Applesauce Quick Bread

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I have a ton of "baby food" (applesauce) to use up, and I need it all out of the little cups they come in by Friday at the very latest.

How much applesauce can you make your kid eat in one sitting?

Not that much.
(And seriously, how do people afford to feed their babies 3 meals a day of baby food?! This stuff was half off, and I still thought it expensive!)

I love to bake with applesauce.  It is healthier than oil, and adds flavor to dishes.  Just make sure you aren't buying applesauce loaded with preservatives and sugar.  The Up & Up baby food above has apples, carrots, water, and ascorbic acid (vitamin c).  I feel pretty good about that.

This recipe makes a double batch - I made one loaf and one square pan.  You can make one large, 9x13 pan, muffins, a million mini muffins, 2 loaves, 2 round pans and frost them and tell people it is cake... whatever you like.

Whatever you choose, line or grease it appropriately.

Preheat the oven to 350.  This is going to bake for an hour if you chose loaves and pans.  I don't know about muffins, but if I had to guess, I'd say 30 minutes.  (But please, watch them.  And if you do try, let me know.  I'm terrible at guessing bake times.)

Ingredients:

3.5 cups of applesauce or baby food.  (That's 28 oz. Each of the above tubs are 4oz., and I used apple carrot.  Go ahead, stick a spinach in.  They'll never notice.)
2/3 c. brown sugar
4 eggs
1/2 c. vegetable oil* (applesauce is a good, but not total, replacement for oil)
1/4 c. Kefir or milk
2 c. whole wheat flour
2 c. white flour
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp pumpkin pie spice (you could use your favorite spices to total 2 tsp if you don't have/like this)
pinch of salt (I forgot to add this into mine.  It turned out fine.)
Stir Ins, if desired (chopped nuts, dried fruit, fresh fruit, chocolate chips)

A good baker would tell you to mix all the liquid items and sugar in a large bowl, blending well.  Cream them, if you like.
Then you should sift (I don't sift a thing.  The French would be so disappointed.) all your dry ingredients together.
Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just mixed.  Add stir-ins if desired.

That is what a good baker would do.  An overly-caffeinated mom on a Target deal high trying to develop a recipe who is more concerned about how many of the baby food containers this will yield dumps all of the ingredients into a bowl, curses, tries to blend the baking soda into the flour with her fingers before it touches the wet ingredients (nobody will thank you for a clump of that in their bread) and after stirring vigorously realized the mass is entirely too dry because half the eggs were left out.  Ever forget to blend in the eggs?  Trust me, don't.  It isn't like you are trying to mix water back in.  They will fight for their independence.

Either way, you end up with batter.

Pour the batter into your chosen vessel(s).
Bake 60 minutes if in a loaf pan or glass baking dish.
Test by inserting a toothpick (when desperate, I use a chopstick.  It's all the same.) - the bread is done when the toothpick/chopstick comes out clean.

It rose more than I thought it would, but smells terrific!  Now we have a whole lot of bread to eat up! (Quick bread always disappears ... quickly... in my house.)

* I used 1/4c in mine and, after tasting it, changed this.  My bread was a bit dry.  I didn't compensate for the whole wheat flour.  It isn't bad with 1/4 cup, but I got a bit of heart burn.