Vintage Eats Recipe: 1976 Quick ‘N Easy Carrot Bread

As Easter approaches, I’m in the mood for carrots.

So for the month of April, I’m focusing on recipes with carrots as an ingredient. Maybe not as the main ingredient as in this recipe for ‘Quick ‘N Easy Carrot Bread’, but they will play a part in each dish. Stay tuned!

Remember, Bunny Rabbit on the Captain Kangaroo Show? He was always eating carrots. Wait, he also wore glasses. Something is wrong there.

Back to the recipe.

As you can see, I made muffins, rather than a loaf bread, as the recipe suggests. And I didn’t add glaze so I could spread the muffins with butter instead.

It has plenty of carrots, but they meld well with other ingredients for a subtly sweet taste.

I have made carrot cake so I don’t know what difference the cereal makes, but leaving it out I suspect would change the taste.

The cookbook for this recipe is a 24-page, stapled pamphlet printed in 1976. No idea where I found it, but it is in great shape and I file it with other small booklets from that decade to keep it safe.

Other recipes I plan to make from it include ‘Kangaroo Pocket Bread’ and ‘Sour Cream Apple Squares.’

The cover explains there was a contest to encourage customers to create recipes with Chex cereals. Each prize-winning recipe has a name listed after it. This recipe for ‘Quick ‘N Easy Carrot Bread’ was submitted by Mrs. Vinson G. Grosse, University City, TX. Congratulations!

Each recipe has a tagline that gives you an idea of how to use it or ease of preparation or just to get you excited.

This recipe: “So good it can double as dessert.”

This might be true as ‘Quick ‘N Easy Carrot Bread’ was a delight with taste testers the first time I made it (they didn’t know they were taste testers! — Don’t worry, I always taste something before I give it to a friend to try! I knew this was a keeper from the first bite).

This week I offered a batch to someone who has helped me greatly in the past couple of months – my tax accountant. Monica worked with my husband and me for 14 years. John always had everything laid out perfectly for her. I tagged along, never understanding anything of what they said.

My paper work as an author/speaker was presented to her with expenses and payments and she always took care of us with patience and professionalism.

This year — my first tax season without John — Monica was just as helpful as she could be. I made multiple trips to provide her with the right information and she always greeted me with a smile, explaining anything I didn’t understand.

Now that we’re finally done, I can concentrate again on baking. I took her several muffins, knowing she had long days yet ahead until tax season was done.

She expressed her appreciation and accepted them with a smile. I hope they help her through the long hours of the next several days.

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Another friend I want to introduce you to is Julie Smith. We attend church together – St. Luke Church in Decatur Indiana (non-denominational).

Julie is a professional photographer and fabulous cook, as I found out when she brought us meals when John was in hospital.

She is also a talented knitter. She made the adorable orange carrots pictured here with the muffins. When I saw them on her social media accounts, I just had to have some to decorate!

She makes cute knitted items for each season. I ordered dozens of pumpkins last fall to give to people who had helped us through the difficult months of John’s illness.

If you’d like to order Julie’s carrots and see more of her work, go to her Etsy link.

I hope you enjoy this recipe. What recipe with carrots is a favorite with you?

Happy Eating!

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Quick ‘N Easy Carrot Bread

2 cups sifted all-purpose flour

1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1-1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

½ teaspoon salt

1-1/2 cups Wheat Chex cereal crushed to ¾ cup.

½ cup chopped walnuts

2 eggs

¾ cup vegetable oil

¾ cup sugar

1-1/2 cups carrot pieces (cut ½-inch thick)

1 teaspoon vanilla

Glaze*

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Grease a 8-1/2 x 4-1/2 x 2-1/2-inch loaf pan (I prepared 12 cupcake liners in cupcake pans).

In large bowl sift together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt.

Stir in cereal and walnuts.

Process eggs, oil, sugar, carrot pieces, and vanilla in blender until smooth.

Pour over dry ingredients.

Stir just until moistened.

Turn into pan.

Bake 60-65 minutes or until tester inserted in center comes out clean. (Muffins should be baked approx. 30 minutes.)

Let cool 15 minutes before removing from pan.

Cool completely.

Top with Glaze*.

Makes 1 loaf or 12 muffins.

*Glaze:

Combine ½ cup sifted confectioner’s sugar, 1 teaspoon milk and ¾ teaspoon lemon juice. Beat until smooth.

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My Notes:

1. Rather than wash a blender, I hand mixed the ingredients, being careful to only do so until well blended. Overmixing will create gluten and give the baked good a tough texture.
2. I used Rice Chex, rather than Wheat, as I don’t like the taste of the wheat cereal. The taste may not be noticeable in the finished product, but I didn’t want to take a chance.
3. The food processor made this recipe easy by chopping up the cereal and carrots within seconds.

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