Nine breads down, thirty-four to go!
From cinnamon rolls we follow a similarly delicious path, to a cinnamon-raisin-walnut-loaf (that’s quite a mouthful!). Running the risk of eternally jinxing myself, I’ll say that making this bread was a piece of cake, especially considering that I threw caution to the wind and halved the recipe again.
Peter Reinhart offers two variations to the basic recipe: a sprinkle of cinnamon-sugar before rolling the dough into a loaf (creating a beautiful swirl in the center of the bread), and a light coating with melted butter plus cinnamon-sugar on top after baking. I decided to skip the swirl, as both me and beloved prefer to go light on sweets. But the sweet crust on top was impossible to resist, so I complied.
The dough was very nice to work with, smooth, soft, and rose quite well. But, you don’t have to take my word for it… Just follow the link for additional photos.
I kneaded the dough with my KitchenAid, but added the raisin/walnut mixture by hand, it was such a wonderful dough to play with! It reached the correct temperature, which always makes me happy… 
The dough rose very well….
I still need a little practice to get a loaf with uniform size, my loaves always seem to to be lopsided.
The bread was awesome right out of the oven, and maybe it was even better toasted the next day. If you have never baked bread and want to start with an easy, tasty recipe, this is a great option… 
Tell me, wouldn’t you love to take a bite?
Thank you, Mr. Reinhart, for a great recipe!
9 responses so far ↓
Susie // July 10, 2009 at 6:57 am |
Sure looks great.
I liked this recipe too.
Great job and nice baking along with you,
Susie
Tammy // July 10, 2009 at 1:06 pm |
Your bread looks perfect to me! I’m heading to the kitchen now to make mine.
sallybr // July 10, 2009 at 8:15 pm |
Will be looking forward to your report….
Jean // July 10, 2009 at 4:40 pm |
Another win, Sally. I want to try this one. A couple of questions–did you bother trying to halve the egg in the recipe and did you use the shortening it called for or did you sub butter? Also,it seems like 3 1/2 cups flour is about what I use for a single loaf, was your loaf smaller than usual?
sallybr // July 10, 2009 at 8:15 pm |
Hello, Jean
In this particular case I did not bother halving the egg, because I had eggs from the farmers market and some were not that big, I picked a small egg for the recipe. But, if I have to halve it, I usually beat it slightly and eye-ball half of it into the recipe.
As to the size of the loaf, you are right, it is smaller than a “regular” kind of bread, I’d say 25% smaller (visual estimation).
Hope you like this recipe. A note from hubby: “go for the swirl…. ”
Jean // July 10, 2009 at 8:32 pm |
I will give the twirl a whirl. When my sprain is healed.
roundthetable // July 14, 2009 at 1:54 am |
Oh, it looks so yummy! I gave in and did the swirl, and it pushed it over-the-top in a very good way.
saltandserenity // July 19, 2009 at 7:20 pm |
Your bread rose so high and you got a wonderful open crumb. Mine did not rise as high – I think because I weighed it down with the extra sugar and cinnamon in the swirl. But it was so delicious – especially toasted the next day.
Cinnamon Raisin Walnut Bread — Pinch My Salt // August 3, 2009 at 9:00 am |
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