It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

Not to be confused with my tax post, It's the Great Tax Punt, Charlie Brown, today's post is all about celebrating a new season. With fall upon us, I figured I would try out a few seasonal recipes (in between working full time and frenetic homework-ing for school). The below recipe for pumpkin bread (from Joy of Baking) turned out to be delicious, so the recipe is below for any baking-leaning readers:

PS: Yes there are a lot of ingredients, and it takes a bit longer than a quick mix recipe, but the results are more than worth it! It took me about 40 minutes to prep, plus an hour to bake.

Cream Cheese Filling:

8 ounce package (227 grams) cream cheese, room temperature

1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated white sugar

2 large eggs

1 1/2 tablespoons all purpose flour

Pumpkin Bread:

1 cup (110 grams) pecans or walnuts

3 1/2 cups (450 grams) all purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

4 large eggs

2 cups (400 grams) granulated white sugar

1 cup (226 grams) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 - 15 ounce (425 grams) can pure pumpkin

1/2 cup (120 ml) water

1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Pumpkin Bread: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) and place rack in the center of the oven. Butter and lightly flour two - 9 x 5 x 3 inch (23 x 13 x 8 cm) loaf pans. 

To toast nuts:  Place the nuts on a baking sheet and bake for about 8 - 10 minutes or until brown and fragrant. Cool completely and then chop coarsely.

Cream Cheese Filling: In your food processor, process the cream cheese just until smooth. (Really, Joy of Baking? A food processor? Clearly you are not considering your Manhattan-dwelling storage-starved readers. I just used a fork to stir). Add the sugar and process just until smooth and creamy. Add the eggs, one at a time, processing just until incorporated. Do not over process. Stir in the flour.

Pumpkin Bread:  In a large bowl, sift or whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

In another large bowl, whisk the eggs until lightly beaten. Add the sugar and melted butter and whisk until blended.  Whisk or stir in the pumpkin, water, vanilla extract, and nuts.

Add the flour mixture to the pumpkin mixture and stir just until the ingredients are combined. (A few streaks of flour is fine.) Do not over mix as it will make the bread tough (this is very important!... less is more in terms of mixing at this stage unless you want a Pumpkin Brick).

Divide the batter in half. Take one half and divide it evenly between the two prepared pans. Divide the cream cheese filling in half and place each half of filling on top the two pans of batter, smoothing the tops. Top with the remaining half of batter (use two spoons to place small dollops of batter on top of the filling) (I guess I put in more than half the batter in before the filling because I didn't have enough batter left to completely cover the filling. But the bread still came out just fine). 

Bake the breads for about 55 - 65 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean.

Place pans on a wire rack and let cool for about 10 minutes before removing breads from pans (One of my loaves ended up with more batter than the other, so one loaf cooked in 55 minutes, and the other took 65). Can serve warm, cold, or at room temperature. Store leftovers in the refrigerator or else freeze for later use.

Makes 2 loaves