New England Brown Bread

Having already enjoyed Steamed Brown Bread and Aunt Geri's New England Brown Bread (see blogs), I was looking forward to trying this recipe. I like the choice of raisins or dried cranberries, but had to go with raisins, not having any cranberries on hand. I will try the cranberries another day.

Of the three bread recipes in the cookbook, this turned out to be the heaviest. Which is fine, I think that is part of the appeal of a brown bread, and one expects it to be heavier. The lightest brown bread turned out to be the Steamed Brown Bread, and I suspect it was the All Bran cereal and the white flour that contributed to that lightness. 

I'm quite fond now of the brown bread cooking method I've discovered to sort of "fix-it-and-forget-it"--pour your bread batter into a well-greased tin can, place tin can in crockpot and pour boiling water from your tea kettle into crockpot, about 1/2 to 2/3 up side of can. Turn crockpot on high for 3-4 hours. I learned to put parchment or wax paper underneath the can, in case a bit of rust develops, so it doesn't transfer to the ceramic crockpot. I must say that I skipped one process this recipe recommends: it calls for laying twine into the can, and using parchment paper, in order that the bread can be properly removed from the tin after baking. I just grease the heck out of the tin, and after steaming, up-end the can, pound it on the counter a couple of times, and out it slides.

The bread steams beautifully, and you don't have to babysit it.
This is a fine bread for pairing with red dogs and beans (see picture of this bread w/meal in Mom's Saturday Night Baked Beans blog).



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