By Martha Rose Shulman
- Total Time
- 1 hour 30 minutes
- Rating
- 4(320)
- Notes
- Read community notes
At my farmers’ market one vendor was selling over-ripe fuyu persimmons for $1 a pound and I bought a few pounds just to make purée, which I used for dense, sweet quick breads like this one and for muffins. According to Deborah Madison, persimmons contain enzymes that will react with the flour and prevent the bread from having a nice crumb, so you must first neutralize them by stirring baking soda into the purée. This also causes the purée to become gelatinous, but the gelatinous mash is easy to break up with a whisk and will dissolve when added to the batter. Freeze any leftover purée.
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Ingredients
Yield:1 9x5-inch loaf (12 slices)
- 2 to 3ripe or over-ripe persimmons (enough for 1 cup purée)
- 10grams (2 teaspoons) baking soda
- 140grams (approximately 1 cup) whole wheat flour
- 70grams (approximately ½ cup) unbleached all-purpose flour
- 75grams (approximately ¾ cup) almond powder (also known as almond flour)
- 1teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ½teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¼teaspoon ground allspice
- ⅛teaspoon ground cloves
- ½teaspoon salt
- 2large eggs, at room temperature
- 100grams (approximately ½ cup) raw brown sugar or tightly packed light brown sugar
- 75grams (⅓ cup) melted unsalted butter, grape seed oil or canola oil
- ⅓cup plain low-fat yogurt or buttermilk
- 1teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½cup raisins
- ½cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Ingredient Substitution Guide
Nutritional analysis per serving (12 servings)
249 calories; 13 grams fat; 4 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 2 grams monounsaturated fat; 3 grams polyunsaturated fat; 30 grams carbohydrates; 3 grams dietary fiber; 13 grams sugars; 6 grams protein; 249 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
Step
1
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees with a rack in the middle. Butter or oil a loaf pan and line with parchment. Oil the parchment. Cut the persimmons in half along the equator, remove any visible seeds and scoop out the pulp, which should be nice and soft. Purée with a hand blender or in a food processor fitted with the steel blade and measure out 1 heaped cup (260 grams). Freeze the remaining pulp.
Step
2
Stir 1 teaspoon of the baking soda into the persimmon pulp and set aside. It will stiffen into a gelatinous mass but don’t worry about it. Sift together the flours, remaining baking soda, spices, and salt.
Step
3
In a standing mixer fitted with the whip, or with a hand beater or whisk, beat together the eggs and sugar until thick and they ribbon when lifted with a spatula, 5 to 8 minutes. Beat in the melted butter or oil, the yogurt, persimmon purée, and vanilla and beat until the persimmon purée has blended into the mixture.
Step
4
At low speed, beat in the flour in 3 additions. Fold in the raisins and the optional nuts. Scrape into the loaf pan and bake 50 to 60 minutes, until the bread is firm and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Remove from the oven, remove from the pan and allow to cool on a rack.
Tip
- Advance preparation: The bread is best if wrapped once cooled and allowed to sit for a day, to let the spices mature. It will keep for 3 or 4 days at room temperature and freezes well.
Ratings
4
out of 5
320
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Cooking Notes
Silicon Valley Chicken Farmer
Love this. Have made it twice now, today made four loaves to give away for Thanksgiving (and two for us). Used unpeeled persimmons whirled in food processor, replaced sugar with 1T. molasses, walnuts with pecans, the spices w/2 t. pumpkin pie spice, and raisins with dried cranberries. Best use for the persimmons from our tree.
Ann Brown
To make this recipe gluten free, I used all almond flour. I used 1/4 cup coconut sugar, 2 cups persimmon pulp, 1/2 cup dried cranberries, 1 teaspoon cardamon. I'll report back on the taste and texture once we dish it up.
Jared B
I've made this recipe a few times now and it's very flexible and forgiving. I use whole persimmons (peel and all) and I reduce the sugar by half, add a tablespoon of molasses, a half-teaspoon of ginger, orange zest, and pecans instead of walnuts. I also added a quarter cup of flax seed meal.
Kaitlin Y.
A lovely spiced loaf, and a great way to use up some overripe persimmons, but I wouldn’t necessarily know there were persimmons in the final product if I hadn’t made the purée myself, as the spices dominate. I am grateful I made it last night, as a slice for breakfast topped with butter and paired with a cup of coffee was perfect on this rainy autumn morning.
terrifrank95
If using a glass pan, forget the parchment paper.Also, I accidentally put all the baking soda into the persimmon pulp. It seemed to make no difference in the outcome, so you can forget that extra step.This bread was good, but I only tried this recipe because my farm delivery gave me 5 ripe fuyu persimmons and I couldn't figure out how to use them quickly. I generally find Ms Shulman's recipes overly complex for their results.
Stephani Bo
Substituted brown sugar with 1/4c. of honey and 1/4c. of maple syrup (I didn't have enough maple syrup to make the complete 1/2c.) and made it into muffins. They turned out great and froze well! Will definitely make again.
HB
Addendum: Persimmon bread without sugar (substituted 1/2 c persimmon puree) came out great! We spread cream cheese on it and that was a nice addition.
Me
Makes a very dry batter - I'd add more persimmon puree. I did add more yogurt
KCbear
used olive oil, and subbed an extra 3/4 cup of persimmon. Very moist!
Terri
Used Hachiya persimmons, which are very good for baking. Must be very ripe and squishy or they will be astringent. Also made into muffins vs loaf and they turned out great.
Mary
I used over-ripe wild persimmons from our West Virginia trees. I had to run the pulp through a sieve to eliminate the many seeds before food processing the remaining pulp. Flavor was great. Nice fall breakfast treat, not overly sweet with a sturdy crumb that slices well.
Katherine
By far the best use for hachiya persimmons I’ve ever found. This recipe is fantastic. I don’t have a food processor, but mashing the pulp with a potato masher was just as effective.
SF Cook
Intro specifically says Fuyu persimmons
Marisa
Made this as directed. I should have checked the oven at 40 minutes because at 50 minutes the bread was well done (not burnt). If I make this recipe again, I would lower the temp to 350F. The taste was mild and the persimmons were a vehicle for moisture, but not a ton of flavor. I was hoping to get more almond flavor with the almond flour, but I could have probably replaced the almond flour with regular flour. I would perhaps up the spices the next time as well.
Caroline Galanty
Which type of persimmons? Fuyu (flat apple like) or Hachiya (pear shaped ones that can leave a funny flavor in your mouth)?
Louise
There are at least two types of persimmons, which you need to work with differently. Fuyu persimmons are hard when ripe, and the peel is edible. Hachiya persimmons are only good when they are super-soft ("over-ripe"). They must be peeled as the skin is astringent.
Donna
The hachiya persimmon is the super soft one that is gelatinous. The fuyu’s texture is more like a firm plum. It seems like this recipe means to use hachiya. What did other cooks find?
Lulu
I followed directions exactly. The cake is fine - nothing more. The spice is pleasant, but rather pedestrian. I won’t bother again.
Nancy
Well this is really good but the recipe neglects to tell you about adding the spices and the other teaspoon of baking soda. I added those to the flour mixture. Overripe persimmons are perfect: I slit open and squeezed the liquid pulp out.
Sahba
Made this with Rye instead of whole wheat flour and used olive oil added 1/4 date and walnut paste I had in my freezer and the results were outstanding!! Highly recommend this for dying fuyu persimmons in the back of your fridge!
Barb T
Absolutely delicious!My sifter couldn't handle the almond flour. So I blended the dry ingredients manually with no problem.
nancy
Used more almond flour. Replaced whole wheat with more almond flour. Put raisins and walnuts in cuisinart with a bit of flour. And used mixed Berry French Yogurt.
,,,
Actually 50 minutes was perfect
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