Pumpkin Bread

I love pumpkin bread.  I love the way my house smells while it's baking, it totally reminds me of fall and it is perfect for a cold blustery day.  A couple years ago I discovered Trader Joe's Pumpkin Bread mix.  It's divine.  Moist, flavourful, and super easy to make.  I prefer to bake from scratch when I can, so this year, I went in search of a recipe that would compare.  I tried a few (including Martha's pumpkin bread recipe which while very tasty, wasn't quite what I was looking for), and this recipe from allrecipes.com hit it bang on.

I used half white whole wheat flour and would probably use just that next time.  I made these into muffins and the whole family loved them.  I also halved the recipe just in case they sucked, which they most certainly did not!  You could easily add pecans or walnuts, or even chocolate chips. Mmmmmm.


Downeast Maine Pumpkin Bread

Ingredients

• 1 (15 ounce) can pumpkin puree
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2/3 cup water
• 3 cups white sugar
• 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour three 7x3 inch loaf pans.
2. In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin puree, eggs, oil, water and sugar until well blended. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and ginger. Stir the dry ingredients into the pumpkin mixture until just blended. Pour into the prepared pans.
3. Bake for about 50 minutes in the preheated oven. Loaves are done when toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.