Spiced Apple Bread

After a horrendous week of midterm assignments and (ugh) group presentations at the university, baking was wonderful way to de-stress.
I've been spending alot of time at the Starbucks outside of my school(they upgrade your the size of your coffee if you flash your student ID, it's awesome)because I had to be on standby near school grounds as my presentation group kept calling group meetings out of nowhere.
They've got some new zucchini bread thing that they keep trying to get you to get on top of your coffee purchase because it's their job. Anyway, I didn't get it because, well, I'm me. But I had a look at it through the glass shelf and thought, "I'll bet I could make something that looks like that".
And so I did. Except with apples.



Spiced Applesauce Bread with Peanut Crumbs
-modified from allrecipes
1 1/2 cups applesauce
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
3 tablespoons milk
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup dried currants

Peanut Crumb Topping
3 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon peanut butter

1.Soak currants in hot water and set aside. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C (350 degrees F). Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
2.In a large bowl, combine the applesauce, sugar, oil, eggs and milk; beat well. Sift in the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove and salt; stir until smooth. Fold in the currants. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.
3.For crumb topping: In a bowl, mix flour, sugar and peanut butter together with your fingers to create crumbs. Sprinkle over batter.
4.Bake bread in preheated oven for 35-40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean.



The bread turned out really nice and moist, I liked it a lot. There's not alot of fat in it, but I used quite alot of sugar.

Applesauce doesn't come cheap or easily in Beijing so I made my own using another recipe adapted from allrecipes. It made the bread even better because it was chunky, plus mashing is always fun^^
Here's the recipe

Chunky Homemade Applesauce
4 medium sized apples
½ cup white sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
½ cup water
1 tablespoon lemon juice

1. Put all ingredients into a large pot. Bring to boil and simmer on low hear for about 20 minutes.
2. Remove from heat and mash apples with potato masher