The Gluten-Free Homemaker

This delicious recipe is serving two blogging purposes.  It is my entry for October’s create a gluten-free quick bread challenge. and it is my entry for this month’s Go Ahead Honey, It’s Gluten-Free.  I love Diane’s scared silly theme.  She is asking us to write about foods we were once afraid to cook, but now realize that it’s silly.  Squash is one of those foods for me.  I was afraid of squashes.  I was afraid I wouldn’t like them and afraid I couldn’t cook them.  I now realize I was wrong on both counts, and it was silly of me to think that way. 

I will admit that I have had squash in the past and more recently that I didn’t like.  I don’t know if it was the particular squash or just the way it was prepared.  However, since I started cooking squash in the past couple of years, most of what I’ve made has been very tasty and did not have that nasty squashy flavor that I always associated with it.

I’ve also learned that squash is very easy to cook.  If you don’t want to deal with cutting a hard squash, just roast it whole.  If you are able to cut it in half, that will speed up the cooking time. Some are not so hard to cut and can be peeled and steamed like in this recipe.  I’ve also cooked squash in my pressure cooker.

For this month’s quick bread loaf challenge I thought of making a pumpkin bread, since I don’t yet have a recipe for that on my blog.  However, I wanted to do something a little less common, and so I used butternut squash puree instead of pumpkin.  I haven’t tried this recipe with pumpkin, but I bet it would work just as well.  This bread rose well, it was soft and moist, but not too moist.  It tasted much like pumpkin bread, but the butternut squash has a gentle flavor of its own.  My family loved it, and it was gone in no time.

Butternut Squash Bread

Preheat oven to 350°.  Grease two 9 x 5 inch loaf pans.
Wet Ingredients:

• 2 c. butternut squash puree (1 med. squash)
• 1 c. granulated sugar
• 1 c. light brown sugar
• 4 large eggs
• 2/3 c. melted coconut oil (or vegetable oil)
• 2/3 c. water

Dry Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 c. sorghum flour
• 1 c. millet flour
• 3/4 c. potato starch
• 1/2 c. tapioca starch
• 2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 2 tsp. xanthan gum
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1 c. chopped toasted pecans or walnuts

Prepare the butternut squash puree.  I start by peeling the squash. If you’re not sure how, Amy has a great tutorial on how to peel a butternut squash. I then remove the seeds and cut the squash into chunks.  Then, I place it in a steamer basket inside a pot and steam about 20 minutes or until tender.  The squash can then be pureed with an immersion blender, a stand blender, or a food processor.

In the bowl of your mixer, combine the wet ingredients.  In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients except for the nuts.  Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix just until moistened.  Stir in the nuts.  Pour the batter into the loaf pans and bake at 350° for 50 – 60 minutes or until a tester comes out clean.

Let cool for 5 minutes in the pan, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.  Makes two loaves.

Note:  I'm sure other add ins would be good in this recipe.  Try raisins, dried cranberries, or chocolate chips. You could also vary the spices and try nutmeg, cardamom, or allspice.

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For more great recipes (though not necessarily gluten free) check out Slightly Indulgent Tuesdays.

Labels: bread recipes, Go Ahead Honey