are no eggs, so if you sub in the required non-dairies, you’ve got a great vegan bread. Normally, Irish soda bread is made with caraway seeds, but I didn’t have any on hand and decided to try fennel seeds instead. Definitely, a great choice. Along with the cinnamon, it made the bread super flavourful and definitely not bland or boring.

It is a dense bread, but I didn’t mind that one bit, and I definitely did not find this bread too dry. It was great smeared with cold butter the same day and it was even more wonderful toasted the following day. A dab of blackberry jam and a strong cup of coffee, this bread made for a filling breakfast. I don’t think I’ll have to wait for next St. Patrick’s day to make this again.

irish soda bread with fennel & cinnamon

(adapted from Buff Chickpea)
1 c vanilla yogurt
1/3 c skim milk
1/3 c apple-cider vinegar
1 t vanilla
3 1/2 c all-purpose flour, plus more for surface and dusting
2 1/2 t kosher salt
1 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
4 T cold butter, cut into bits
1 c wheat bran
2 T fennel seeds, lightly crushed
2 t ground cinnamon
1/2 c raisins

1/2 c dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 350F. In a small bowl, combine yogurt, milk, vanilla and apple cider and set aside to thicken. In a large bowl, mix together flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda. Add cold butter into the flour and use your hands to break it up until the mixture resembles coarse meal. With a wooden spoon, stir in wheat bran, fennel, cinnamon, and dried fruit.

Pour in milk/yogurt mixture and stir until the mixture starts to hold together into a ball. Dump the dough onto a floured surface and knead a few times. Pat into a dome-shaped lump and place onto a baking sheet covered with parchment paper or silpat. Sprinkle some flour on top and cut a cross into the loaf. Bake for about 1 hour or so, or until a cake tester inserted comes out clean. This is best eaten the same day…or toasted the next day.

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I made this for a New Years Eve feast, but we were too stuffed from eating mussels and carelessly imbibing way too many different types of cocktails, that the banana bread got lost in the shuffle. A true shame. However, the next day we gladly cut into the loaf and loved each and every slice. The banana bread brimmed with chocolate chips, pecans and caramelized ginger bits…and the gingery bits were the best part. When making the loaf, I realized that I was out of candied ginger, but I did find a tiny box of ginger chewy candy, so I subbed that instead. Instead of remaining a solid chunk, like normal candied ginger, it melted and bubbled and turned into a hidden golden lump of gingery caramel. It was wonderful and made the loaf extra special.

chocolate chip banana bread with ginger
(recipe adapted from Orangette)
1 c sugar
1 large egg
½ c unsalted butter, at room temperature
2 ripe medium-size bananas
3 T milk
2 c unbleached all-purpose flour
1 t baking powder
½ t baking soda
1 c chocolate chips
Small chunks of candied ginger or soft ginger candies, to taste
½ c chopped roasted pecans, optional

1. Preheat oven to 350F and grease and flour a loaf tin.

2. In a bowl, mix the sugar, egg and butter until fluffy. In another bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder and baking soda. In a small bowl, mash together the bananas and milk and set aside.

3. Add flour mixture to butter mixture in three parts, alternating with banana mixture in two parts, stirring until just combined. Stir in chocolate chips, ginger, and pecans.

4. Pour batter into prepared tin, smoothing the batter with the back of a spoon. Bake for 1 hour or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool for a few minutes and then turn loaf out onto a wire rack to cool.

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When I first tasted this bread, I though that maybe I should have increased the candied ginger instead of adding in raisins. The ginger flavour was there but not as gingery as I was hoping. The next day however, the flavours had really intensified and I’m glad I didn’t up the ginger ante. I decided to divide the batter into 2 loaf pans rather than make just one loaf. So I tightly wrapped the one destined for the freezer in plastic wrap to be enjoyed at a later date.

ginger-studded molasses bread
1 c whole wheat flour
1 c all-purpose flour
1 t baking powder
1 t ground ginger
1 t cinnamon
1/4 t ground cloves
1/2 t salt
1 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
2 eggs
1/3 c packed brown sugar
1 c buttermilk
1/2 c blackstrap molasses
1/4 c canola oil
1/4 c candied ginger, diced
1/4 c raisins (optional)

1. Preheat oven to 350F. In a mixing bowl, combine the flours, spices, salt, baking powder and baking soda together. Set aside.

2. In another large bowl, mix the brown sugar, eggs, buttermilk, molasses and oil together. Beat in the flour mixture and then fold in the ginger and raisins.

3. Pour batter into a greased and floured bread tin and bake for 50 minutes, or until tester comes out clean.

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This cornbread isn’t too sweet or heavy. Its got a nice bit of texture from the frozen corn and the cheese is always a nice touch! Plus, it’s super quick to whip up a batch in time for dinner. Don’t have buttermilk, just use milk plus a teaspoon of vinegar for the same effect (or mix a little plain yogurt into the milk). Leftovers can be eaten cold from the fridge, but I like it best heated up in the oven for a bit just so the sides can get nice and crisp.

cheesy cornbread
1 c all purpose flour
1 c yellow cornmeal
2 t baking powder
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
3/4 c + 1/4 c grated cheddar cheese
1 1/4 c buttermilk
1/2 c frozen corn
1/4 c maple syrup
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 c canola oil

Preheat oven to 400. Mix together the first 6 ingredients, flour to 3/4 cup of cheese, reserving the rest of the cheese as a topping. In another bowl, combine the wet ingredients, buttermilk to oil and pour into dry mixture, careful not to over mix. Pour batter into a greased 9×12 pan and top with remaining cheese. Bake for 18-20 minutes or until tester comes out clean.

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