Consolation Prize Pear Bread

Dilemma #1
Joe is at work. My mom and my best friend have just informed me via text that they are together in sunny California, eating delicious Mexican food and shopping at the outlet mall. I must find a way to drown my sorrows/keep myself busy for the evening...

Dilemma #2
Abel & Cole keeps sending us pears. Last week I put some in the Thanksgiving cranberry sauce. I've put them in a smoothie. I've poached them and eaten them with ice cream. I had thought there might be a reprieve from pears this week, but no go. Apparently it is Pear Season around here. I must find a way to use all the pears before they go bad...

Dilemma #3
Catching Fire came out last weekend and even though I have no one to go with I think I'm going to go tomorrow night when Joe's at work. As is tradition, I must watch the preceding film before seeing the newest installment...

Solution: Spend Friday night watching Hunger Games (because Joe isn't here so I can because I have the TV to myself) and baking pear bread!

I found a recipe from Taste of Home that looks yummy (ie had a good preview picture) and didn't require any crazy ridiculous ingredients. I had to borrow a loaf pan, but if it works out well I may go ahead and buy one.

Ingredients

• 3 Eggland's Best Eggs (that's convenient! Abel & Cole sent me organic eggs to try this week!)
• 1-1/2 cups sugar
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 4 cups finely chopped peeled ripe pears (about 4 medium ALL of the pears I have from this week and last!)
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice (didn't have lemon juice. oh well.)
• 1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions

1. In a bowl, combine the eggs, sugar, oil and vanilla; mix well. Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda and salt; stir into the egg mixture just until moistened. Toss pears with lemon juice. Stir pears and walnuts into batter (batter will be thick).
2. Spoon into two greased 9-in. x 5-in. loaf pans. Bake at 350° for 55-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks. Yield: 2 loaves.

super thick and goupy but smells great already

With limited space to keep things in my kitchen, I don't buy ingredients without a recipe in mind usually; I can't afford to have stuff taking up room (and potentially going bad) if I don't know how I'm going to use it. That's why I was excited to find little one-teaspoon sachets of baking soda and baking powder at Sainsbury. My baking cabinet at home is stocked with large containers of all the essential ingredients for home baking, but here I just don't invest in ingredients I'm not 100% sure I'll use.

Now we wait...

Looks tasty!

Yummy!!

I am not a big fan of banana-flavored sweets, so this quick bread is the ideal solution. It's moist and salty-sweet like banana bread but flavored with the mildness of pears instead. So yummy! I probably could have diced the pears into the smaller pieces, but generally (since chopping is my least favorite) I will deal with chunkier pieces rather than spend the extra time.

Take that, Friday night!

Update: when Joe got home he thought it smelled so good
he didn't want to wait to slice a piece off...