Spicy Buckwheat Pumpkin Bread

One might imagine that we grew our own pumpkins on the farm, which would be a bad assumption… 

Daddy didn’t grow them, and no one in the kitchen seeded, roasted, peeled, pureed, drained or strained them. After all, Mom could write “pumpkin” on the grocery list and an orange can of perfectly prepared plain pumpkin puree would magically appear in the pantry. She could sweeten and spice it to her heart’s content for our holiday pies.

So I was a bit taken aback at my husband’s plan to make it ourselves. Granted, we did receive a hefty pumpkin in our community supported agriculture share. While most members would carve that squash for Halloween, he had been assured by the CSA staff that properly prepared, it would make fine puree for pie, soup, bread, whatever. When I suggested that we just use it on the porch for decoration, he suggested right back that we may as well send out party invitations to the javelinas. And, while I am most reticent to admit it, he was right. 

Which meant that we would in fact be seeding, roasting, peeling, pureeing, draining and straining that pumpkin. And now, weeks later, we have a considerable number of neatly packaged containers of frozen pumpkin puree hogging up space in our tiny freezer. 

While I am quite fond of pumpkin and its compatriot spices, I am decidedly not a fan of what the market calls “pumpkin spice.” Most commercially prepared products with that moniker are much too sweet and artificial tasting for me. However, I did not have a standard recipe for pumpkin bread. So I began by comparing various quick bread recipes in order to develop one I would enjoy. Again, most of these were too sweet, given my efforts to enjoy baked goods with less sugar. A gluten free recipe for pumpkin bread with buckwheat flour from Alice Medrich’s Flavor Flours caught my attention immediately, though. The earthy, nutty flavor profile of buckwheat might tone down the over enthusiasm of pumpkin spice…

I got to work making a buckwheat pumpkin bread replacing butter with oil, using wheat flour and reducing sugar. After a number of trials, my spicy buckwheat pumpkin bread came out of the oven and I was hooked. Don’t worry about the trials-there was more than enough pumpkin to make dozens of loaves of pumpkin bread…

Our favorite way to enjoy this bread is for breakfast, slathered with cream cheese and sprinkled with toasted chopped pecans. Sandwiched together with cream cheese and freshly chopped ginger, it makes terrific little sandwiches. I wouldn’t hesitate to top it with a dollop of whipped cream and call it dessert, either. It slices beautifully and freezes well. Wrapped in packages of two slices each, we can pull precisely the amount from the freezer that we want. A full loaf makes a great gift or bake sale item for the holidays, too. 

Now I don’t know how you obtain your pumpkin puree. But however that may be, I hope you’ll put some in this spicy quick bread.