Zucchini Bread

I happened upon this recipe, which I modified slightly from Paula Deen, when I had an overabundance of zucchinis to consume from last year's farm share (more about farm shares in another post). It is a simple and tasty quickbread recipe that will yield 2-9x5" loaves, plenty to eat and share!

Banana Bread

I have always been on the lookout for a definitive banana bread recipe, and I've finally found it in the form of my friend Lauren's MIL's recipe (which I have since learned is the banana bread recipe from the 1970 Betty Crocker's Cookbook (the red one with the wheel of food on the cover). It's not what I normally think of when I think of banana bread -- that is to say a slightly spicy bread filled with nuts. In contrast, it is pale, white, devoid of spice (although you can certainly add spice in), and also devoid of mix-ins (which again, you can always add back in). It also has, to my thinking, a lot of baking powder in it, and I was expecting there to be an aftertaste. But I tried the recipe because I trust my friend Lauren's opinion since she too is an avid baker. And to my great surprise, I preferred this recipe of plain banana bread to any other that I've tried yet, and I think you will too. It is fluffy and pure, with a banana taste that hits you right in the face.

I've made this bread plain, with chocolate chips, and with cinnamon and pecans, and that is the order of my preference -- plain, chocolate chip, and then nuts/spice. I'd highly recommend making it plain the first time you try it, and then you can always change it up later if your tastebuds want something extra.

Cinnamon Apple Quick Bread

I am waaaaaaay behind on the posts I had hoped to make. I still have an entire summer's worth of farm-share related blogs to get to, but I'm going to not even think about those until after this holiday season is done.

Although I love yeast breads, the joy and simplicity of a simple quick bread never ceases to amaze me. After I went on my annual apple-picking excursion, I wanted to try some new things with my apples. The first recipe I settled on was an apple quick bread, which is a variation of Paula Deen's zucchini bread, which I became well-acquainted with this summer during my farm share, when I had zucchinis coming out of my ears. At the time, I thought the base would be good for other fruit or veggie mix-ins, and I was right. With a little tweaking, I made this recipe work beautifully for apples.

But first, a little interlude (or skip down for more baking!):

Halloween is my absolute favorite holiday, hand's down. Not only do I love Halloween-themed treats, but I love Halloween tradition as well.  Last year, around this time, I paired my Halloween and Fall-themed posts with little blurbs on the background of some common Halloween tradition and/or lore, including the history of Halloween and trick-or-treating, vampires, zombies, jack-o-lanterns, and bobbing for apples. This year, even though I am starting a little late, I am continuing that tradition with this latest topic:

"So useful to have him swooping around like an overgrown bat."

Tsoureki (Sweet Greek Easter Bread)

One of my most consistent childhood memories is of the tsoureki my Yia-Yia would always bring to my house at Easter. She would get it from the church, and I was always fascinated by the slightly sweet, almond topped bread with a blood-red egg stuffed into it. This year, I decided to try my hand at making my own. I have never made a yeast bread before, and every Easter when I see the tsoureki at the Greek store by my house, I think "I can do that" but I never actually try. So I decided that 2009 would be the year. Ignoring my family's dusty, obligatory "Joys of Greek Cooking" book, I located a recipe online that I liked the look of, from Evelyn/Athens at RecipeZaar.


For those who don't know, tsoureki is a braided Greek sweet bread, traditionally served at Easter. It has many equivalents in other cultures, including: corek (Turkey); panaret (Albanian); choreg (Armenian); and, more distantly, Challah. It is considered a "brioche-like" bread, meaning that it is tender and yet has a dark outer crust courtesy of an egg wash. Although it has the right amount of flour, it does not, however, contain enough butter to be truly considered a brioche bread. In Greece, tsoureki can also be known as lambropsomo, which is a derivative of the Greek name for Easter Sunday, and literally means "shining bread." The outer glossiness of the bread is considered an important symbol for the light of Christ, and the blood-red egg (kokkina avga) is also highly symbolic -- red for the blood of Christ, and egg as a symbol of renewal and rebirth. All of this, of course, went right over my head as a child. I just thought I was getting a yummy dessert!

The prospect of tsoureki-making was exciting to me because it was such a familiar part of my life (and yet I had no clue how to make it), because it was a yeast bread, and because it contained a few elements out of the common way.

Irish Soda Bread

I have wanted to try and make Irish soda bread for a long time now, and in honor of St. Patrick's Day coming up, I finally decided to give it a shot. I don't know what it is about Irish Soda Bread, but around this time of year, I crave it. Maybe it makes me feel more Irish. Of course, I'm not Irish at all...but everyone always thinks I am. So I routinely pass myself off as such during every mid-March.

I prefer my soda bread with just a hint of sweetness (especially in the yummy crusty outer part), so I hunted for a recipe that seemed like it would fit the bill. I came across Marilyn O'Reilly's Irish Soda Bread on the Food Network website. Not only was it the highest rated out of all the soda bread recipes, but it also called for more sugar than the others. So I decided that this recipe was definitely the one for me.