Butter Pecan Bread

This Butter Pecan bread is moist and delicious, just like those dessert breads you can buy from the bread shop. The hardest part is toasting the nuts, and that is not as hard as you think it is. You can bring this bread to family gatherings and wow them that you made it yourself and didn't buy it. It is a simple recipe that you can make as long as you can boil water and follow directions!

1. A large mixing bowl

2. A spoon to mix with

3. A hand held or stand mixer (optional, but handy)

4. Baking pans (you can use two loaf pans or two 9 inch cake pans or a similar equivalent, but you will need two pans to bake in)

5. Butter and flour for greasing and dusting the baking pans (it doesn't take a whole lot of either)

6. A flat baking pan for toasting the pecans

7. A pan to boil water in on the stove

8. Toothpicks for testing the bread for doneness

INGREDIENTS:

- 2 Cups of white sugar

- 2 1/4 cups of all purpose flour

- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

- 1 teaspoon salt

- 2 eggs

- 1 cup milk

- 1/2 cup vegetable oil

- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

- 1 cup boiling water

- Butter Pecan Mixture

BUTTER PECAN MIXTURE:

- 1 cup pecans, crushed or halves (I think it is best with crushed)

- 1/2 stick butter

- 1/3 cup of brown sugar

Heat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit ( about 177 degrees Celsius).

With the butter for greasing, grease your pans that will have the bread batter poured in them. Coat the inside of the pans with the butter very well. Put about a 1/4 cup of flour into one of the pans and then swirl the pan around until the flour has coated all of the butter coating (this may take more or less flour than 1/4 cup). Do the same to the second pan.

Combine the dry ingredients into the mixing bowl. This includes 2 cups of sugar, 2 1/4 cups of all purpose flour, 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder, 1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda, and 1 teaspoon salt. Mix until thoroughly combined.

Put the 1 cup pecans onto the flat baking pan along with the 1/2 stick of butter. Put in the heated oven and toast for about 10 minutes. Halfway through I like to take a flipper and move them around a bit and kind of flip them, then I continue to let them toast until I can smell pecans. That is the hint: the smell of pecans coming from the oven or out of the oven when you open the door tells you they are ready.

Add the 1/3 cup of brown sugar to the butter and pecan mixture and toast just a tiny bit more, maybe only 3 minutes. Remove them from the oven (careful, it is hot) and set them aside.

*TIP: move on to other steps in mixing the bread while the pecans are toasting.

Add in the 2 eggs, 1 cup milk, 1/2 cup oil, and 2 teaspoons vanilla extract. Using the mixer, beat these ingredients into the dry mix until thoroughly combined.

Scrape all the pecan mixture from the flat pan and mix it into the batter.

Take the small pan for boiling water and fill with a little more than 1 cup water. Place it on the stove and turn the burner to medium (or high if you are impatient as I am). Once the water comes to a boil, pour into a heat-proof measuring utensil to measure out 1 cup boiling water. Don't use plastic! If you use metal, be very careful as the metal will instantly heat up to that temperature. If you use glass, make sure it is a heat-proof measuring cup (most of them are), or it could possibly go bang.

Pour the boiling cup of water into the batter mixture, stirring with a spoon until combined.

Pour the batter into the greased and floured pans. Put the pans on the middle rack of the oven and set the timer for 15 minutes.

At the 15 minute mark, rotate the pans so that what was facing the back of the oven will now be facing the front. Add another 15 minutes to the timer.

This bread takes about 35-40 minutes to bake, depending on your oven (If you use loaf pans, it is closer to 40. If you use cake pans or another flatter pan, it will be about 30-35 minutes). To check it, take a toothpick and poke it into the center of the bread. If you pull the toothpick out and it is clean or clean with a few crumbs, the bread is done. If it is obviously not clean (with wet batter on it or sticky batter on it), you need to add some more time to your bread.

Once done, take the pans and set them to cool on a cooling mat (or pot holder, or oven mitt, whatever). Let them cool completely before serving.

*TIP: to stop your bread loaf from over browning on top, place the pans on the middle rack. Also take a sheet of aluminum foil and cover the top of the pan (don't let it touch the batter!). This will help prevent overbrowning (you can use that trick for the edges of pie crust as well).

As an extra, and to be more like those yummy store-bought breads, you can add a glaze on top. To do that, you need

1 cup confectioner's or powdered sugar

2 tablespoons milk

Mix these together in a small bowl. With the spoon, drizzle the glaze over the bread in stripes (the bread needs to be all the way cooled before you do this). Add as much or as little as you like, then view your masterpiece.

Enjoy the butter pecan bread with coffee or milk. I am sure that it would probably make great muffins as well. It is such a tasty moist bread and makes me think of the breads from Great Harvest Bread Company.

I hope you learned how to make something from this Instructable, whether it was how to make bread or how to boil water (haha!).

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