Rosh Hashana Apple and Flax Quick Bread

Welcome back to Seduced by Produce!  I apologize for the extended and unexpected absence I took from this blog.  This Summer, my life intervened in the most interesting ways, but that is for my memoirs and not for today.  Today is for celebrating this coming Fall's bounty as well as the upcoming Jewish New Year.

For those of you out there in the blog-o-sphere who haven't yet been told, Rosh Hashana, is quickly coming upon us.  Rosh Hashana, Hebrew for Head or First of the Year, is when Jews around the world celebrate the spiritual New Year.    Should you not be savvy to the Jewish food traditions, allow me to catch you up to speed.  During this time, Jews keep an even closer eye on their food then normal to ensure their food can be a harbinger of things to come.  We eat sweet foods for a sweet year and foods that look or sound like positive things like carrots and lentils since they look like coins.  There's a lot of foods with symbolism, (for more information, check out this link) but suffice to say we Jews adapt to our surroundings, are a superstitious lot and if it tastes good, we find a way to enjoy it often.  We do avoid hot and spicy foods and foods with nuts during this time.  Do you want to have a nutty year?  Didn't think so!

You didn't come to a cooking blog for an education on Judaism, though.  You came here for FOOD, so here you go!

The inner workings of deliciousness

Meet Apple Bread.  She is my new friend.  My family has a tradition of a deep, dark honey cake being served this time of year.  I don't know the recipe, but knowing my maternal Grandmother (Nanny), it was probably Joan Nathan's recipe first.  There is something comforting about a warmly spiced, sweet nosh when shared with family.  Or in my case, being sneaked from Nanny's kitchen behind my Mom's back.  (Sorry, Mom, your parents snuck me a lot of goodies over the years.  Take it up with Pop Pop, but I figure you probably already knew because of those eyes in the back of your head you kept telling me about.)

This is not that cake.  That cake was all sweetness and cinnamon like a true fall dessert made for a munchkin.  This is a lighter and more adult quick bread that incorporates my personal favorite Rosh Hashana food tradition - apples.  Apples dipped in honey are traditionally served the first night of Rosh Hashana and are eagerly awaited by kids and adults alike.  Who doesn't like apples and honey, I mean come on!  I've been known to sneak more than a few slices myself for an impromptu honey tasting.  I'm sure as this blog goes on, you will hear more on my honey obsession.  Today is for the apple.  I was inspired by Brown Eyed Baker's Apple Cinnamon Bread recipe.  Everything I've made from her has rocked my world, but I can't help but tweak as I bake.  I've put my spin on it by using ground flax seeds and mixing in whole wheat flour for a more nutty flavor. If you've never used flax seeds before, they are a great source of fiber and a myriad of other health benefits.  I keep a bag of them ground and in the freezer for an easy nutrition boost.  I've also made it with walnuts which was truly awesome, but not for today.  It's also staying at home, no matter how much my co-workers beg.

Ingredients:

1 cup unbleached, all-purpose flour
½ cup whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground allspice
¼ teaspoon ground cloves
2 eggs
¼ cup canola oil
¼ cup unsweetened applesauce
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup vegan cane sugar (use granulated if that's what is around)
2 tablespoons ground flax seeds
2 tablespoons ground walnuts, if using
2 cups peeled and chopped apples (about 1½ to 2 apples)

Topping
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon


Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.  After greasing a loaf pan, cut parchment paper to fit and then grease the paper too.  This will help ensure the bread can be pulled out neatly later.  Then, peel and chop up apples.  The type of apples do not matter, but something crisp will ensure a more firm bite of apple later.  With apples just coming into season, take your pick of whatever looks delicious and is selling for the cheapest.  They don't need to be perfect squares, but they do need to be reasonably small here. 

Mmmm.....apples......

In a medium sized mixing bowl, mix all of the bread's dry ingredients and set aside.

Jackson Pollack and his paints has nothing on me and my spices.

In the bowl of your stand mixer, beat the eggs on medium speed for about 30 seconds. Use farm fresh if you can, and in the process help out your local farmer while enjoying a superior egg. Add in the oil, applesauce and vanilla and mix until smooth. Make sure you are using unsweetened applesauce.  Next, add the sugar and mix until well-combined.  I'd love to try using honey and then begin trying to cut down the amount of added sweetness overall, say by half, but that is for another day.

Eggy goo, anyone?

Then, add the dry flour and spice mixture to the wet in the mixer in thirds.  Adding the dry mixture in portions allows for full incorporation without creating clumps and helps to avoid over mixing the batter.  Once combined, take the mixer bowl off and then gently fold in the apples into the batter making sure to incorporate them fully. 

Apples = Fruit gold!

Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan.  In a small mixing bowl, combine the granulated sugar and cinnamon. Sprinkle evenly over the batter in the loaf pan.

Sugar, cinnamon and apples are never wrong.

Bake for 50 to 55 minutes, or until the loaf is golden and a thin knife inserted in the center comes out clean.  I use a piece of dried linguine instead, to make a smaller hole in the crust.

Cool the bread in the pan and on your cooling rack for 10 minutes, then and turn it out on a cooling rack, remove the parchment paper. Cool completely before slicing, if you can. The smell of this bread is intoxicating.  If someone made this into a perfume, it'd be dangerous.  Making this transports your home instantly into fall.  It's much better than an apple cinnamon air freshener.

 
Wrap leftover loaf in plastic wrap and store at room temperature.  If you manage to have leftovers, that is.  I made a walnut-enriched version of this quick bread for a recent training, and not a crumb was left.  I baked it the day before and it held up incredibly well.  I'm not entirely convinced that it was even better the next day, but I don't think it will last that long without serious planning including hiding the baked goods out of sight.

Overnight Pumpkin and Ginger Cinnamon Buns

I have a deep, dark, obsession with all things doughy, buttery, sugary and baked.  I'm Seduced by Produce, but I have a sinister and more floury side.  If you were a fan of Saturday Morning Cartoons, just imagine the following: Good angel = green leafy stuff, bad angel = baked, buttery deliciousness.  There, I said it!  Wow, that was freeing!

Ok, now that I got that off my chest, I get to share with you the most recent product of my obsession. I found a recipe on King Arthur Flour's website for Cinnamon-Swirl Pumpkin Rolls last year and it was so good last year that I just had to make it again!  I'm the only one in the house who likes pumpkin and ginger, but I had family coming in this weekend which gave me the opportunity to enjoy cinnamon bun deliciousness with others!  What is better than waking up to the smell of baked goods?!? Really, there isn't much you come up with, is there?

Besides, this frozen pumpkin has been staring at me every time I open the freezer. As you can see, I dated and measured before putting it in a freezer bag and flattening it out.  It makes it easier to use later, but watch out because the permanent marker can run when wet. 

I am big fan of sales, and Hydro Harvest Farms had pie pumpkins around Halloween for CHEAP!  They never got made into baked goods like I had intended.  By the time Thanksgiving weekend rolled around and I still was staring at three pie pumpkins, I finally decided I needed to just roast and freeze the suckers for when inspiration struck.  It doesn't look like much in roasted puree form, but it's magic gold to me!

Use a stand mixer with a paddle and a dough hook for this to save yourself the trouble if you can.  Start the stand mixer with the paddle attachment for this step.  Add the pumpkin puree (do not use pumpkin pie filling, it is not the same) to a mixing bowl with two eggs and a 1/4 cup of softened butter.  Run mixer on low until the butter has combined with the eggs and pumpkin until the butter has disintegrated into tiny little butter pebbles.  Cracking eggs into a small bowl before adding helps to ensure that no shell gets added to the bowl.

Combine your flours, dry milk powder, yeast and seasonings in another bowl.  After switching from the paddle shown above to a dough hook, add the dry ingredients to the mixing bowl a small bit at a time while mixing.  Allowing the dry ingredients time to incorporate into the wet before adding more helps to ensure that the dough incorporates fully.  After all the dry ingredients, begin adding the water a tablespoon at a time.  Allow about 30 seconds in between each tablespoon to allow the water to be incorporated into the dough.  Here's what the dough hook looks like:

 When you've added the right amount of water, the dough should look like this:  

Set aside your dough for about an hour and a half in a warm and dry location.  It's risen enough when it's doubled in size and is springy to the touch.  I just cover my dough filled bowl with a dish towel and leave it in an area where it's not going to be affected by a draft and near my timer.

While waiting for the dough to rise, I got together the cinnamon bun filling.  I combined cinnamon, sugar and minced crystallized ginger.  If you've never worked with crystallized ginger, it's a fancy-pants name for candied ginger and it's ginger cooked in a sugar water solution and then baked. I picked up a bit from the bulk bin at my local Whole Foods and finally used the last bit today.  Oil your knife before mincing with a very small amount of a neutral flavored oil, or expect to have the ginger to stick to the knife.  Here's what it looks like for the un-initiated.

Once the dough has risen fully, it's time to be rolled out into a rectangle.  The recipe said it should be rolled out to "about 14" x 22" rectangle."  I just rolled it until it looked two feet long and the size of two hands across.  It was good enough for me. Once rolled out, spread the filling mixture evenly across the whole dough leaving about one long edge free about a 1/2 inch from the edge.  This edge is the edge you will roll towards to be the outermost portion of the buns. The recipe said I could use some dried cranberry pieces, but I didn't have any this time.  It works that way too, if you like and have cranberries on hand.


After rolling these up, try to cut the dough cylinder into nine even segments.  I just eyeballed it.  This is where the overnight comes in to play.  You can grease your dish and put the buns in the pan to rise for the second time in the fridge overnight.  This is great for a potluck breakfast, but you may not be able to leave without giving up the recipe.  If you choose to make them the same day, the buns should rise for at least an hour undisturbed in a warm location.  The fridge's cold temperatures slows the yeast fermentation.


After putting the buns in the oven (preheated to 375 degrees), and giggling at the obvious jokes based on that phrase, walk away and leave them alone.  Do not take the buns out of the oven until they have become nice and tanned.  They are already a bit tan due to the pumpkin and spices, so we are looking for a middle of the summer Miami Beach tan not a mid-winter leftover tan.  This should take about 30 minutes. 

Take this time to make the glaze by melting the butter, milk (or almond milk in this case), and confectioner's sugar until it combines and turns glossy.  If you want to keep the glaze white and opaque, let the buns cool before pouring the sugary deliciousness on top.  If you just can't wait that long, like me, then pour it on about ten minutes after the buns are taken out of the oven. 


When done and cooled, if you don't wait to glaze them, the buns should look something like this:

Dough:
1 cup pumpkin puree
2 large eggs 
1/4 cup softened butter
2 1/2 cups All Purpose Flour - I use organic, unbleached flour, but any AP flour will work
1 3/4 cups Whole Wheat Flour
1/4 cup nonfat dry milk powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon allspice
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons instant yeast
2 tablespoons to 1/4 cup lukewarm water

Filling:
1/2 cup minced crystallized ginger
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

Glaze:
1 cup confectioner sugar
1 tablespoon butter
1 1/2 tablespoons milk - I used almond milk 

Verdict:  These buns are decadent and not an every day breakfast, but if you need a warming and rich breakfast to impress yourself or others, this is a sure bet.  Just make sure you like ginger!