Here’s a quickie for ya before I get started in the kitchen today… This was really just an experiment for myself, but it turned out quite tasty so I thought I’d post it!
One of my favorite things to eat for breakfast is peanut butter toast. In fact, I think I went through a phase that was at least a year long where I ate oatmeal molasses bread toast every morning. That recipe is super good, but I wanted something easier this week. So, I added a twist to the “almost no-knead” cinnamon raisin bread.
I love my Indian Spiced Oats with Coconut Milk, so I decided to add some of those spices to the cinnamon raisin bread. The result? Super good! But make this recipe on a weekend… although it doesn’t take much effort, it does need to sit around for a few hours during its rise times.
Raisin Spice Bread
Raisin Spice Bread
Servings 12 slicesIngredients
- 1 cup whole wheat flour ($0.16)
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour ($0.50)
- 2 Tbsp brown sugar ($0.04)
- 1 1/4 tsp salt ($0.05)
- 3/4 Tbsp instant or bread machine yeast ($0.20)
- 1 Tbsp cinnamon ($0.15)
- 1 tsp ground ginger, dry ($0.05)
- 1/2 tsp ground cloves ($0.05)
- 1/2 cup raisins ($0.31)
- approx 1 1/2 cups warm water ($0.00)
Instructions
- In a large bowl combine the dry ingredients: flour, brown sugar, salt, yeast, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and raisins. Stir until evenly combined.
- Starting with one cup, add warm water until the dough forms one cohesive ball and no dry flour is left on the bottom of the bowl (see photos below). This will be anywhere between 1.25 to 1.75 cups of water, depending on the moisture level of your flour. Having the dough be a little too wet is better than it being a little too dry. Loosely cover the bowl and let stand at room temperature for two hours.
- After two hours the dough should be light and fluffy (see photos below). Sprinkle lightly with flour and remove the dough from the bowl. Place the dough on a lightly floured surface and gently knead a few times to make the texture of the dough even. Shape the dough into a log the same length as your bread pan. Place the loaf in a bread pan coated with non-stick spray. Loosely cover with a moist towel and let rise until double (about 1-1.5 hours depending on the temperature in your kitchen).
- Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Lightly brush the top of the bread with water. Cook the loaf in the preheated oven for about 30 minutes or until it is a deep golden brown on top. After baking, remove it from the bread pan and allow it to completely cool on a wire rack before slicing. Enjoy!
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Nutrition
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I keep my loaf in a zip top bag in my refrigerator. The loaf stays good for about a week. If you won’t use the whole loaf within that time, cut it in half and freeze half of it. To thaw, just transfer the half loaf from the freezer to the refrigerator.
Step By Step Photos
In a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients (or everything except the water). Sorry about the lighting, I started making the bread before the sun came up!
Add warm water, beginning with one cup, until the dough forms a cohesive ball of dough. After the first cup, just add a little at a time, or about 1/4 cup at a time.
After 1 cup of warm water, the dough was still very dry and it had not yet formed a ball.
This time, I needed just over 1.5 cups to get it to form a ball. See how there is no dry flour left on the bottom of the bowl? That’s what you want. It’s okay for the dough to be a little wet and sticky at this point. Better to have it too wet than too dry.
Instead of kneading the dough like in normal recipes, just cover it loosely at this point and let it sit at room temperature for two hours. After two hours, it will look a little something like this. It is bubbly and fluffy.
Sprinkle it with a little flour so that you can get it out of the bowl and then place it on a lightly floured surface. Knead it just a couple of times to make sure the texture is smooth and even. I added a bit too much flour and my dough was kind of stiff, but you want a soft, moist dough.
Shape it into a log the same length of your bread pan. Coat the bread pan in non-stick spray and place the loaf inside. Cover loosely with a moist towel and let rise until double (about an hour, depending on the temperature in your kitchen).
After it has risen, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Lightly brush the top of the loaf with water.
Bake in the preheated oven until deep golden brown on top (about 30 minutes). My dough was a little dry so it had a hard time expanding in the oven and the side split open.
Remove the loaf from the pan and allow it to cool completely on a wire rack before slicing. This is the hardest step! ;)
Breakfast is served!
I have probably made this recipe more than a dozen times. It is comfort food and therefore I have made it twice in the last month! Here’s hoping I can get more yeast soon…
I have experimented with adding pear purée, oats (keep it less than 1/4 of total dry ingredients), all (white) whole wheat flour, active dry yeast, and I have been happy with the results every time. Thanks for this recipe!
WOW. This bread is amazing. The cloves and ginger add so much flavor. I make toast with this and add peanut butter and little bit of honey – absolutely fantastic. Since I was running low on AP flour, I did a ratio of 2/3 whole wheat to 1/3 all-purpose and it came out great.
Wanna make this tomorrow, but i just have regular yeast, not quick rise. Can i just proof it and go from there?
I haven’t tested it that way, but I think I’ve had other people say that they’ve used that method with no-knead breads and it worked for them.
Thanks! I’m gonna try it today
Made this today but used dried cranberries instead of raisins… delicious! Thanks for sharing the recipe.
Okay, I’ve made this bread two times now and I can say definitively- It works great if you replace all the flour with white whole wheat. I increased the yeast and the rising time slightly, but otherwise made no changes, and it is So. Good. I haven’t tried with traditional whole wheat, but I will soon. Thanks for the great recipe!
-Maia
So delicious! I will be making this all the time now.
-Maia
This bread is so delicious! I added a 1/4 cup more raisins to the recipe to get more in every bite!
I made this last Sunday and LOVED it! I think I will make it again today when I am done with work. Thanks for the great recipe!
I have yet to try one of your bread recipies, but as soon as I get a free weekend and a loaf pant they’re first on my list! Being Italian, I despise typical sliced loaf breads from the store. Real bread! Have you ever tried making jam/jelly/preserves? I had some leftover cranberries the other day and made cranberry jam, it was incredibly easy and the 76 cent bag made almost 2 jam jars full! (I believe I used one bag of cranberries, a cup of sugar, and half a cup of water and a little bit of orange juice.) I’d imagine ti would go great with some of your breads!
I think I’ll make this this morning! Saw you in my little Everyday Food mag – congratulations!
I made this recipe this morning, swapping out the whole wheat flour with buckwheat flour (because I’m trying to use it up). Other than almost burning it in the oven, it was perfect! The buckwheat flour made the loaf darker and chewier on the inside, and I had to use a bit more water, but it’s so good! Breakfast for the week is done!