Favorite Fall Recipes - Fall-Flavored Chocolate Bread

 UPDATE: I have submitted this recipe to the Great Denby Cake Off!! Wish me luck  :-)

This is so awesome, I want to eat it all the time. A while ago, I found this recipe for a double-chocolate banana bread, and loved it (like everything double-chocolate really). But to be honest, I have tons of banana bread recipes already, and with fall being in full swing, I am more into fall flavors these days. Which left me one afternoon with time on hand (i.e. Calvin napping and the girls enjoying their daily quiet time), some home-made apple sauce from my trip to the semi-public apple tree, and a sprinkle of creativity to create my fall-flavored chocolate bread.  Yum is all I can say!

(c) Life, Unexpectedly

Ingredients:
1-1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce (if you use sweetened apple sauce, reduce sugar accordingly)
1/3 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 - 2 Tbs. maple syrup
1 egg
1 tsp. baking soda
1 pinch of salt
1 cup flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
2 heaping Tbs. cocoa powder
1/2 cup dark chocolate sprinkles


Pre-heat oven to 350°F.
Grease and flour a loaf pan.
Mix applesauce, butter, sugar, and maple syrup; add egg and stir well.
Add flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, cinnamin, and salt ; mix in until just combined.
Mix in chocolate sprinkles.
Fill batter in prepared pan and bake at 350°F for about 20 - 25 minutes or until a tooth pick comes out clean.

Let cool for about 10 minutes and remove the bread from the pan. Let it cool completely so you can cut it without the bread crumbling. Keeps wrapped up in wax paper or foil for up to 5 days (longer when you store it in the fridge).

Tips:
- If the batter seems too dry, just add a little milk, apple juice, or apple cider.
- Add an apple cut into small cubes to the batter to make it extra moist and to increase the apple-flavor.
- Melt a bar of dark chocolate and pour it over the cooled-off cake to make a nice chocolate frosting.
- Serve with whipped cream and a nice cup of cappuccino.

ENJOY!!!

Modern Cooking - Preserving For Winter

You know what I like most about late summer and early fall? Lots and lots of local produce, some of which you can just pick at the side of the road. Unfortunately, right now there's too much goodness to be consumed immediately. So what to do? Even though I've always hated helping my mom with it when I was a child, I've now taken up preserving myself. In much smaller scale, but still. That's what I have done during the last weeks:

Blackberry Jam with Elderflower Syrup:
Inspired by Susannah's Blackberry Jam, I spontaneously took Lily out blackberry picking. Our loot wasn't the best, but I just loved taking her on a typical North-Western late-summer past time. So what to do? I asked my neighbor for some empty jam containers, and on we went on our very first preserving adventure. Since I had gotten a bottle of home-made elderflower syrup from my coworker a couple of weeks earlier, I scratched the sugar, and used the syrup instead. We mashed the berries with a fork, added the syrup and a few teaspoons of pectine, boiled it until it bubbled, and filled it in the glasses. The result? Not sweet at all, so fruity, and the special elderflower aroma. Delicious! Can't wait to put some on our thumbprint cookies for the holidays!

Yummie, let me tell you!

Apple Sauce
I personally can't stand the over-sweetened taste of apple sauces from the store. When I got a bowl of little apples from my neighbor, I took the opportunity and made some home-made apple sauce. It's SO easy! Peel your apples and cut them into small pieces. Put in a sauce pan, add water to cover about an inch  of the pot and some sugar (I used about 1 cup of water, 2 teaspoons of sugar, and 6 or 9 tiny apples). Bring water to a boil and cook covered until the apples are soft. Blend, if you like smooth apple sauce, or if you prefer chunky apple sauce, just pour it directly into a jar. If you like, you can add a cinnamon stick or some other pices to add extra flavor to the apple sauce. We just kept it simple and chunky.


Other things to preserve for the winter:
Cherries (as jam, baked into a cake and frozen, or remove the stone and freeze)
Peaches (as preserve, jam, or cut in pieces and frozen)
Tomatoes (as tomatoe sauce)
Bell peppers (grill under the broiler, fill in glass and cover with olive oil)
Cucumbers (pickled)
Pears (as preserve, pear sauce, in a rum pot, or cut in pieces and frozen)

Things you can preserve, but it's gross somehow:
Pig feet
Eggs


 Are you preserving goodies for the winter? Please share your recipes!