Pumpkin Swirl

A little bit pumpkin pie, a little bit cinnamon swirl, all parts fantastic!

I am a super sucker for a swirl bread. I love the surprise inside, and I love the flavor–it tastes delicious and makes for fantastic toast, and, well, my love for toast is legendary. This bread is a unique pumpkin bread in that it is a yeasted bread, not a quick bread. It has great spring to it, and sweet, but not too sweet. I will be honest and say that I was terribly disappointed that I discovered the recipe in December. I realized I had flitted fall away without making this bread weekly. I guess there is always next year, or you know, breaking the rules and making pumpkin in January.

This recipe came courtesy of those fabulous artisan bread in five minutes a day gurus Zoe Francois and Jeff Hertzberg. I have added the swirl because I thought the bread was begging for it, but they suggest a nutella swirl in their Holiday and Celebration Bread in Five Minutes a Day book, and who I am to argue with a published recipe? I am sure it would be fantastic as well, but perhaps less great for toasting.

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Pumpkin Swirl

This recipe can easily be doubled for more loaves, or halved for less. I have given the recipe in the form below that should yield two standard, but generous (think tall) loaves, or three full size, yet a little shorter loaves. You get to choose!

Ingredients

For the bread dough

  • 7 cups all purpose flour
  • 1 tablespoon yeast
  • 1 tablespoon kosher salt (diamond brand, if using morton's go with 1.5-2 teaspoons kosher)
  • 1.5 tablespoons pumpkin pie spice
  • 1 cup warm water
  • 1/2 cup honey
  • 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 15 oz can of pumpkin puree

For the swirl

  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 2 tablespoons ground cinnamon
  • 2 eggs whisked with a teaspoon of water
  • butter for greasing loaf pans

Instructions

Prepare the bread dough

  1. Whisk the flour, yeast, salt and spices together.

  2. Mix the liquid ingredients, oil, vanilla, water, honey, and pumpkin together.

  3. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and combine thoroughly, but don't knead. You can use a stand mixer with a paddle attachment, or a spoon, but you do need to make sure all the flour is fully hydrated and no bits of dry flour remain unmixed. You can also finish mixing with wet hands if that is easier. The dough will be pretty sticky.

  4. Let dough rest at room temperature for 2 hours, then cover (not air tight) and refrigerate for at least three hours, or up to 5 days. Yes, it really can last for up to 5 days in the fridge.

Assemble the bread

  1. Mix your cinnamon and sugar for the swirl together, and prepare your egg wash by whisking the eggs and water together, and set both aside.

  2. Generously butter 2 or 3 standard sized loaf pans.

  3. Remove your chilled dough from the fridge and divide into how ever many loaves you will be making (2 or three if using the recipe portions as is).

  4. On a very, very generously floured board, roll/flatten dough into an 8 by 12-16 inch (again, depending on if you are making 2 or 3 loaves) rectangle. Brush the rectangle with some of the egg wash (saving some for the other loaves and for the tops before baking) and sprinkle the appropriate portion of the cinnamon sugar, either 1/3 or 1/2 over the dough. Roll, starting at the shorter side, until you have an 8 inch long round of rolled dough and transfer into loaf pan. Repeat with the remaining dough.

  5. Allow dough to rise in loaf pans for about 2 hours, until proofed and puffed.

  6. When dough is almost fully proofed and puffy, preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Brush each loaf with the remaining egg wash and bake for about 50 minutes if making 2 loaves. If making 3 smaller loaves, you will need to start checking for doneness at about 35-40 minutes. When the bread is done, it will be firm and have a deep caramel brown color.

  7. Remove the bread from the pans and let cool before slicing. Enjoy!