By Rookie Mom
This week summer finally shifted to fall. So we traded Baby’s breezy sack-gowns for fuzzy footy-pajamas. And I threw an oversized sweatshirt over my old Illini t-shirt and blue-jeans.
It’s time to let our fall-freak-flags fly, folks. Apple cinnamon candles. Pumpkin spice coffee. Loaded baked potato–anything.
This morning–to kick off the yummiest of seasons–I baked my favorite pumpkin bread. It’s actually an old Paula Deen recipe–and everyone knows you can’t go wrong with an old Paula Deen recipe. I always add more cinnamon and nutmeg, but the rest of this recipe is all hers.
It made my house smell like Thanksgiving.
While the bread was still warm, I opened my refrigerator and had to reach behind a few vials of Ovidrel for butter to spread on my perfect slice.
Fertility drugs—still in my fridge. A little reminder of all our infertility struggles this year—and a big reminder of just how thankful we are this holiday season.
I have a baby now. He didn’t come from injectables or fertility procedures. And I don’t plan to conceive again for a very long time—if ever. But I can’t seem to part with the vials of ovulation-stimulating-hormones in my fridge. Or the grocery bag full of ovulation predictor sticks, needles and syringes and progesterone suppositories hidden in the back of my closet.
I hated struggling through infertility. I hated all the drugs and procedures. You’d think I’d have lit a match to all that infertility crap as soon as we brought Baby home from the hospital. But I didn’t.
I have my reasons, I suppose. Justifications I’m too embarrassed to share. So let’s just say–I’m busy with a new Baby. And I just haven’t taken the time to research what you should do with leftover fertility drugs.
For now I’m pushing them behind the buttuh, baby. And I’m slathering my slice.
Try this pumpkin bread recipe this weekend–and thank me later.
Pumpkin Bread
Adapted from Cooking with Paula Deen
- 1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin
- 1 cup vegetable oil
- 2/3 cup water
- 4 large eggs
- 3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 3 cups sugar
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I use 1 ½ or 2)
- 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg (I use 1 ½ or 2)
- 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
Preheat oven to 350˚F. Grease 2 (8×5-inch) loaf pans. In a medium bowl, beat pumpkin, oil, water, and eggs at medium speed with an electric mixer until smooth.
In a separate medium bowl, sift together flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. Gradually add to pumpkin mixture, stirring to combine.
Pour into pans, and bake for 1 hour, or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool in pans 10 minutes. Remove from pans, and cool completely on wire racks.
Slather butter—not Ovidrel–on your warm slice, and enjoy.
Makes 2 loaves.