Orange-Cranberry Breakfast Bread

  Back in early March, I posted a recipe for a Honey-Lemon breakfast bread. At the end of the post, I suggested that a variation using orange zest and juice and lightly sweetened cranberries might be a nice variation. Well, I finally got around to trying it and I have to say, I like it better than the lemon bread! That being said, here's the recipe. I hope you enjoy!

• 1 stick unsalted butter, softened plus 1/2 tbsp butter, kept separate
• 1/2 cup honey (I like to use Grade A Clover honey)
• 2 eggs
• 1 orange (when possible, I like to use a Navel orange as they are usually larger, but a good-size Valencia will work, too)
• 1 cup whole cranberries, fresh or frozen
• 1 tbsp white sugar
• 2 cups basic white flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt

  Preheat oven to 350⁰. In a mixing bowl, cream together the stick of softened butter with the 1/2 cup of honey. Add the eggs one at at time, mixing well. Zest 1/2 of the orange rind and add that to the mix, along with all the juice from the orange (you should have about 1/2 cup of juice), mixing well. Put the cup of cranberries in a food processor along with the tbsp of sugar and run for 20 seconds. Add the processed cranberries to the mix and blend. Mix together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Blend these dry ingredients into the wet mix in 2 or 3 portions. Stir til all the dry ingredients are just incorporated - try not to overwork it.

  Use the extra 1/2 tbsp of butter to coat the inside of a bread tin (roughly 8-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 2-1/4).Add the bread dough into the tin and place in oven. Bake 45 minutes or til toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool in tin on a rack for 30 minutes then remove from tin and let cool completely. As with lemon bread, it is better if you wrap the cooled bread and let sit overnight til the next morning, if you can!
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