Yummy Recipe Wednesday! (Strawberry Bread)

Hello again friends and food lovers. Welcome to another Yummy Recipe Wednesday. I hope everyone had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend and had lots of delicious food. Today I bring you a great summer time recipe that is perfect now that strawberries are in season just about everywhere. Now I know I don’t post many recipes like this on the blog since I’m not a huge baker so be assured that when I do it’s going to be something special and that’s the way I feel about this recipe. This strawberry bread is just so sweet, moist, and dense almost like a pound cake which is something I like to indulge in occasionally. The strawberry flavor comes out so nicely in this bread and this could easily be served as a dessert with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and/or some whipped cream served on top. Give this a try for yourself next time you have a family get-together or a work function and I promise no one will be disappointed. As always, feel free to post comments below and if you aren’t already, be sure to follow @RecipeBlogger on Twitter so you don’t miss out on any new posted recipes.

Strawberry Bread

• 4 cups Fresh Strawberries
• 3 1/8 cups All-Purpose Flour
• 1 1/2 cups White Sugar
• 1/2 Tbsp Ground Cinnamon
• 1 tsp Salt
• 1 tsp Baking Soda
• 3/4 cups Vegetable Oil
• 1/2 cup Unsweetened Applesauce
• 4 Eggs, beaten
• 1 1/4 cups Chopped Pecans (optional) 

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C); butter and flour two 9 x 5-inch loaf pans.
2. Place 2 cups of the strawberries in a medium-sized bowl and smash them gently with the back of a large spoon; sprinkle the strawberries with 1/2 cup of the sugar and set aside while preparing the batter.
3. Combine the flour, remaining 1 cup of sugar, cinnamon, salt and baking soda in large bowl; mix well and set aside.
4. Whisk the oil, eggs, and applesauce into the smashed strawberries (you can also use a hand mixer or blender/processor); add the strawberry mixture to flour mixture and mix until the dry ingredients are just moistened.
5. Slice the remaining 2 cups of strawberries and fold them gently into the batter with the pecans (if using); divide the batter into the 2 loaf pans.
6. Bake in the preheated oven approximately 45 to 50 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center comes out clean (test each loaf separately); let loaves cool in their pans on a wire rack for 10 minutes and then turn the loaves out of the pans.