Pumpkin Bread without Pumpkin? Pumpkinless Pumpkin Bread!

As I was making pumpkin bread, I wondered why I needed four times the liquid I usually use. As I looked at my very dry batter I thought, "Wow, this whole wheat flour seems to need much liquid today."

I added the extra liquid and wondered why white whole wheat flour would demand so much more liquid that whole wheat "pastry" flour?

I made the batter and  filled up the same two loaf pans, which I regularly use to bake pumpkin bread. What I had added to this pumpkin bread was two cups of raisins and cut up dried apricots to make the "pumpkin" bread more like a fruit cake.

When the bread was baking I realized that I had forgotten to put the solid packed pumpkin, a 29 ounce can, into the batter! My husband said "take it out of the oven and add the pumpkin," but I told him it is much too late and we are now baking an "experiment."

Herein is a picture of my "pumpkinless" pumpkin bread which my husband says he likes very much, in fact, he might like it more than the normal "pumpkin" bread I have made in the past! The recipe has no oil, no eggs, and no dairy. One can see the raisins in the bread, but the diced apricots are more difficult to see in the photograph.

To my surprise, my husband says he loves this "pumpkin" bread! He said this is the best pumpkin bread every. This "pumpkin" bread has no eggs, no oil, no dairy, and no PUMPKIN!

Kale and Kale

My favorite kale variety to date is the Russian Purple Kale which turns completely purple after a frost. The kale appears to be more tender than other varieties and the color is superb, however, I noticed the kale turning from dark purple to a very dark green as I was cooking it. I immediately added a bit of lemon hoping to preserve as much of the purple color as possible.

Per my previous posts where the stem of the kale did not soften on cooking, I have found that the stem of some varieties becomes tender on cooking and the stems of other varieties remain almost woody.

I found frozen kale in one store, Whole Foods, and have it in the freezer for those occasions when I can not get to the fresh market, such as on very snowy days as today!

                                                                                 

I have been putting kale in everything from stir fry to soups and we continue to love it.

I will be searching for kale seed as it gets closer to spring and hope to plant several varieties in my garden.

I have found that the flowering kale in my flower garden, is the most delicious and tender kale of all and it is safe under the snow outside until I am ready to pick it. One of our local vegetable markets sells the flowering kale as a vegetable and it is the most expensive of the kales at our store, definitely worth planting for its beautiful color, tenderness and taste in cooking!