There was a funny little article by Roz Chast in the April 26 & May 3, 2021 issue of the New Yorker called "Fending." That is the term Chast and her husband use for when they make a meal by picking around the kitchen rather than cooking something or ordering out. (I think of avocado toast as one of the ultimate "fending" meals.) Chast got to wondering what other people call throwing a meal together on the fly like that, so she asked the question on Instagram and got more than 1,700 responses. Some of them were just weird, like fossick and schlunz, while others were pretty clever, like anarchy kitchen. There were several acronyms, one of which I like: YOYO (you're on your own). But my favorite term is probably getcheroni, for the obvious pasta association.
The problem with getcheroni night around here is Mom always wants a salad when we hunt and peck, and it always falls to yours truly to make the salad, so it's no longer really get-your-own-y. We had actually planned a getcheroni dinner last night to deal with a mounting leftover situation. But then Dylan texted me in the afternoon with a link to a recipe for "AMAZING" pumpkin bread. As it turns out, there's a great recipe for pumpkin muffins on UaKS but not one for pumpkin bread. So I couldn't resist, and baking that bread got added to making a salad on my list of no-longer-getcheroni night tasks.
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Anyway, it is really good pumpkin bread, which gets even better the second day. The recipe uses a whole 15-ounce can of pumpkin puree to make two loaves, but you can easily halve the recipe to make one loaf (though you might be sorry later), which is what I did. The recipe also calls for ¼ cup of bourbon (I used another
kind of whiskey), but suggests water or apple cider as substitutes, so
don't let that stop you from making it. Also, the instructions are unnecessarily fussy in my opinion, so I've cleaned them up some to streamline the process, thanks to the magic of weighing your ingredients instead of using volume measurements.
Pumpkin Bread with Brown Butter and Bourbon
Adapted from Melissa Clark via the New York Times
Time: ~1:15 (~17 minutes active, including browning the butter)
Dry ingredients
260 grams (~2 cups) all-purpose flour
130 grams (~1 cup) whole wheat flour
1½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon ground cardamom
Wet ingredients
1 stick (113 grams) unsalted butter
4 large eggs (~57 grams each still in the shell)
1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
350 grams (1¾ cups) light brown sugar
105 grams (½ cup) olive or other oil such as sunflower or canola
80 grams (~⅓ cup) water
60 grams (¼ cup) bourbon whiskey (or substitute water or apple cider)
1 tablespoon (15 grams) vanilla extract
1. Place a rack in the center of the oven; heat to 350 degrees. Spray two 8-by-4-inch loaf pans with nonstick cooking spray.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients.
3. In a 10- or 12-inch skillet with a light-colored bottom (such as stainless steel), melt the butter over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and cook until the frothy white milk solids sink to the bottom of the pan and turn a fragrant, nutty brown, 5 to 7 minutes. Watch carefully. (Clark’s tip for knowing when the brown butter is almost ready is to listen for the frantic bubbling sound to die down, which means the water in the butter has cooked off.) Set aside.
4. Crack the eggs into a large bowl and whisk to break them up. Add the pumpkin, brown sugar, oil, water, bourbon, and vanilla, and whisk until thoroughly combined. Using a silicone spatula, scrape all of the brown butter into the bowl, and whisk to combine.
5. Dump the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Stir with the spatula until just combined.
6. Divide the batter evenly between the two loaf pans (you should have ~825 grams in each pan). Bake until a skewer stuck into the centers of the loaves comes out clean, about 50 to 60 minutes.
7. Transfer the pans to a wire rack. Let cool for 10 minutes, then turn the loaves out onto the rack to cool completely. Makes 2 loaves.
60 grams (¼ cup) bourbon whiskey (or substitute water or apple cider)
1 tablespoon (15 grams) vanilla extract
1. Place a rack in the center of the oven; heat to 350 degrees. Spray two 8-by-4-inch loaf pans with nonstick cooking spray.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together all of the dry ingredients.
3. In a 10- or 12-inch skillet with a light-colored bottom (such as stainless steel), melt the butter over medium-high heat. Reduce the heat to medium and cook until the frothy white milk solids sink to the bottom of the pan and turn a fragrant, nutty brown, 5 to 7 minutes. Watch carefully. (Clark’s tip for knowing when the brown butter is almost ready is to listen for the frantic bubbling sound to die down, which means the water in the butter has cooked off.) Set aside.
4. Crack the eggs into a large bowl and whisk to break them up. Add the pumpkin, brown sugar, oil, water, bourbon, and vanilla, and whisk until thoroughly combined. Using a silicone spatula, scrape all of the brown butter into the bowl, and whisk to combine.
5. Dump the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Stir with the spatula until just combined.
6. Divide the batter evenly between the two loaf pans (you should have ~825 grams in each pan). Bake until a skewer stuck into the centers of the loaves comes out clean, about 50 to 60 minutes.
7. Transfer the pans to a wire rack. Let cool for 10 minutes, then turn the loaves out onto the rack to cool completely. Makes 2 loaves.
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