Day One: 1.88 miles and Cranberry-Orange Bread

Today began with a walk. I intended on walking 20 minutes or more. I set out on a path that took me to walk just seconds shy of 30 minutes. In that 30 minutes I covered 1.88 miles. I was slightly disappointed with the total distance because I honestly felt like I was walking at a good pace. Since I live just outside of San Diego, the sun is shining and the temperature is roughly 58. (not too bad for December 27!) Regardless of the slight disappointment with the overall distance covered, I am happy that I went and feel good about having spent some quality time working on myself. I had my ipod geared up and enjoyed listening to music and taking in the natural beauty of the mountains that are the backdrop to my neighborhood. As I walked I honestly felt overwhelmingly fortunate.

Upon my arrival home I decided I would tackle the healthy vegan cooking. I found a recipe on VegWeb.com for Cranberry-Orange Bread. Here is the link tho their recipe and I will advise how I modified the recipe. http://vegweb.com/index.php?topic=7407.0

This recipe calls for 2 cups of all purpose flour and I instead used 1 3/4 c of whole wheat flour as I try to minimize the use of processed white flour. I also added 1/4 c of flax meal, spinkled on the top of the bread, after it cooked for 15 minutes or so. I like the health benefits (satifying the omega needs of our bodies or so I've read) and the nutty flavor it adds to recipes. The recipe calls for salt and I use only sea salt. I did not use any nuts either and used fresh cranberries. I found that the recipe make too much batter for just one bread tin so I went ahead and whipped up another batch and now have three loaves cooking in the oven. The house smells sweet and the kids are very interested in trying another one of mommys creations. Sometimes they turn out great and sometimes not so much. 

The Cranberry-Orange bread I would make again, with a few additional modifications to the recipe I think. The flax meal must be added to the batter or right away on top prior to cooking. Adding it 15 minutes into cooking didnt secure it to the top of the bread and I lost a lot of it when I took the breads out of their pans. I also think I would either soak the fresh cranberries in agave or cook them slightly in agave prior to adding to the batter. The fresh cranberries are big in the bread and when eating them are tart. I like them like this but I dont think the large tart cranberries will appeal to the masses. The wheat flour is great. The bread is moist on the inside and the crust is crisp and firm.

I am curious as well about using white sugar. I will do some additional research to find out if vegans use white sugar and what are the vegan concerns with white sugar. I read something about it previously but dont recall. This recipe called for 1 cup of sugar and I used regular white sugar. The orange flavor is very sutle, I could up the amount of orange zest as well.  We have enough Cranberry-Orange bread to last for weeks!

Modified Cranberry-Orange Bread Recipe

2 c whole wheat flour

1 c sugar

1/2 tsp sea salt

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 T vegetable oil

hot water

1/2 c orange juice

1 T orange peel, grated

Egg Replacer for 1 egg

1 c dried cranberries  (if using fresh cranberries, try soaking in agave nectar overnight)

Directions:

Preheat over to 375 F

Grease loaf pan

Premix dry ingrediants in one bowl

In a measuring cup, add oil and top-up with hot water to make 3/4 c

In a medium bowl, mix oil/water mixture, orange juice, orange peel and egg replacer.

Add dry mixture to liquid mixture. Be careful to not overmix.

Add berries.

Bake for 1 hour.