Category: King Arthur Retirement Quest

Well isn’t that a cheery title for a blog post? We are living through something that seems unique in the modern era. Here in the UK, as of the date this is written, many working from home, leisure establishments are closing as of tonight and waves of panicked shoppers are emptying the supermarkets as fast the staff can restock.

My ‘normal’ supply chain for baking supplies is not supermarket dependent; I tend to bulk buy flour of various kinds and mail order speciality ingredients. This for both cost and certainty of supply – I find that supermarkets are increasingly purveying ‘meals’ and processed food and much less likely to have anything but the most commonly used basic ingredients. And those only in smaller packages.

I’m facing some supply chain issues as those stockpiling are turning to alternative suppliers – including mine.

I’m embracing this challenge and will try to use up some of the niche and speciality ingredients in my store cupboards. The likelihood that you will have the same weird assortment of ingredients is very low, but improvisation and imagination are your best friends. I’ll try to describe what can be substituted and how.

First up, buttermilk rye rolls to use molasses, rye flour and potato flour (not starch) and a limited amount of bread and whole wheat flour. The recipe is based on one in King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking.

The flour mix is flexible except for the quantity of potato flour. This is different from ‘potato starch’. Potato flour is dried potatoes ground very fine. If you don’t have potato flour you can substitute a cup of mashed potatoes and reduce the buttermilk by half initially. Keep an eye on the dough, if it seems dry add more buttermilk a tablespoon at a time. Otherwise, flex the flour components to your taste. This version is a little lighter than the Davinator’s favourite version which has much more rye flour.

I kneaded in my new mixer, the Anskrarum Assistent. It’s cool, it rotates the bowl not the hook and I love to watch it. You can hand knead or machine knead. Get the dough smooth and glossy.

Time to dig deep in the store cupboards and make up some yummy baked goods.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 285 mls of buttermilk, heated to lukewarm. If no buttermilk, sour 280 mls of milk with 5 mls of lemon juice, leave it ‘curdle’ for 10 minutes.
• 60 grams of unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons molasses or black treacle
• 60 grams whole wheat flour
• 110 grams rye flour
• 180 grams bread flour or plain white flour
• 2 teaspoons caraway seeds
• 35 grams potato flour
• 2 teaspoons instant dry yeast
  
• Topping – 60 grams of butter, melted

Instructions

1. Combine all the ingredients except the topping butter in the bowl. Mix well then knead until smooth and glossy. Cover with a damp towel, cling film or a shower cap.
2. Allow the dough to rise for a couple of hours. It may not double but it should get puffy and elastic.
3. Turn the dough out onto a lightly oiled surface. Separate into 12 or 16 pieces. I made 16 rolls of approximately 50 grams each. The dough will weigh about 800 grams.
4. Prepare a baking pan – I used a 30 cm (12 inch) round tin, lined it with paper. Parchment works best.
5. Flatten each piece into a rough circle. Fold from the outside to the middle to make a little bundle that looks vaguely like a Chinese dumpling. Turn over and create surface tension by rolling it under your hand or between your hands. Place in the prepared pan, should not touch each other at this point.
6. Cover the pan and allow a second rise of 2 to 3 hours. Preheat the oven to 170C (160fan) when nearly ready to rise.
7. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. Temperature test or tap to hear a hollow sound.
8. Leave the rolls in the pan while you melt the butter. Brush butter over the top, twice then remove from the pan to complete cooling.

These rolls make great sandwiches in the larger version or little buns with cheese in the smaller version. They basically disappeared in my house while still warm each time I made them.

Keep well everyone. Be of good cheer and be good to each other.

Send requests. I’m flexing my baking skills to avoid wasting anything. Let me know if you’ve got any strange ingredients you want to use yp. Thanks for reading, commenting and baking my recipes.

Carrot cake takes misuse of vegetables to new heights. Carrots, a starchy questionable vegetable to start with, become the foundation of sweet rich lovely textured cake in this recipe from King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking. If you’re interested in carrots as a vegetable, try and find heritage carrots – before the Dutch made them orange and sweet. But we’re going to make them unhealthy, so the ordinary supermarket carrots are fine.

Carrot cake is a favourite wherever you take it. If I’m transporting the cake, I over bake it slightly. It changes the texture to more chewy but it’s just as tasty. You can make a vegan version of this cake as well – substitutions are below.

My recipe calls for nuts, coconut and raisins – these can all be omitted, none are essential to the structure of the cake. If you make the classic cream cheese icing, I suggest using Philadelphia Cream Cheese. I’m not a fan of American processed food but Philly has some magic ingredients that keeps the icing from getting lumpy.

No specialist equipment is required for this recipe but a mini chopper or a food processor is highly recommended for the carrots. For the best texture, I suggest fine grating the carrots. Smaller pieces makes the cake cut better.

I bake this recipe as a sheet cake in two square cake pans: 15 cms (6 inches) by 15 cms (bake for 45 mins) It also makes 2 x 23 cm (9 inch) round layers (bake for 40 mins) or a 33 cm (13 inch) by 23 cm (9 inch) sheet or single layer cake (bake for 45 mins). I line pans with parchment paper or pre-cut parchment liners – I never grease pans.

Bake away.

Recipe

Cake

• 4 large eggs
• 295 grams (10.5 ounces) of vegetable oil
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 295 grams (10.5 ounces) caster (white) sugar
• 90 grams (3.25 ounces) brown sugar
• 225 grams (8 ounces) whole wheat flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 tablespoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 250 grams (8.75 ounces) finely grated carrot
• 100 grams (3.75 ounces) pecans or walnuts, chopped
• 85 grams (3 ounces) shredded or flaked coconut
• 340 grams (12 ounces) raisins

Cream cheese icing

• 85 grams (3 ounces) unsalted butter, softened, at room temperature
• 225 grams (8 ounces) Philadelphia cream cheese, softened, at room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 450 (1 lb) icing (confectioners) sugar, sifted
• 90 grams (3.25 ounces) chopped candied ginger (optional)
• 110 grams (4 ounces) chopped nuts, walnuts or pecans

Vegan option: use 260 grams of unsweetened applesauce instead of the eggs in the cake. Try this recipe for vegan vanilla icing.

Instructions

1. Prep your pan or pans. Preheat the oven to 350F.
2. Grate the carrots. Chop the nuts. Combine all in a bowl and put to one side (stir ins).
3. Whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and spices in a separate bowl (dry ingredients).
4. Beat the eggs (or applesauce) in the mixing bowl of your stand mixer. Add the oil while the mixer is running. Add the vanilla and the sugars and beat until smooth.
5. Mix the dry ingredients into the batter until well combined. Don’t over beat.
6. Add the stir ins. Scoop batter into prepared pans.
7. Bake for the amount of time appropriate to the pan size. Use a toothpick to test, if it comes out clean the cake is done. Cool on a rack when done, then dust with confectioners sugar or use the cream cheese icing. Decorate the top with ginger or nuts.

I hope you enjoy the blog. Please ask questions and send comments. If you bake any of the recipes, please post a photo and tag @mamadolson on Instagram or Twitter.

This is an updated version of a previous post. Working through my store cupboard of less well used ingredients.

Everyone (well every American cook) is likely to have a can of pumpkin rattling around in the cupboard and god only knows how old it might be. If you don’t have canned or tinned then you can make this recipe with just about any squash except courgette (zucchini to los Americanos).

Oven bake the squash – split, remove seeds, brush surfaces with vegetable oil and roast until soft. Then scrape the inside out and weigh. One butternut squash should make about the right amount. Or peel, seed, cut into chunks and boil until soft. Drain and mash. You don’t need exactly the ‘right’ amount. If you’re within 20% plus or minus you should still be okay.

Don’t have the ‘right’ ingredients in your cupboard? Here are some flex suggestions and there’s a vegan version also.

Flour: any old plain wheat flour will do. Not self rising but white or whole wheat and any mixture of those. I also mixed in 10% by weight of potato flour.

Sugar: any brown sugar will do, even those dried up lumps you’ve found in the cupboard. You can reduce the sugar by 25% and still get a great result.

Spices: use what you have, spices add to the complexity of the flavour but not the basic taste or structure.

Nuts, raisins, chocolate: any or all can be omitted. Any dried fruit can be used, cut into raisin sized chunks. I didn’t use any chocolate in the version pictured here.

Vegan version:
– use 1/2 mashed ripe banana per egg,
– use vegetable shortening (trex or crisco) in same quantity
– reduce sugar by 20%

This is a straightforward ‘quick’ bread designed to use one can of pumpkin adapted from a King Arthur recipe. Depending on what pans you have:

• 3 x one pound loaves (small loaf pan, 400gms).
• 1 x two pound loaf (large loaf pan) and 1 x one pound loaf
• 2 x one pound loaves and 6 to 9 muffins.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 340 grams whole wheat flour (I used 60 grams of potato flour and 280 gram of mixed quality whole wheat flour)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 tsp salt
• 3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
• 3/4 tsp ground cloves
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 170 grams unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
• 320 grams brown sugar (light or dark)
• 70 grams caster sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 can of pumpkin puree (Not pumpkin pie filling) or (400 grams of cooked pureed squash of your choice)
• 115 grams of chopped nuts (walnut or pecan)
• 170 grams of ‘mix in’ I used raisins but any dried fruit chopped to the right size will do. Substitute a portion for chocolate chips for a decadent effect.

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 170C (350f) if making smaller loaves or muffins. 180C if making larger loaves. Prep your loaf pans or muffin tins – I use paper liners for my loaf pans as well as muffin tins.
2. Chop the nuts and fruit. Combine with the chocolate chips if using. Put to one side.
3. Combine the butter and the sugars. This can be done by hand but easier in the mixer. Beat in the eggs one at a time, scraping the bowl to ensure everything is combined. Then beat in the vanilla and the pumpkin or squash.
4. Whisk the dry ingredients together: flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg.
5. Stir your fruit, nuts and chocolate chips into the dry ingredients. Coating them with flour seems to distribute them more evenly throughout the batter.
6. Add the dry ingredients in three batches to the butter/sugar mix. Don’t over beat, but make sure all the dry ingredients are moistened.
7. Put the batter in your prepared pans. I like to use a trigger ice cream scoop, this batter does not pour well.
8. A large loaf will need an hour in the oven. Small loaves about 45 minutes and a muffin tin 35 minutes. Check the temperature – should be above 90C. The bread or muffins should look ‘dry’ across the top.
9. Take the bread out of the oven and place the pan or pans on the rack to cool for 15 minutes. Then remove from the pans and allow to cool completely.

And then enjoy. We like to eat this for breakfast with cream cheese. Please let me know if you’re baking the recipes. Thanks for reading, following, sharing. Happy baking.

Ginger snaps for grown ups.

This recipe is for a good friend of mine who insists ‘I can’t cook’. This banana bread recipe is made with whole wheat flour and walnuts and has a lovely depth of flavour. And if you can’t cook – your five year old should be able to make this bread (with appropriate adult supervision). It’s a great introduction to the joy of whole grain baking.

We’re back to my retirement quest – cooking every recipe in the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking cookbook. As a quest, it’s completely lacking in organisation and I’m randomly skipping through the book and baking what looks good. Today I was inspired by a request for ‘recipes for someone who doesn’t cook’ and the Davinator’s excess banana purchases. This banana bread recipe is best with the ultra-ripe about to be thrown away bananas – you know that icky black mottled soft to the touch banana. If your bananas aren’t ripe enough, put them in a brown paper back with an apple. Fold the top of the bag closed and leave it overnight. This should convert a ripe banana to an ultra-ripe one.

Basically, the spotty banana to the left is just about ripe enough but if you can bear it – ripen it until more black than yellow. (I forgot to take pictures of the ultra-ripe bananas before I peeled and mashed them). Enough musings on bananas – on to the recipe.

Recipe

Ingredients

• 60 grams (2 ounces) chopped walnuts
• 110 grams (4 ounces) unsalted butter
• 105 grams (3.75 ounces) brown sugar (light or dark)
• 3/4 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking SODA not baking powder)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 340 – 350 grams (12 ounces) ripe mashed banana (4 or 5 normal sized European bananas – 3 or 4 normal sized American ones)
• 85 grams (3 ounces) honey
• 2 large eggs
• 230 grams (8 ounces) whole wheat flour

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 170C (160C fan) or 350F. Prep your loaf pan or pans. I use two small (450 gram) (1 pound) loaf pans and line them with paper. If you’re using a single loaf pan it needs to be a genuine 9 x 5 or 900 gram (2 pound) pan. I prefer to line with paper but you can also lightly grease with butter.
2. Microwave the butter for about 45 seconds in a microwave safe bowl. Set it to one side.
3. Chop the walnuts. I go back and forth on chopping nuts. This is a small quantity and both taste and texture say ‘chop by hand’. Leave ready in a small bowl.
4. Peel the bananas and mash with a fork or a potato masher.
5. Combine the butter, sugar, soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. Beat well by hand.
6. Add the bananas, honey and eggs, stir well to incorporate into a smooth batter.
7. Add the flour and the chopped nuts and again stir until smooth.
8. Divide between the loaf pans. If using two – you want about 480 to 490 grams of batter in each pan.
9. Two loaves – bake for 40 minutes. At about 30 minutes check the loaves and if they seem too brown on the top, cover loosely with foil. Using your trusty thermometer – the internal temperature should be around 85C.
10. One loaf – bake for 50 minutes. At about 35 minutes check the loaf and cover with foil if the top is looking brown and dry.

This bread smells absolutely delicious when cooking. Try and let it cool before cutting. Enjoy and bake on!

These brownies are greeted with cries of delight anywhere I take them. They look dark and dangerous and taste amazing. Made with brown sugar and whole wheat flour though, you can almost imagine they are healthy. There is a little trick to making the chocolate top shine. One of my favourite recipes from King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking.

This recipe is quick and fairly easy. The hardest part is leaving the brownies uncut overnight to let the flavour develop. I use a loose bottomed pan and line the pan with parchment paper. There’s a couple of methods for lining; the ‘approved’ collar method which you can see at this link or my super fast ‘loincloth’ method.

The loin cloth method can result in some brownie stuck in the corners but has the benefit of speed and simplicity. Basically, it’s two pieces of parchment that cross over. Cut two pieces of parchment; one slightly wider than the width and one slightly wider than the length. Each piece should be long enough to cover the bottom and come up the sides with extra roughly 3 times width (or length) of the bottom. Lay the ‘wide’ piece in first and crease the bit of overlap in the corners. Then do the ‘length’ piece, doing likewise with the bit of overlap in the corners. Not always perfect coverage but the brownies will still come out easily.

Ingredients

225 grams unsalted butter

425 grams light or dark brown sugar

65 grams Dutch process cocoa powder

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon strong instant coffee granules

1 tablespoon vanilla extract

4 large eggs

170 grams whole wheat flour

350 grams chocolate chips – dark chocolate, semi sweet (for Americans traditional Nestle Toll House morsels) or milk chocolate if you’ve got a real sweet tooth

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 170C, 150C if you’re using a fan oven. If you have the option, don’t use the fan in the oven. These brownies do like a more gentle bake.
2. Line your pan or pans. The original recipe calls for 9″ by 13″ (23 cm by 33 cm). I prefer a square pan for this recipe and sometimes make a small square (15 cm by 15 cm) and a medium square (23 cm by 23 cm). If you don’t have exactly the right size pan, do some arithmetic. Here’s how to solve this equation: the area of pan (length times width) is 23 cm x 33 cm = 759 sq cms. My two smaller square pans: 15 x 15 = 225 sq cms and 23 x 23 = 529. 225 + 529 = 754 sq cms.
3. Place the butter in a microwave bowl. Melt the butter, then stir in the brown sugar. Put the butter and sugar back in the microwave and heat it to the point of bubbling. I do this in 30 second bursts to keep in from making a big sticky mess in the microwave. Heating the butter and sugar this second time gives the top it’s beautiful shiny look.
4. Mix the coffee granules with a tiny bit of hot water to make a paste.
5. Add the coffee paste, cocoa, baking powder, salt and vanilla to the butter and sugar mixture. Whisk together and check the temperature with your finger. It should feel like hot bath water. If (improbably) it’s too hot, leave it for five minutes.
6. Combine the flour and the chocolate chips. Coating the chips in the flour helps to distribute them more evenly in the batter.
7. Whisk in the eggs, then add the flour and chocolate chip mixture. Stir well to combine, scraping up from the bottom of the bowl to make sure all the mixture is incorporated.
8. Put the batter in your pan or pans and place them in oven. Bake about 30 minutes until your cake tester gives you crumbs. The top should look set and start to crack.
9. Leave overnight if you can or at least until completely cooled.

Enjoy.

Recipe #2 from from Chapter 2 ‘Quick Breads’ , King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking.

I made this recipe three times. Came out much the same each time. I have concluded I don’t like corn muffins. I shouldn’t be surprised by this because I don’t really like polenta, grits or corn bread. I’ll eat corn tortillas, corn chips and corn on the cob but apparently baked goods with corn meal are not my thing. However, I’ve mastered the recipe and share it for the sake of completeness. And for those readers who might like corn meal baked goods.

Important – corn meal is the yellow stuff. Corn starch or corn flour (UK) are white and primarily used as thickening agents. This recipe calls for corn meal. You might struggle to find it in your local supermarket but as always – the internet is your friend. Buy one bag, you may find yourself not a big fan of corn meal.

The Davinator (never met a baked good he didn’t eat) liked these and I ate them also although he did compare their texture to scones. My second and third attempts produced a fluffier outcome – less dense, more muffin like – but the taste has remained constant. I’ve modified the original recipe and it’s below with my adjustments. In both metric and imperial measurements.

No mocking but I did use a piping bag to fill the muffin cups because I wanted to make some mini-muffins, much better for taking to my charity job at Smart Works. A muffin small enough to eat in one bit is guilt free after all.

Ingredients

170 grams (6 ounces) – unsalted butter, melted

190 grams (6 3/4 ounces) – white flour

275 grams (9 3/4 ounces) – whole yellow cornmeal

50 grams (1 3/4 ounces) – caster sugar (granulated)

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon baking powder

2 large eggs

340 mls (12 ounces) – milk

50 grams (3 tablespoons) – honey

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 200C (180 fan) (400F). Melt the butter and have ready.
2. Prepare your muffin tin – this makes a dozen normal sized muffins or 6 normal sized and a dozen mini muffins.
3. Whisk together the sugar, flour, cornmeal , baking powder and salt in your mixing bowl.
4. Using the beater attachment, turn the mixer on and add the butter as the mixer is going.
5. Do the same with the milk and the honey.
6. Beat the eggs in one at a time, don’t overbeat.
7. Fill the piping bag. Or use your ice cream trigger scoop and fill the muffin tins.
8. Normal sized muffins need 20 to 23 minutes in the oven. 12 minutes is sufficient for the mini muffins.

These are nice with butter and jam (what isn’t when you think about it) but also good with peanut butter and or Nutella. Bake away and enjoy.

It’s still January (just barely). I’m back to the King Arthur Whole Grain Baking quest after a busy and tumultuous holiday season. Also, I started my non-exec and ‘consulting’ job. But that’s in my parallel universe. Here, it’s all about that bread.

I was trying to be methodical and start at the beginning of the cookbook but I fell at the first fence. The first chapter is ‘breakfast’. It’s essentially pancakes, waffles, crepes and granola. The problem here is that the Davinator prefers savoury breakfast – unless it’s a croissant and then he’s all over it with the butter and jam. So, I parked the first chapter until I have keener ‘consumers’. Maybe pancake day…..

I’ve jumped to the quick bread chapter which has twelve muffin recipes. And decided I must go in strict order. So, it’s ‘Sour Cream Muffins’ to start. Here we go.

I have, however, a couple of minor criticisms of the KA Whole Grain Baking cookbook.

The first is that in their quest to make whole grain taste good, the recipes call for an array of specialised ingredients. A few of these are practically impossible to find in the UK – so if I can’t get it, I’m assuming readers will be unable to source. I’ve decided to ‘substitute’ those difficult ingredients. If substitution doesn’t work, I’ll punt on those recipes until I can get my hands on the real thing. One thing I couldn’t find -‘white whole wheat flour’. I tried a mix of white and whole wheat flour and that came out fine in this recipe.

The second is that the recipes are tailored to American taste buds. After I’ve made them the first time, I start reducing the sugar. In some recipes, I’ve cut the sugar by 1/3. I’m careful with this because sugar also affects the basic chemistry of baked goods, beyond making it sweet.

I made these muffins with frozen blueberries and I suspect they would be fine with any frozen or fresh fruit. My frozen blueberries (from Sainsburys I confess) were on the large size, so I would probably try smaller berries or smaller pieces of fruit the next time.

Recipe

Ingredients – makes 12 muffins

150 grams (5 ounces) whole wheat flour

140 grams (4 1/3 ounces) plain white flour (not self raising)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

55 grams (2 ounces, 4 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted

180 grams (6 1/3 ounces) of sugar

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

225 mls (8 fluid ounces) of sour cream or full fat greek yoghurt

220 grams (8 ounces) frozen blueberries

Instructions

1. Combine the first five ingredients; flour to salt, in a bowl. Stir together.
2. Put the melted butter in the bowl for your mixer. Add the sugar. Beat to combine (don’t you love the melted butter trick).
3. Scrape down the bowl, beat in the eggs one a time and combine well.
4. Add the vanilla and the sour cream. Beat until incorporated.
5. Add the dry ingredients from step 1. Mix on low speed until just combined. (Do not overbeat quick bread, it will punish you).
6. Stir in the frozen fruit. Make sure that the bottom of the batter has mixed in properly.
7. Cover the bowl and refrigerate for an hour. You could leave it longer but I think the frozen fruit will deteriorate if you leave it for too long.
8. Preheat the oven to 200C (180C fan) (375F).
9. Prep a muffin pan with paper liners lightly coated with non-stick spray or grease the tin.
10. Fill the muffin pan – I use my ice cream scoop. Put a generous scoop full in each muffin cup.
11. Bake for 22 to 26 minutes. They will look lovely and brown on the top when complete.
12. Cool for 5 minutes in the tin, then tip out to cool on a rack or on the counter top. Don’t let them cool in the tin; that’s how they get hard crust on the sides and bottom.

Enjoy. One recipe down, eleven to go.

These muffins are the first recipe I made with my King Arthur Whole Grain Baking cookbook and they remain a favourite.  One of these muffins is the perfect breakfast for busy people.  The cookbook itself was a gift from my elder sister, Rachael.    It’s a gift that keeps giving and has given me and my family lots of joy.

This is a muffin recipe and it really is one of those that anyone can bake.  It’s full of fruit, vegetables and seeds as well as whole grains.  I’ve done the ingredients in metric (except for teaspoons and tablespoons). I have done the instructions in the order that I do them – not the order they are in the cookbook.

Ingredients

225 grams whole wheat flour

210 grams light or dark  brown sugar

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon salt

200 grams of carrots – grated

2 large tart apples – grated

85 grams  raisins

45 grams desiccated coconut

45 grams slivered almonds

60 grams sunflower seeds

3 eggs

130 mls corn oil

55 mls orange juice

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 190C (or 170C fan).  Put paper liners in a 12 cup muffin tin.  Line a small (450 grams) loaf tin.  You might not need it, but I always do.  You’ll see why below.
2. Prep the dry ingredients.  Combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger and salt in a big bowl.
3. Prepare the carrots.  I don’t peel the carrots and I’m not precise about the amount.  I cut off the tops and bottoms, weight the carrots and err on the side of more carrots not less.   I use a small electric chopper (like this one from Amazon – I actually have 2).  The electric chopper is a great gadget and is priceless for people who use lots of fresh fruit and vegetables.  Chop the carrots small and throw them in a medium bowl.
4. Prepare the apples.  I use two big green Granny Smith apples.  I core them – like the carrots, I never peel them. Chop the apples into big chunks and then chop them small, like the carrots.  You don’t need to be too precise with the apples either and I always err on the side of more apples.   Put the apples in with the carrots.
5. Add the coconut, almonds, sunflower seeds and raisins to the bowl with the apples and carrots.  Stir it together and then add the contents to the dry ingredients.  Mix well using a big wooden spoon – DO NOT USE YOUR MIXER.
6. Beat the eggs in a separate medium bowl with a fork until they are well mixed.  Add the corn oil, orange juice and vanilla to the eggs.  Stir together and add it to the dry ingredients and the fruit vegetable and seed mixture.  Mix well with your wooden spoon!
7. Time to fill your muffin tins.  I use my trigger ice cream scoop (like this one on Amazon).  A generously filled scoop is perfect for a muffin cup.  Don’t overfill the muffin pan.  You may well have enough left over dough for a small loaf.
8. Bake the muffins for 23 to 25 minutes; the tops should look dry.  If you make a loaf as well, that needs to be baked for about 35 minutes at the same heat.
9. Take the muffins out of the oven, leave them in tin for about 5 minutes, then tip them out onto a cooling rack.   The muffins are sturdy; they travel well, they freeze well and kids love them.  The kids never notice the healthy bits.

Sturdy muffins that travel well.

It’s called  a quick bread because the leavening agent is baking power but it is genuinely quick to prepare,  to cook and to clean up.  And if your vegetable garden goes into courgette overdrive – you can use the courgettes and make the family happy at the same time.

Whole wheat courgette bread – zucchini for los Americanos.

Ingredients

Dry:

• 225 grams whole wheat flour
• 120 grams plain white flour or bread flour (NOT self raising)
• 150 grams caster sugar
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

Wet:

• 2 large eggs
• 170 mls milk
• 60 mls vegetable oil (corn or rapeseed, not olive oil)

Other:

• 350 grams grated courgette
• 85 grams raisins
• 60 grams chopped walnuts
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest (see top tip below)

Instructions

Preheat your oven.  175C non-fan/160C fan.  Prepare a large loaf pan (900 gram/2 lb/23x13cms) or two small loaf pans (450gram/1lb/12×6).   Either grease with a hard fat (butter or lard) or line with paper.

Whisk together the dry ingredients (from whole wheat flour down to nutmeg) in a large bowl.  Make sure they are well mixed.

Prep the ‘other’ ingredients and put them in a bowl (don’t need to mix).

A top tip; you can buy lemon zest and keep it in the freezer or use Dr Oetker or another substitute.  Sometimes its just too much to have to have a lemon in the fridge to zest.   Another suggestion; if you do a lot of baking with nuts and vegetables, you might want to get a mini-chopper like this one.   No, I’m not sponsored by Amazon, it’s just where I do my appliance shopping.  I find it much easier to use and to clean up if I’m not working with big quantities.

Put all the ‘wet’ ingredients in a bowl or a big mixing jug and whisk to blend smoothly.  Pour the wet into the dry and mix well.  Then add the ‘other’ ingredients to the mixture and stir until incorporated.  Scoop the batter into the prepared pan and place in the oven.

Bake for an hour and then check the temperature (if more than 90C you’re done and out it comes).  If you don’t have a thermometer, if the top looks wet and wobbles, it’s not done.   It’s unlikely to be done after an hour – tent the top loosely with foil and bake for another 10 to 15 minutes.

Remove from the oven when it’s done, cool in the pan for 15 minutes or so.  Then remove from the pan and cool completely on a wire rack.

Top tips and gadgets

Loaf pan liners are very convenient and speed prep, cooking and clean up.  I use an ice cream scoop with a trigger to fill the pan.  The mini-chopper comes into its own for chopping nuts – buying pre-chopped nuts is expensive plus they get stale. But chopping your own by hand is too time consuming for me.   Prepared lemon zest is also a big time saver and means you can keep lemons in the ‘pantry’ (zest and bottled juice)  rather than needing fresh for baking.

Recipe count

47 quick bread recipes; 4 completed! OMG what was I thinking.