In my last post, I told you about a not-so-satisfying low-fat pumpkin bread recipe I had just tried. I knew what was missing in that bread was some flavor and some oil. You need a little fat in a sweet quick bread!
All other recipes for pumpkin bread or muffins that I had found called for a good 1/2 cup of oil for a bread, if not more. Most of them called for well over a cup for each loaf. A lot of oil and a lot of sugar. I can halve it, and that’s what I did. And, of course, I added some salt and a few more spices.

Here’s my recipe:

Ingredients:

2 cups roasted Hokaido pumpkin (or any other source of mashed pumpkin)
1 1/4 cup sugar
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1/2 cup sunflower oil
3 eggs (or two eggs, and two egg whites)
2 cups whole wheat flour
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
( I know, I spiced it within an inch of it’s life!)

Preheat oven to 200 C
Line two 9×5 inch loaf pans with parchment paper (for very easy removal of the breads)

In a large bowl, mix together pumpkin, applesauce, eggs, oil and sugar. Add spices and blend well. ( It tastes like pumpkin pie….)

In a smaller bowl, combine flours, soda and salt. Stir into the liquid mixture.

Pour batter evenly into the prepared loaf pans and place in the middle rack of the oven.
Bake on high for the first 45 minutes, then lower the temperature to around 180. If the tops start browning to quickly, cover losely with foil.
Mine took about 1 hour and 45 minutes to bake.

The smell of the bread is irresistible. I could barely wait until it cooled down enough to have a slice! Let’s see how well the breads ripen.

There are many recipes for me to share with the world wide web, many very healthy ones too, but you got to start somewhere!

It’s cold and rainy outside.  The kids are home for two weeks and were nagging at me for something “special”.  I thought some chocolate would be nice, so I went to Google to find the recipe for chocolate cake in a coffee mug.

I’ve made the cake before and wasn’t very impressed.  Too spongey and dry, and not enough chocolate flavor!  So I was prepared to do some tweaking.

I followed the recipe from Recipezaar, and made a couple changes.

You will need:
- A bowl and a fork or whisk for mixing the ingredients (I didn’t bother mixing dry in one, wet in another)
- Two coffee mugs or one large one.
- A microwave.

Ingredients

- 4 T. Cake or all-purpose flour (not self rising)
- 4 T. Sugar
- 3 T. Cocoa powder
- 1/2 t. Baking powder
- 1 Egg
- 3 T. Milk
- 3 T. Oil
- 1/2-1t. Vanilla (I used about 5 gr. vanilla sugar)
- Chocolate chips or nuts (we didn’t have any, so I left those out)

Oil both mugs.
In the bowl, beat egg, add other liquid ingredients and mix well. Add dry ingredients and mix very well so there are no lumps left. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts, if using.
Pour batter into the prepared mugs, trying to get the same amount in both.
Microwave on high for 2.5 minutes for two cakes, and 3 for one in a large mug. I microwaved mine for 2 minutes, and there was a little raw batter left at the bottom. It kind of served as sauce, and tasted yummy, but if you want it cooked through you’ll have to let them cook a little longer.

Next time, I think I’ll add a pinch of salt and some chopped chocolate, and let the cakes cook a little longer.

About 1/3 of that cake was enough to satisfy the craving. It is definitely not the one to make for yourself if you are on your own!

I made it with the salt and some white chocolate bits. The chocolate tends to settle on the bottom, but it makes a wonderful sauce…. yummy…