Making quick bread is easy and satisfying: You mix the dry ingredients and wet ingredients separately, quickly combine the two, and bake. You don’t need special techniques or equipment; even a loaf pan is optional, since you can bake quick breads in a square brownie pan or even an ovenproof skillet.
The loose batter is usually rich, full of butter, eggs, sugar, and milk. It’s generally leavened with either baking powder or soda or a combination of the two. This combination makes quick breads and muffins more like cakes than yeasted breads: The crumb is soft, moist, and airy, with a little chew but no crunch. Fat makes them tender and flavorful. The difference between, for example, a carrot muffin and carrot cake is slight. (These aren’t ironclad rules, of course.)
The star ingredients in most of these are frequently pantry staples or a last-call fruit or vegetable—ginger for gingerbread; bananas gone black; zucchini and carrots that need using up; overripe berries. The rest of the no-frills ingredients lists are another of quick breads’ appeals. You can make one anytime at a moment’s notice because you probably already have everything you need.
While yeast breads benefit from high-gluten (bread) flour and rough handling (kneading), the resulting gluten development makes the dough chewy and the crust thick. In quick breads and their kin, what you want is tenderness: Handle them gently, and that’s what you’ll get. Combine the wet and dry ingredients quickly and stir only as much as needed to incorporate the flour; a few lumps are fine. Overmixing will make quick breads tough. Similarly, bread flour is to be avoided; all-purpose is the way to go.
Quick breads are best the day they are made but will keep for a few days. Once cool, wrap them tightly. They freeze well for a couple of months. Quick breads that are drying out respond well to being toasted and buttered or transformed into French Toast.
Recipes