Happy Autumn

Autumn around our house means BAKING. One of the most popular items I bake this season (and no other time of year) is pumpkin bread. Spread a little autumn cheer and bake the recipe below. It’s best served with crisp autumn air, a cracking fire, and some hot cocoa.

Paulette’s Pumpkin Bread

Ingredients:

1/3 cup of vegetable oil

1 cup of canned pumpkin*

3 eggs

2 1/3 cups of Bisquick or Krusteaz**

1 1/4 cups of sugar

2 tsp of cinnamon***

Instructions:

Mix any old way you want, but I like to use an electric standing mixer or electric hand mixer. Grease a bread loaf pan with Crisco or the nonstick greasy stuff of your choice. Dump your batter in the pan. If you really wanna be a rockstar, sprinkle some sugar on top of the mixture to make a sugar crust. Pop it into an oven that’s been preheated to 350 degrees and bake for 45-50 minutes. One word of caution. If you have two loaf pans, you can split the mixture between them. Sometimes, the mixture takes a while to bake and can lead to wonky results if you don’t split it. I’ve achieved better results splitting the mix into two pans. Go figure. If you choose to split the mixture, don’t forget to only bake your break for 30-35 minutes.

*If you wanna be really extra, don’t use the canned pumpkin. Instead, use a sugar pumpkin or really, any old pumpkin. Cut it in half, dig out the seeds (great for roasting), remove the stem, and boil it with a cinnamon stick and some whole cloves. Once it’s cooked, cool it and then dig out the meat. It’s the ONLY way I make pumpkin bread. That canned stuff isn’t even pumpkin!

**I recommend Krusteaz. Far superior to Bisquick. I say this as a longtime Bisquick customer. I bought Krusteaz once when Bisquick wasn’t available and it CHANGED MY LIFE.

***If you like it super pumpkin spicy, go to town on that cinnamon. Add some nutmeg too. Or, you can pick up pumpkin pie spice mix (found among the spices in your grocery store) and use that.

Enjoy your bread! Now, go read a book!