Crabapple Pecan Bread

I must say I was a bit perplexed when I found crabapples in the bottom of my CSA bag last week.  I know that you can make jelly out of them, and I know that you can make your own pectin from them for making preserves (we will do this Erica!).  But I didn't have any other ideas of what to do with a crabapple!

So off to the internet I went.  And I was pleasantly surprised to find that you can use crabapples like you would any other tart apple!  Yay!  They are not so mysterious afterall! 

My mom is in town and I have been getting up at normal people time and drinking coffee with her while planning our days together.  I thought that we both would enjoy a yummy quickbread to accompany our coffee.  I found a nice recipe for crabapple bread on Idlewife's blog and went to work adjusting it to my taste.  I thought it definately could benefit from some delicious streusel topping and pecans.  I was not wrong. 

 

Ingredients

For the bread:

1/2 cup butter, room temp

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

2 tblsp milk

1/2 teaspoon lemon juice

2 cup flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 cup roughly chopped crabapple (leave the skins on, but remove the core and seeds)

1/2 cup chopped pecans

 

For the streusel topping:

1/4 cup sugar
1/6 cup flour
1/8 cup butter, cubed
3/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Procedure

Cream the butter and sugar. Add eggs, milk, and lemon juice. Mix flour, salt, and baking soda together. Add to butter mixture. Stir in the crabapple and pecans until combined.

 

For the streusel, mix together sugar, flour, cinnamon, and butter with a fork until it resembles clumpy sand.  Sprinkle topping liberally over bread

Grease a large loaf pan. Add batter and bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean (timing depends a lot on what size of pan you choose to use). Cool (if you can) then slice.