I HATE PUMPKIN!

Ok, seriously, I really despise pumpkin flavored food items. BUT... I came across this recipe in a magazine a few years ago. It's a low-fat chocolate chip pumpkin bread. I just liked to bake and figured I would just take it into work for everyone else to enjoy since it was "pumpkin season", but of course, I have to taste everything before I share it with others, so I did, and fell in love with this bread. I have no idea what magazine I ripped this recipe out of, however the article says ...

"While Sarah Brinkley's Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread sounded deliciously intriguing, it was the vanilla pudding that really caught our eye. Sarah says this recipe for pumpkin bread is a family favorite.

"Sarah inherited the recipe from a friend but knew she wanted to give it her own twist when she saw the ingredients. 'It had egg yolks and lots of oil,' she says. Her first step was to reduce the amount of oil and substitute egg whites for whole eggs. Then she turned a trick she learned from a banana bread recipe in Cooking Light that used sour cream to make a light, moist loaf. 'I was out of sour cream, so on a whim I used vanilla pudding.'"

Blah blah blah, etc., etc.

Needless to say, I believe Sarah is a genius. This bread is SO moist and, so, without further adieu, here it is!

-----

CHOCOLATE CHIP PUMPKIN BREAD

no mixer required

-----

2 cups sugar

2 cups canned pumpkin

1/2 cup canola oil (I'm sure vegetable oil would be fine)

1/2 cup fat-free vanilla pudding (I used Hunt's Snack Pack Fat-Free Vanilla Pudding)

4 large egg whites

3 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 1/4 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (I used Hershey's Milk Chocolate Chips)

Cooking spray

-----

1. Preheat oven to 350

2. Combine first 5 ingredients in large bowl, stirring well with a whisk. Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups, level with a knife. Combine flour, cinnamon, salt, and baking soda in a medium bowl, stirring well with a whisk. Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture, stirring just until moist. Stir in chocolate chips.

3. Spoon batter into 2 (8 x 4 inch) loaf pans coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350 for 1 hour 15 minutes (mine took 1 hour 25 minutes) or until a wooden pick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes in pans on wire rack, and remove from pans. Cool completely on wire rack.

-----

Yield: 32 servings

Calories: 152

Fat: 5g

Protein: 2g

Carb: 26.5g

Fiber: 1.1g