Pumpkin Bread Recipe

I love me some homemade pumpkin bread!

Cooking is an excellent activity for adults and children.

 

Measuring and mixing are physical and functional hand skills.

 

Measuring and mixing require important cognitive skills.

 

 

The satisfaction of eating and sharing the results (mmmm!) is emotionally gratifying while mentally connecting work to results (aka learning).

 

 

For anyone who is here just to see my cooking talent, you should know that I enjoy these two things while leisurely cooking.

 

For my regular readers or those who come here for my parental commentary – there’s that, too.

 

If your child loves to eat, if your child hates to eat, if your child is learning to eat, helping your child to participate in food preparation or cooking offers memorable sensory and motor incentives. Throughout this recipe page I will include some suggestions for including children while baking pumpkin bread.

 

Me and Betty Crocker go way back.  With this book at least 23 years back as it was part of my Studly Hubby’s dowry. (We also still have my copyrighted 1976 Better Homes and Gardens 5-ring-binder cookbook. With a stylish red gingham cover no less.) I often modify my cooking from old cookbooks recipes to reduce fat, salt and sugar. Feel free to do the same!

Notice I used a jar-opener-thingy to keep the cookbook propped on the bread box from sliding off the counter.  This is what is known as an adaptation in OT-language. Using what one already has ~ differently ~ to accomplish something else.

So if you want your child to participate in the baking of pumpkin bread, think ahead about matching your child’s skills and the utensils you already have. BTW, that jar-opener-thingy is also good for placing under the bottom of a bowl when stirring. You know, to keep the bowl from sliding around.

A complete list of the ingredients is at the end. Shoot ahead if that is the only reason you came here. No!  Wait!  Set the oven to heat to 350 degrees (F) before you skip ahead.

 

 

Back to thinking ahead, if you want to include your child in this wonderful holiday memory making experience ~ consider making the recipe once by yourself first. [That way you can enjoy some wine while cooking, too. Just saying.] 

I am big on putting the ingredients right into the oven after mixing them. So I try to do the non-mixing tasks first.

I keep a stash of pecans in the freezer, so I have to take them out to thaw.

 

Coating the pans with some shortening is an important early step in baking. I usually use a paper towel to spread the grease shortening, but if your pans are unbreakable, consider allowing your child to spread the shortening with his hands. Might be safer if you know your child can keep from getting shortening on the outside of the pans (which might either smoke in the oven or drip onto the heating element). Might be more feasible, too, if you can plan an acceptable hand clean-up for afterwards.

I know - lots of considerations for helping your child to participate. But coating the pans would be a sensory experience. Ah hah!

 

 

I am also a bit compulsive about making sure there are no pieces of wood hiding within. So I break each half into half before I chop them.

Whichever nut you include in your pumpkin bread, consider having your child place them into a chopper bowl – one at a time to repeat fine motor skills.

Oh. Be sure she is not hungry before cooking.

 

If you happen to have a chopper your child can operate – electric or hand pump – there’s another opportunity for his participation.

Which reminds me – I’m taking this opportunity to air a pet peeve…. In the many self-contained special education classrooms I visited over my career few (to none) of the teachers made enough effort to plan for much participation by the students in cooking. Somehow their efforts were consumed by setting up the Cuisinart or blender for each child to press the button for about 3 seconds. Uh-hum.

 

Combine the dry ingredients (except the sugar) in a mixing bowl. No matter who creates this combination, with a high-sided bowl and some guidance, a very young child benefits from mixing the dry ingredients. A whisk is a better tool choice for a child (I use a fork).

The sugar however is added with the wet ingredients in a bowl large enough to hold the whole recipe.

 

There is reason that no can of pumpkin was in the photo of the ingredients. The reason is I used pumpkin that I cooked last fall and froze in bags like this. (The roasted seeds were delicious!)

If you choose to cook the pumpkins you now have decorating your home, potentially your child could help scoop the cooled cooked flesh from the rind into containers for later use. (Plastic bags require more skill to handle.)

 

Unlike canned pumpkin, the thawed pumpkin had to be drained. (I reserved the pumpkin juice for inclusion in a soup later.)

 

Then the pumpkin needed to be converted into a smoother consistency.

 

 

 

The complete mix of ingredients can be mixed by hand and this task is also nice for arm/hand/motor/strengthening.

Few children can pour a bowl of heavy wet dough into the baking pans. But a large spoon or ladle could be used to spoon the dough into the pans.

Only you can decide if your child can safely work with moving pans in and out of the oven. I recommend mitts for whoever completes this task.

 

The toothpick method for ‘doneness’ offers another fine motor skill for trial and practice.

Stick a toothpick into the bread after it has been removed from the oven and placed on a temperature safe surface. The bread is done when the toothpick comes out clean (instead of with goopy batter on it).

If you make pumpkin bread with your child, please post about it (with photos!) and come back and share the url.

Recipe for pumpkin bread 

2/3 cup shortening
2 cups sugar (I sometimes use brown sugar)
4 eggs
1 can or 16 ounces pumpkin
2/3 cup water
3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour (I mix whole wheat and all-purpose, half-n-half)
1 ½ teaspoons salt (add ½ tsp if using whole wheat flour – necessary for leavening)
2 teaspoons baking soda
½ teaspoon baking powder (add ½ tsp if using whole wheat flour)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
2/3 cup coarsely chopped nuts (I like pecans best.)
2/3 cup raisins (I prefer dried cranberries.)
Baking time: 1 hour, 10 minutes (but test the bread earlier if you make smaller loaves or have oven-temp-control-issues.)

Comments

[Candace]

Great post, Dr. Boucher. A fitting idea for Faith now that she is showing interest in food items. I might give this a try!

[Stephanie @ Ralphcrew]

WOW! You could do a cooking show/child development video using this material. How do you cook your pumpkin? I'm looking for a better way than peeling and chunking the big raw thing! I nearly chopped a finger off last year!

[The Barbara who lives here]

You flatter me, Candace and Stephanie....which makes me *smile*.

I cut the pumpkin into large wedges and scoop off the strings and seeds (which I roast separately). I think I put a bit of oil on the pan, puncture the skin side with a fork, and bake flesh side down until soft. Foil cover optional or in a covered cassarole dish. Usually less baking time in a covered dish.

All the squash I cook can be put in the microwave, too - covered with wax paper.

Now to go fix the typo I just saw in the post!

[Bethany]

When we cooked in the classroom the kids did everything from measuring to mixing to operating the kitchen appliances using an awesome switch adapted outlet system. We made everything from cookies to trail mix to smoothies to stone soup and a lot of other yummy treats. They chopped vegetables and fruit (with plastic knives and close supervision), they stirred the soup cooking in a slow cooker (again with supervision - and yes we did cook it with stones that I had boiled until sanitary), they were responsible for checking on the cookies to see if they were done (need I say with supervision), and they packaged up treats to give to other teachers and to take home. We were there to support them as THEY cooked, not for them to get to do a little something as WE cooked. We also always used picture direction recipes for the kids to follow, laminated and secured to all cooking surfaces. Cooking was fun, and a great opportunity for all of the things you mentioned - sensory, language, counting, turn taking, fine and gross motor skills, functional skills of daily living, etc. And the kids never knew they were working!

[Your Therapy Source Inc]

This is a great post for all children. As a girl scout leader, it shocked me at our last meeting that so many of the 3rd and 4th grade girls had never helped out in the kitchen. The entire troop had never peeled an apple. I think this is a lost art with more and more women working out of the home teaching cooking skills to our children has gone by the wayside.
Margaret

[The Barbara who lives here]

Ah, Bethany, to be a therapist in your classroom. What would I give?

Agreeing with you wholeheartedly, Margaret. I had a similar experience with my daughter's Girl Scout troop when they were in 6th grade and working on sewing. Several of them came up to me to request I thread their needles. I'm aware of some 'newer' programs to teach women in their 20's how to cook. Just sayin' (Bethany-whoclaimedtonotknowhowtocook on another post).