Cinnamon Raisin Quick Bread

People think baking bread takes a long time because you have to wait for yeast to rise, but this cinnamon raisin quick bread uses only baking soda to get that lift. That means no waiting or kneading, and all you have to do is pour the batter into greased pans when you’re ready to bake. You’ll add a cinnamon-sugar mixture between layers of batter to give this bread a sweet center. It’s fantastic for breakfast, snacks or dessert, and if you need to grab some food before running out to school or work, this is a tasty choice.

Cinnamon Raisin Quick Bread Ingredients

• All-purpose flour: All-purpose has that name for a reason: It’s got the right amount of protein to give the bread strength, but not so much that the bread becomes chewy.
• Sugar: White sugar holds on to moisture and prevents too much gluten from forming. This gives baked goods a more cake-like texture. Less sugar would make the quick bread have a breadlike texture.
• Baking soda: This is what will make the quick bread batter rise as it bakes.
• Eggs: Eggs bind ingredients together in the batter, and in this recipe, they also help a bit with making the batter rise.
• Buttermilk: This is not only the acidic ingredient that will activate the baking soda, but it will also help flavor the bread and make it tender.
• Raisins: You can add the raisins to the batter straight from the package, but soaking them first in warm water plumps them and gives them a much softer texture.
• Cinnamon: Even though the mixture you sprinkle over the batter is cinnamon sugar, don’t use store-bought blends. Use the combination in the recipe.

Directions

Step 1: Make the batter

Danielle Moore for Taste of Home

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Combine the flour, 1 1/2 cups of the sugar, the baking soda and the salt in a large bowl. Whisk the eggs, buttermilk and some canola oil together in a separate bowl. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients gradually, until the dry ingredients are just moistened. Fold the raisins into the batter. In a separate, clean bowl, mix the rest of the sugar and the cinnamon. Set that mixture aside for now.

Step 2: Layer the batter and cinnamon

Danielle Moore for Taste of Home

Grease two 8×4-inch loaf pans. Spoon half the batter into each of the two pans. Top these layers with half of the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Repeat the layers with the rest of the batter and cinnamon-sugar mixture. Cut through the batter in each pan with a knife to create a swirl.

Step 3: Bake and cool the quick bread

Danielle Moore for Taste of Home

Bake the loaves for 55 to 60 minutes. When they’re ready, a toothpick inserted in the center of the loaves should come out clean. Let the loaves cool for 10 minutes in their pans, and then remove the loaves and transfer them to a wire rack to cool fully.

Cinnamon Raisin Quick Bread Variations

Danielle Moore for Taste of Home

• Use golden raisins or other dried fruit: You can use regular dark raisins or golden raisins in this recipe. If you don’t like raisins, try another fruit su h as sweetened dried cranberries or dried cherries. And if you don’t want any fruit and are just looking for a cinnamon bread recipe, try this cinnamon quick bread.
• Use brown sugar instead of white: This cinnamon raisin quick bread uses all white sugar; try substituting brown sugar in the cinnamon mixture instead.

How to Store Cinnamon Raisin Quick Bread

Initially, you can store the raisin quick bread in an airtight container at room temperature for up to two days. Make sure the loaf has completely cooled before you put it in the container, otherwise the steam from the warm bread will make the exterior soggy and promote mold growth.

Can you freeze cinnamon raisin quick bread?

If you’re going to have leftover bread past a couple of days, freeze it. You can also make extra loaves and freeze them for later. In both cases, ensure the bread has completely cooled down. Then, wrap the bread in foil and place that in a freezer-safe bag or container, squeezing out as much air as possible. In both cases, you’re better off slicing the bread before freezing it. That allows you to take just the slices you want instead of having to thaw the entire loaf at once.

Cinnamon Raisin Quick Bread Tips

Danielle Moore for Taste of Home

What can you use if you don’t have buttermilk?

If you don’t have buttermilk and don’t want to buy a whole quart or a half gallon just to get 2 cups for the recipe, you have three options: One is to place 1 tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice in a liquid cup measure, and then fill the rest of the measure with milk. Do that for each cup of buttermilk called for in the recipe, and let the cups stand for five minutes before using. The second option is to use 1 cup of plain yogurt for each 1 cup of buttermilk. The third option is to mix 1 cup of milk with 1 3/4 teaspoons of cream of tartar. There’s actually a fourth option, which you may like if you don’t usually have milk or yogurt on hand: buttermilk powder. Unopened packages are often shelf-stable. Opened packages have to be refrigerated, but they last a lot longer than liquid buttermilk and are easy to mix into any baking recipe. By the way, if you’ve been freezing buttermilk, give the powder a try because you don’t have to wait for the powder to thaw.

Can you use bread flour?

Don’t use bread flour here. Bread flour is very “strong,” meaning it’s got a lot of protein and will form a lot of gluten as you knead the dough. It makes loaves chewy and gives them structure, so bread flour is good for a lot of yeast-bread recipes. But this is a quick bread recipe, and you want that tender, almost-but-not-quite-cakey texture. Bread flour doesn’t do that texture well even when mixed with a lot of sugar. All-purpose is best here. On the other end of the flour protein scale, pastry flour that’s at the higher end of the protein percentage range (making it close to the amount of protein in all-purpose flour) could be an acceptable substitute.

Won’t the buttermilk overpower the baking soda?

This easy raisin bread recipe contains 2 teaspoons of baking soda and 2 cups of buttermilk. Normally, you need an acidic ingredient to activate the rising power of baking soda. If you have too much of an acidic ingredient, then that can destroy the rising power of the soda. You see this a lot when buttermilk or lemon juice combine with both baking powder and baking soda. The baking powder, which contains both baking soda and acidic cream of tartar, would be completely overwhelmed by the amount of acidity in the recipe. The bread wouldn’t rise well. So, extra baking soda counters the acidic ingredient and lets the baking powder do its job. Plus, the extra rising power you get from the baking soda and acidic ingredients doesn’t hurt. If you’re using older baking soda, test it to ensure it’s still useable.