Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread

A good friend came to me recently, after we had struggled to find time to spend together, and asked if our next get together could involve baking something for her mother. She had joined me last when I painted the chevron pattern in the kitchen, featured earlier this month, and while we worked we had been snacking on some pumpkin-chocolate chip cupcakes which we both enjoyed. We discussed, and decided to make something similar for her mother. We ended up making chocolate chip pumpkin bread, 2 loaves so my roommates and I got to enjoy the other. I dug up a basic pumpkin quick bread recipe in my trusty Betty Crocker Baking book, and all we changed was the spices, and adding the chips.

 

I used my stand mixer for good measure, but to be hones the batter was very easy to handle and mixed by hand beautifully. As this was rather last minute I opted to use canned pumpkin (which is what the recipe called for) though I have always been curious to try baking with homemade pumpkin puree.

 

At the last minute we decided to finish the gift loaf, to make it a little more special, with some piped on melted chocolate. Clearly I should work a bit on my piping technique, as I got equal amounts of chocolate on my hands as ended up on the loaf, it seems.

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread

Adapted from Betty Crocker's Best of Baking
1 cup sugar
1 cup canned pumpkin (make sure not the get the kind with spices!)
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
1 1/2 cup flour
2 tsp Baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp allspice
1/2 cup chocolate chips (or more to your liking!) optional: an additional half cup for melting.

The incredibly easy steps:
1. preheat your oven to 350.
2. combine pumpkin, sugar, oil, vanilla and eggs.
3.combine the dry ingredients then mix them into the pumpkin mixture
5.stir in your chocolate chips
6. pour batter into a greased loaf pan, should fit in one 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 or 9x5.
7. cook 50-60 minutes, or until your kitchen smells amazing and a toothpick inserted in the middle of the loaf comes out cleanly.