this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2024
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52 Weeks of Baking

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Welcome to 52 weeks of theme-based baking! A new challenge each week of the year. This is a great way for beginners to learn, and for experienced bakers to expand their skill set and explore their creativity.

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According to Wikipedia, quick breads are bread leavened with a chemical leavening agent (baking powder, baking soda) rather than yeast. In addition to the leavening agent, they contain flour, eggs, fat (like butter or oil) and liquid. Now, this is a very broad categorization which technically includes everything from pancakes to cakes to biscuits. Few people are imagining a white cake though, when they say "quick bread". There's an interesting discussion online about what is or isn't a quick bread. Mark Bittman's book "How to Bake Everything" groups "quick breads" and "biscuits" into a single chapter and calls them "cousins".

Quick breads are usually made using the "Muffin mixing" method. This is the popular "mix all the wet ingredients together, mix all the dry ingredients together, then add the dry to the wet and mix until just incorporated". It produces more liquid-y batter rather than dough. See more info here.

Some recipes, however, use the "creaming" method for quick breads. This is the method used more typically for cakes (and cookies) of creaming softened butter with sugar first. This traps air bubbles in the batter, which results in a lighter crumb. A fun exercise would be to compare Alton Brown's muffin mixed banana bread with Sally's creamed banana bread.

Biscuits and scones use the biscuit method of mixing, which involves cutting the cold fat (butter or shortening) into the dry ingredients. This results in a flaky texture as the fat melts during baking, leaving air pockets behind. This is similar to the way pie crust is made.

So feel free to share your favorite muffins, quick bread loaves, or even scones. For something less sweet, you may prefer zucchini bread, cheddar biscuits or Irish soda bread.

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