By LAURA GROSS-HIGGINS
This time of year, most everyone is busy. Whether you are working or retired, there are cards to write and send, presents to buy (and send), food to get ready, and gatherings to attend. Since prices are higher for everything, it makes sense to consider something less expensive as a gift.
What can you give those people you cherish but whom you don’t have the faintest idea what they want? In this day and age, we all have so many things. Most of us at this time of life have most of the things we need.
I like to bake, so my go-to is often a baked good. They are often less expensive to make ,and I am putting my time into it, too. I am not talking here about something big. Because the other thing about the holidays is that we are eating, eating, eating. And your recipient may be cooking and eating, too.
So, what is a gift that will show your appreciation but not add to the waist/waste that can happen this time of year. In addition to baking, I have often given small jars of preserves or savory jams or chutneys. But here I am concentrating on small loaf or quick breads. Some quick breads are tea breads, which are English in origin, but specifically have dried fruit in them. Quick breads use baking powder or soda for leavening. They don’t need time to rise like yeast breads.
What is great about quick breads as gifts is that you can find small disposable aluminum loaf pans at the grocery stores or even online at King Arthur Flour (It sells light paper ones you can use in the oven and then gift them in those pans). And though there are recipes that are specifically for quick breads, a recipe for a pound cake or a dense fruit-based cake can be portioned out into smaller pans to accomplish the same purpose. Just be sure to adjust the cooking time.
And after they have cooked and cooled, I double-wrap them: first in plastic wrap, then in aluminum foil, if they are not in a disposable pan, and tie a festive ribbon around them. Just add a holiday tag and your gift is ready.
So here are some recipes I would like to share that have worked for me:
Apple Sauce Bread
(adapted from “The New Carry-Out Cuisine” by Phyllis Meras, with Linda Glick Conway)
1.5x recipe makes 5 small quick loaves
2 c. all-purpose flour
½ tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. baking soda
½ tsp. cinnamon
½ tsp. salt
½ c. unsalted butter (1 stick)
1-½ c. sugar
2 eggs, beaten
1 c. applesauce
½ c. buttermilk or sour milk or yogurt
1 tsp vanilla
1 c. chopped nuts (pecans)
9×5-inch greased loaf pan
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease the pan or pans.
Sift together the dry ingredients and set aside.
Cream the butter and sugar and then add the eggs and applesauce.
Alternately add the dry ingredients and the buttermilk/yogurt. Then stir in vanilla and the nuts. Pour into prepared pan(s). Bake 50 minutes to an hour until a cake tester or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
In the small loaf pans, bake it for less time. I check at 45 minutes.
Here is a Chocolate Zucchini Cake recipe that I have made as a quick bread. It is dense, moist and chocolatey—perfect for any chocolate lovers on your gift list. And you can bake it as a cake if you so desire!
Chocolate Zucchini Cake (or Bread)
(Garden Way’s “Joy of Gardening Cookbook”)
4 oz. unsweetened chocolate
½ c. vegetable oil
½ c. butter, at room temperature
2 c. sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1 TBSP vanilla
2 c. sifted all-purpose flour
¹/³ c. cocoa
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
¹/³ c. buttermilk, sour cream or plain yogurt
3 c. coarsely grated zucchini or summer squash (undrained)
½ c. chopped nuts
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour either two 9-inch cake pans or two 9-inch loaf pans. (You can also use 4 to 6 mini loaf pans.)
Melt the chocolate and oil in a small pan or in the microwave.
Cream the butter until light, add the sugar, eggs and vanilla. Beat well. Add the melted chocolate and mix well.
Sift together the dry ingredients and stir them into the batter alternatively with the buttermilk. Mix the zucchini and nuts into the batter.
Put into the prepared pans. Bake on the middle shelf for 40 minutes if baking a cake; if in bread pans, check at 40 minutes; a toothpick inserted in the batter should come out clean. For the smaller loaf pans, I would check at 30 minutes.
Cool completely before frosting with whipped cream or a cream cheese frosting for the cake. If you have it as a bread, it doesn’t need a thing.
And finally, here is a recipe for a Cranberry Coffee Cake that was included in one of the cookbooks published by the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. I adapted it for a quick bread. I added the lemon curd because I love the combination! Again, you have the choice of how to use the recipe. Cake or quick bread? And remember you can freeze these, too. Just let them cool, then double-wrap them and put them in the freezer.
Hope that your holidays are filled with good things!
Cranberry Coffee Cake
(Adapted from “The Fine Arts Cookbook I”)
1 large cake (10-inch tube pan) or 4 small quick loaves
¼ lb (1 stick) butter
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
2 c. flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
1 c. sour cream or plain whole fat yogurt
1 tsp almond extract
1 can cranberry sauce and Bonne Maman Lemon Curd
Topping:
½ c. nuts, chopped
2 tsp sugar
½ tsp cinnamon
Grease the tube pan or pans. Set aside.
Cream butter, gradually adding sugar and cream well. Add the eggs and mix well. Sift the dry ingredients together and add alternately with sour cream or yogurt into which you have stirred the almond extract. Pour first into the greased tube pan a layer of batter, then a layer of cranberry sauce *and lemon curd, with batter as the top layer.
Sprinkle with topping mixture. Swirl with knife.
Bake in 350 degree oven for 55 minutes in a tube pan, 35 to 40 minutes in smaller pans (check at 35 minutes).
*If you use the cranberry/lemon combination, you don’t have to use up the can or jar. Just eyeball the amounts. I dotted the layer with alternating dollops of both.
This last recipe is for peach bread. You can make it with fresh, frozen or canned peaches.
Peach Bread
(“Key Lime Pie Murder” by Joanne Fluke)
Makes two 9-inch loaves or 6 smaller ones
¾ cup softened butter (1-½ sticks)
1 pkg (8 oz) softened cream cheese (brick kind)
2 cups granulated sugar
2 beaten eggs
½ tsp almond extract
1-½ c. mashed peaches (fresh, canned or frozen)
3 cups flour
½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
1 cup chopped blanched almonds
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Coat the inside of two loaf pans (bread pans) with nonstick cooking spray (or Crisco or butter).
Beat the butter, cream cheese and sugar together until they are nice and fluffy. Add the beaten eggs and almond extract and mix in.
Peel and slice the peaches (if fresh) or drain them and pat dry if you use prepared peaches or canned ones). Mash them in a food processor with the steel blade or puree them in a blender, or squash them with a potato masher until they are pureed. Measure out 1-½ cups and add to the mixing bowl. Stir well.
In another bowl, measure out the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Mix them together.
Gradually add the flour mixture to the peach mixture, beating at a low speed until everything is incorporated. Mix in the almonds by hand.
Spoon the peach batter into the prepared pans.
Bake at 350 degrees for one hour or until a long toothpick or skewer inserted in the center comes out clean. If the top browns a bit too fast, tent a piece of foil over the top of the loaves.
You can bake this in 6 smaller loaf pans, filling them half full. For smaller pans, bake about 45 minutes.
Cool on a rack in the pan. Loosen the edges after 20 minutes and turn the loaf out onto a wire rack.