Guest Author - Deborah Markus

Never having thought of myself as a food writer before I took this job, I've been pleasantly surprised in the course of working here how easy and enjoyable coming up with recipes is. Chocolate recipes, anyway.

But once in a while, there's nothing like someone else offering to do your job for you.

I'm a homeschooler, and am on many email loops for homeschoolers. One of the members of one of these posted a recipe for pumpkin chocolate-chip bread.

I happen to have a pumpkin pie recipe that calls for chocolate chips, so I know that pumpkin and chocolate can go together very nicely. So I emailed this woman and begged her to let me share her recipe.

She readily agreed, adding only that as she'd gotten it from Lisa, a friend of hers, she couldn't take credit for it. And for that matter, she wasn't sure if Lisa had come up with it all by herself. "Maybe you could just say that this is a recipe that's been passed around in the homeschooling community," she suggested.

Fair enough. So here is the homeschooling community's gift to the chocolate community, with many thanks to Louise and Lisa.

Set 1/3 cup of butter out to soften. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9x5x3-inch loaf pan.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the following dry ingredients:

1 cup unbleached flour
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

Whisk or stir with a fork until thoroughly combined.
Add the following:

1 cup canned pumpkin
1/2 cup milk [note: in general, it's always a good idea in this kind of recipe to use at least 2% milk, or whole, rather than skim]
2 eggs
1/3 cup butter, softened

Beat with an electric mixer on low speed until blended, then on high speed for two minutes.
Stir in:

1 more cup of flour

Beat well, then add the part you've been waiting for:

Between 3/4 cup and 1 cup chocolate chips

Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for about an hour, or until tester comes out clean. Cool for ten minutes on a wire rack, then remove from pan and allow to cool completely on rack.
Lisa says to wrap and store this overnight before slicing. If you have that kind of self-control, let me know how it went, okay?