One year my neighbor who was vacationing at her lake home for the majority of the Summer  offered us free access to her expansive strawberry patch that was heavily laden with fruit on the verge of going bad.  After just one hour of picking my daughter Catherine and I had two massive mixing bowls heaped with strawberries and we needed a way to use them up quickly before they spoiled. We found this recipe and made a pile of loaves to gift to our friends and freeze to enjoy over the coming weeks.

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 large egg at room temperature

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 cup buttermilk at room temp.

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

zest of 1 lemon

Butter to grease the pan

2 cups of diced fresh strawberries

1.5 Tablespoon of all-purpose flour

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees

Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan with butter

Whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt

In a separate bowl mix the eggs, sugar, oil, buttermilk, vanilla, and lemon zest until evenly combined.

Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients whisking until no pockets of dry remain. Be mindful that you don’t overmix.

Wash the strawberries and pat them dry. Reserve about 3 Tablesppons of strawbeerries for later and set aside. Toss the sliced strawberries with 1.5 tablespoons of all-purpose flour. Carefully fold the strawberries into the batter until just combined. 

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and top with the reserved strawberries, carefully pressing them into the batter. 

Bake for one hour or until a toothpick poked into the bread comes out clean. If your bread is browning too fast you can cover the top with a piece of foil to protect it from looking burned. 

Remove the bread from the oven and let it cook for 25 minutes before removing it from the pan. Let the bread cool for another 20 minutes before slicing.