When I spotted apricots at the farmers market recently, I realized I’ve never shared a single recipe that used fresh apricots. And I thought it was time to change that! I bought enough to make some delicious Apricot Pecan Quick Bread, and still had a few leftover for an afternoon snack. When choosing apricots, look for fruit that is fragrant and slightly soft, but not mushy. Avoid apricots with any green areas. They should be yellow to deep orange in color, and may have touches of red. Store unripened apricots in a paper bag at room temperature, away from sunlight. Once ripe, put your apricots in a plastic bag in the refrigerator, where they will keep for a day or two.
You’ll need about 8 apricots for this quick bread (maybe a few more, depending on their size). I diced mine pretty small, so they were well distributed throughout the loaf. I love the hint of nutmeg and ginger in this bread, and the fact that it isn’t too sweet made it perfect for breakfast. If you have a sweet tooth, you may want to add another 1/4 cup of sugar or so, but I thought it was perfect as is. I was able to make one large loaf and a few mini loaves with the batter, and it would make fabulous muffins too!
Apricot Pecan Quick Bread
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups finely diced fresh apricots
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 1/2 cups flour
- 2 tablespoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon ginger
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/2 cup finely chopped pecans
- 1/4 cup rolled oats, for topping (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease loaf pans. (I made one 9x5x2 loaf and 1 mini loafs). In a small bowl, toss diced apricots with lemon juice.
- With an electric mixer, cream together butter and sugars until. Beat in egg and vanilla. Stir in apricots.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg and ginger. Add flour mixture to creamed mixture, alternately with the milk, starting and ending with the flour. Fold in chopped pecans.
- Fill loaf pan(s) 2/3 full with batter. If desired, sprinkle rolled oats over tops of batter. Bake for about 50 minutes for a large loaf (about 25 for a mini loaf), or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Cool bread for 10-15 minutes in pan before turning onto a wire rack to cool completely.
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Hi Danelle! I like apricots, but don’t ever think of baking with them. Your bread looks delicious, especially with the addition of pecans. Did you use whole milk?
The work “quick” always brings things to my attention!!!! I love these type of bread/cakes. Lovely with a cup of tea sitting out on my back veranda listening to the Lorikeets screeching in the gum trees…..oh and the overhead sound of planes…..we live on the flight path to the airport. Will be making this very soon but with dried apricots as they are not in season here at the moment. Thanks for this lovely recipe Danelle.
Thanks so much Suzanne!
This sounds wonderful. I have to try it. Thanks for sharing.
Wishes for tásty dishes, Linda
Hi Danelle, this is a good basic recipe. Nothing hard or fancy. Easy ingredients with quick preparation time. I didn’t have dried apricots so I used bottled ones from last season. I drained them in the fridge overnight in a colander over a bowl. They made the bread extremely moist. I’d try this again and maybe add cinnamon & cloves to make it tastier.
Great ideas! Thank you. 🙂