Lemon-Olive oil Loaf

I just posted a recipe which uses lemons, so I was debating if I should have waited before posting this one. But when life gives you lemons, you just cook yummy stuff with it. Believe me when I say there is no such thing as too many lemons or lemon recipes. Lemons (and limes) are one of the most versatile ingredients you can have on hand. Just so many different kinds of things you can turn them into!

I was looking for a lemon ‘bread’ recipe a few weeks back because we were traveling, and I wanted to have decent food on hand when my (extremely) active toddler got hungry. I didn’t want to keep buying airport food all the time or keep feeding him cheerios/goldfish snacks. And truth be told, this was as much for us as for him. And I wanted some for the hotel room. I can use this loaf to feed us first thing in the morning, without running out in our pjs looking for food. So after all that planning and making the bread, I carefully put it on our countertop and completely forgot to pack it! So we did end up doing all the things I mentioned above that I didn’t want to do! Yeah, that’s me! All I can say is thank god (and Kashi) for cereal bars.

But you don’t really need a reason to make this bread. The original recipe was from epicurious but I replaced the butter with olive oil to make it a tad healthier. I used extra virgin and we could really taste the olive oil in the bread. If you get turned off by it, I suggest you use regular olive oil. Also, I suggest you do not skip the glaze. It makes the bread so special giving it such an intense flavor. All in all, this is wonderfully lemony, light, fruity and goes extremely well with coffee and tea. You can also pair it with some berry sauce to make a simple dessert or use leftovers for Trifle pudding.

Lemon-Olive oil Loaf
Slightly adapted from epicurious

Ingredients-
1 2/3 cups whole wheat white flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cups sugar
½ cup extra virgin or regular olive oil
2 large eggs
2 tsp packed lemon peel, grated
½ cup milk
1 tsp vanilla extract

For the glaze-
½ cup sugar
¼ cup lemon juice, fresh squeezed

Grate the lemons to get the peel (only the yellow part, not the white) and then squeeze the juice. Keep aside.

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Grease a standard loaf pan (approximately 4.5X8.5).
Stir together flour, baking powder and salt.
Beat together olive oil and one cup of sugar until sugar melts and gets fluffy.
Beat in eggs one at a time and then add grated lemon peel followed by vanilla extract.
Mix in flour mixture alternately with milk.
Pour batter into the loaf pan and bake until a tooth pick inserted in the center comes out clean. This takes approximately an hour depending on your oven.

To make the glaze, combine ½ cup sugar and lemon juice in a small pan and keep stirring over low heat until the sugar melts.

Take the bread out of the oven and when it is warm, poke a few holes in it. Keep pouring the glaze with a spoon until all of it is absorbed. I thought I ended up with way too much glaze for the bread and had to throw away a little. Remove the loaf from pan, slice and store in an airtight container in the refrigerator to make it last longer.