Pumpkin Lovin' Recipe: Pumpkin (Cranberry ChocChip etc etc etc) Bread

Ingredients:

3 cups all purpose flour (leveled and sifted) 

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon table salt

1 1/2 cup (brown) sugar

3 eggs, slightly beaten

20 oz fresh pumpkin puree

1 cup of greek yogurt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup oil

1 cup chocolate chips 

1 cup cup dried cranberries 

Note: Before you start with the Pumpkin Bread, you need to prepare your Pumpkin puree: Find the instructions here. 

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F. 

TIP: Before you start combining all the ingredients, take a small bowl and add the chocolate chips and the dried cranberries (and / or any other yumminess you want to add to the bread at the end - like pistachios or nuts or figs...). Add a couple of spoons of flour and mix it all well so that every ChocChip and every cranberry is well coated with flour. This is the trick how to prevent all these toppings to sink to the bottom of the bread. For some magical reason the flour coating will keep them levitating in the dough ensuring a quite regular distribution of the goodies. It's a genius trick and it really works! 

2. In a smaller bowl combine flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. 

TIP: I use a sifter to make sure the flour doesn't have lumps. I also add the other ingredients between the cups of flour to sift them trough and ensure that all the dry ingredients are mixed well and evenly. 

3. In a bigger bowl add the sugar and eggs - whisk them smooth and creamy - and then mix in the other wet ingredients: pumpkin puree, greek yogurt, vanilla extract and oil. 

4. Slowly add dry ingredients to the wet ones and mix together. Be careful to not overmix the dough - at this point I don't use the electric mixer but just a wooden spoon to stir it all together gently. 

5. Now spray two loaf pans (or any baking form really - I like to use my bunt cake pan and it looks great!) with nonstick spray or use some butter to wipe the pan and then dust some flour over it so the bread can come out of the pan easily when it's done. 

5. As a very last step gently stir the chocolate chips and cranberries into the dough. Fill your baking form to 3/4 with the dough - the bread will rise a little while baking. 

6. Bake for 45-60 minutes. Use the skewer test to see when the bread is done to perfection: by poking e bread with a wooden skewer and checking the consistency of the dough in the heart of it... 

Variation: I really like the combination of pumpkin, cranberry and chocolate chip (I use the the dark chocolate chips because they are not too sweet) but as I mentioned above - you can add other goodies as well: like different kinds of nuts or other dried fruit... Just have fun with it and add whatever your favorite goodies may be :-) 

ENJOY!