Receta Cinnamon, Cherry and Almond Bread for #TwelveLoaves
Talk about ‘tardy to the party’ and that would be me. When my friend Lora, THE Cake Duchess, and I discussed my participating in a blog/bread initiative called Twelve Loaves; I was having a decidedly overwhelmed day. Yard work, client work, dog haircut (and cleaning my family room carpets on a 90 degree day because of another dog issue…you know what I’m talking about!). So our wires may have been crossed and the stars not totally aligned and I missed the timing of the first post; I had another obligation that day (yes a clear sign when you need to admit this is a job as well as your passion). Still, if better late than never is true, well then here I am late but I it would never be never!
Lora is the cake and bread Queen really; forget that Duchess business. I am, on the other hand, more the bread Serf. She makes as much bread in one month as I do in a year I’m sure. So this will pull me outside my comfort zone a bit and force me to deal with some yeast and high altitude issues while we’re at it.
Most importantly? We want you to join us!
Twelve Loaves has some very talented bakers getting the ball rolling. Jamie, from Life’s a Feast and Lisa, from Parsley, Sage and Line Drives round out a band of four and this month Lora’s mom wanted to show her support and be a hostess with us. Thanks for joining us, Lizzie! Be sure to check out their delicious blogs and see what they are all about too. We hope that one of our recipes will inspire you; make one of them as is or let one jump start your own creativity…most of all, just have fun with it.
What unites Twelve Loaves and all of you? We love baking from scratch because people love eating real breads, both sweet and savory, right out of the oven. Together we will discover new recipes and learn and master new techniques, discover flavors, textures, new ways to experience bread at the table with family and friends. 12 months, 12 baked goods, 12 challenges… so get baking! Bake along with us every month to discover and rediscover the joys of home bread baking for your family and friends. Let’s start a Bread Baking Revolution!
I’ll post a new challenge on my blog the first of every month with a recipe utilizing the month’s theme; feel free to use one of our recipes or choose your own. Just adhere to the theme and go crazy; that’s what makes it fun!
Our very first Twelve Loaves theme for the month of August is: Bread with Summer Fruit. Bake a bread, yeast or quick bread, loaf or individual, filled, stuffed, studded or topped with your favorite fresh summer fruit or berries. It’s your bread…we want you to have fun with the idea! Lora made this gorgeous Blueberry Cream Cheese Bread, Lisa did a bread that should be an ice cream treat, Chocolate Chunk Strawberry Malted Bread and Jamie made a beautiful Cherry Chocolate Chip Maple Challah. Lora’s mom Lizzy is a woman after my heart with the baked/booze thing going on with her Blueberry-Peach Bread with a Limoncello Glaze.
Just follow the rules, it’s as easy as pie bread:
Have your Twelve Loaves bread that you baked this August, 2012 posted on your blog by August 31, 2012.
When you post your Twelve Loaves bread on your blog, make sure that you mention the Twelve Loaves challenge in your post and link back to this blog post; this helps us to get more members as well as share everyone’s posts. Please make sure that your Bread is inspired by the theme! This is obligatory if you would like your link to be included!
Please link your post using the link tool at the bottom of this post; it must be a bread baked to the Twelve Loaves theme.
Do you tweet? We do! Follow @TwelveLoaves on Twitter and let everyone know when you post at #TwelveLoaves.
C’mon…join us and let’s bake and break some bread!
My recipe for this month was inspired by three things. Cherries, cherries and more cherries. I’ve made cherry chipotle BBQ sauce, cherry sorbet, cherry conserve, maraschino cherries and so it stands to reason I would make a bread with cherries. Actually guess I have to say four things; I could not have done it without well this recipe I used for the bread!
Now…this started as a cinnamon bread that I decided to add some cherries to but come on…this is cake folks; putting it in a loaf pan does not make it bread! Still, I’m not complaining, it’s wonderful. Lots of cinnamon and almond crunch layered in between and on top of the bread cake along with lots of lots of cherries. Cherries I foolishly expected would dot the canvas of this bread but they had other plans and all huddled together on the bottom. Was that me or was that altitude. Well, you know I’m gonna blame the altitude!! Still, it worked and not one person who was offered a slice refused it saying, ‘The cherries seem to have all sunk to the bottom, no thanks.’ But then maybe that’s just what we’re used to here in Denver? All I know is I could get used to this bread…it was most definitely a ‘yummers!’
Cinnamon, Cherry and Almond Bread
A bread filled with cherries and a cinnamon/almond streusel.
Ingredients
- 2 cups flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup butter (room temperature)
- 1 cup white sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
- 1 & 1/2 cups pitted cherries, halved
- For the Cinnamon/Almond mixture
- 1/2 cup almonds
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 2 Tbsp butter
2 heaping tablespoons ground cinnamon.
Preparation
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Lightly grease a 9 inch loaf pan and line the bottom with parchment paper. Grease parchment and set aside.
Cream together the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, salt and vanilla extract.
Sift together the flour, baking soda and baking powder. Add alternately to the creamed mixture along with the buttermilk, beginning and ending with your dry ingredients.
Add the lemon zest and the cherries and blend in with a large wooden spoon.
To Prepare the Cinnamon/Almond Mixture:
Put the almonds into a food processor and pulse until they resemble large, course meal. Add the brown sugar, butter and cinnamon and pulse until thoroughly mixed.
To Prepare the Bread:
Spoon 1/3 of the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Sprinkle with 1/3 of the cinnamon mixture. Repeat the layers twice more, ending with cinnamon on top.
Bake in the pre-heated oven for 1 hour or until it tests done when a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let rest in the pan for about 10 minutes before removing from the pan to finish cooling on a rack.
Notes
Since I had added a fair amount of bulk to this bread, instead of revising all of the ingredients to compensate, I just used both a regular bread pan and a small loaf pan for baking the finished product and did only two layers of dough and cinnamon in each one. This could also be baked in a 8X8 square pan; just revise the baking time accordingly.
I might have been able to have fit it all in a loaf pan but decided not to take that chance; besides it was the perfect gift to give my neighbor's son; it was a bite sized treat for him!
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http://www.creative-culinary.com/2012/08/cinnamon-cherry-and-almond-bread/
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