Maple Sweet Potato Bread

This week I'm sharing a fabulous vegan bread recipe. You can use pumpkin instead of sweet potatoes in this recipe if you want. That's what I did.  So maybe I should have called it Maple Sweet Potato or Pumpkin Bread. 

I got this recipe from the library.  I check out two books.  One was Gweneth Paltrow's It's all Good, and the other was Skinny Bitch Bakery by Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin.  I liked Skinny Bitch better.  It was vegan and much more useful.  Parts of the Paltrow book didn't quite make sense, and there were so many photos of the Gweneth, if you're not totally star stuck and in love with Paltrow, this cookbook would not make sense as book you'd want to keep. And the headers for the recipes. . . Maybe some people don't think this is a skill, but it is.

The recipe I picked for the week a version of a recipe in Skinny Bitch Bakery. The book's recipe uses an egg-replacer, but I've made pumpkin bread so often without any eggs or replacers, I skipped it and it worked.

Pumpkin is in season right now.  If you don't like it, it's time to learn how to love it. Winter squash is filled with nutrients, and farmers grow a lot of squash in the Northwest.

Sweet potatoes are a newer crop for Northwest farmers.  Ten years ago, you couldn't find one local sweet potato at the market. Now a few farmers bring them and the price is similar to what you would pay for organic sweet potatoes at a natural foods store.

If you don't have fresh, use one can of pumpkin or sweet potato puree.

You can buy local whole-wheat pastry flour, but if you don't have any, use the flour you have in your pantry.

You can use most any squash besides pumpkin, except for summer or spaghetti squash. Puree it in the blender before stirring it into the mix.

If you use sweet potatoes, try making sweet potato chews for your cooking assistant with leftovers.

You can bake a Sugar Pie pumpkin whole.  Poke some holes in it with a fork and stick it in a 350F oven for about an hour.  Remove from oven, let it cool.  Remove stem and seeds before scraping pumpkin away from the skin. 

Walnuts are in at the market!  I'm put in my request, have you?

Maple Sweet Potato or Pumpkin Bread

(Makes 1 8-inch loaf)

This bread isn't too sweet so it's perfect for breakfast. The dough should be very thick when you put it in the pan for baking.

1 1/2 cups cooked sweet potato or pumpkin or 1 15-ounce can pumpkin puree

1/4 cup maple syrup

2 tablespoons canola oil

1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry or unbleached white flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup oat flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon allspice

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/2 cup dried currants

1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

1. Preheat oven to 350F.  Lightly oil an 8-inch loaf pan.  Combine sweet potato, maple syrup, and canola oil. Whisk until well blended.

2. Combine flour, sugar, oat flour, baking soda, powder, cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg.  Combine wet and dry ingredients, then stir in currants and walnuts. 

3. Bake 55 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.