Breads Fig Bread
Submitted by msbelle on September 11, 2010 at 1:34 pm

DESCRIPTION
Very tasty way to use extra fresh figs. Delicious! Add a brown sugar glaze and it's over the top!

SUMMARY
Yield 0 Source southernfood.about.com File under bread, fresh figs

INGREDIENTS
3 eggs
2 cups sugar
2 cups ripe figs, mashed
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3 cups flour (I use KA AP)
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup chopped pecans

Thanks to Kidpizza for helping me get the ratios more balanced so the recipe to works better.

INSTRUCTIONS
Amended directions:

Mix together all dry ingredients and separately mix together all wet ingredients. With mixer on very lowest speed, alternately combine the liquid mixture and dry mixture (about a cup of each at a time) ending with dry. Don't overmix. Fold in pecans last. Thanks to Kidpizza and Rickthebaker for their help in giving me a more workable set of directions.

Original directions
Beat eggs; add sugar and beat well. Add the mashed figs and vegetable oil. Sift together flour, soda, salt and cinnamon and add to fig mixture. Add the combined fig and flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk. Stir gently until well blended. Fold in chopped pecans. Bake at 350 degrees for one hour in a greased and floured loaf pan.

Makes 2 large or 3 small loaves.

comments
Submitted by KIDPIZZA on Sat, 2010-09-11 18:29.
MSBELLE:
Good day Msbelle. I do not know where you got this recipe but the mixing technique is not what it should be for a oil based mixing method. No guarantees but this is the way I do mine regardless of the written directions. To begin with you are employing too, too, too much Bkg soda.for approx 15, oz of flour you are using. reduce this to 1 tsp it' power equates to 4X the amount of bgk powder . Also I might add there is an excessive amount of gran sugar for the amount of flour you are using. Sooo, what I would here is reduce the sugar amount to 2 cups of sugar.
Place oil & sugar in a large mixing bowl, Using a hand held mixer, mix in eggs 1 at a time mix each for a minute or so.Add figs. In a separate bowl mix flour,soda, salt, cinn. & pecans.
Add 1/3rd of flour into wet ingredients & mix well Then add 1/2 buttermilk continue till completed. ( 1/3rd FLR, 1/2 LIQUID 1/3rd FLR & all of LIQUID all of flour FLOUR)
You can make muffins out of this recipe or you can also bake this in a bundt pan as well.
Good luck & enjoy the weekend.
~KIDPIZZA.
Submitted by msbelle on Sun, 2010-09-12 18:54.
Kidpizza - It's taking me a while to learn my way around to get all responses. I like that you added this to my recipe. This way I'll have it attached to the recipe.
I had presumed it had that much baking SODA because of the acid in buttermilk and figs. Your mixing directions are similiar to what my grandmother would have done 50 years ago. You just can't beat success. She made a fabulous Pound Cake using this method of alternating liquid and flour and ending with flour. She would not have known about the why of the Chemistry but she knew what worked.
Thanks again. msbelle
Submitted by 7cats03 on Fri, 2010-09-24 11:43.
Good morning !
Thank you msbelle for this recipe, it has been saved in my recipe box waiting to be served! Thanks kidpizza (love that) for the review and help sometimes we just forget what we learned from our favorite family cooks. Proof here that at 75 I can still benefit from help in the kitchen...often.
7cats03 and yes, at one time there were 7 cats in my life.
Submitted by rickthebaker on Fri, 2010-09-24 13:51.
I'm a retired pastry chef and culinary school instructor. Generally one would use the "muffin method" of mixing for oil-based breads/cakes and use the "creaming method" of mixing for butter-based breads/cakes. The muffin method is simple: mix all wet ingredients together, mix all dry ingredients together, add the dry to the wet only until moistened. I think Alton Brown says no more than 10 stirs. Mixing more than this can make the baked good tough and/or create strange "tunneling" air holes in the finished goods. The creaming method creams together the butter and sugar until light, adds the eggs one at a time, and then alternates 1/3 mixed remaining dry ingredients, 1/2 the remaining liquid, 1/3 dry, 1/2 liquid, and finishing with the last 1/3 dry. These methods are standard methods in virtually every baking text book. (There are other methods but these 2 cover almost all home recipes.) Other personalized methods can work, but often truly do depend on the individual using them--everyone's touch is different. The methods I've described above generally work best for all bakers.
Submitted by msbelle on Sat, 2010-09-25 20:06.
rickthebaker and others - All of your comments are appreciated and noted and make so much sense. It still amazes me after cooking/baking for 55+ years that there is still so much to learn whether its a slight nuance or an all new principle. That's one of the things that makes this baking circle so valuable. Bakers from all walks of life and expertise are so open to sharing their knowledge. Thanks so much. msbelle
Submitted by msbelle on Sat, 2012-03-24 20:50.
Reducing the baking soda and sugar and using a different mixing method did the trick. The bread bakes up beautifully.
Submitted by msbelle on Sat, 2012-03-24 20:48.
Never did get back online to give a report using the amended ingredient ratios and mixing method that Kidpizza and Rickthebaker gave me. Made the bread again today and it worked perfectly.
Reducing the sugar to 2 cups and baking soda to 1 teaspoon made it work like a charm.
Thanks for your valuable advise! msbelle