Cranberry-Walnut Pumpkin Loaf sounds like a quick bread, but this version from Baking With Julia is anything but quick. It’s a yeast bread with two rises interrupted by a six-hour chilling in the refrigerator followed by three to four hours warming back up to room temperature…baking the loaves is definitely a two-day affair. Except for my grandmother’s apple kuchen recipe, the only breads that I’ve made where the dough is chilled are ones that use small amounts of yeast and a long rising time. I’m not sure the chilling is really necessary to this recipe.
It’s a little early in the season for fresh cranberries to be available in the markets here. I tried a couple of local stores with no success, but then while in Philadelphia on Friday and walking through Reading Terminal Market, I stopped into a produce stand and scored a bag of fresh cranberries. I’m glad I did, because the tart bursts of flavor from the cranberries was my favorite part of these loaves.
The recipe called for baking the loaves in three small loaf pans. I do have some small loaf pans somewhere, maybe smaller than the 5 3/4″ x 3 1/4″ size specified in the recipe. Mine are four pans linked together, and I don’t use them often - it beats me where I stored them. Instead I used two standard sized pans, about 8 1/2″ x 4 1/2″. If I were to bake these again, I would either persist in searching out my mini-pans or make one larger loaf with about 2/3 of the dough and use the rest to make a few rolls. The quantity of dough really wasn’t quite enough for two large loaves.
I thought the dough was sluggish in rising. It was weighed down by the added-in cranberries and walnuts, and my kitchen isn’t so warm now that fall has settled in. I gave it a boost in a slightly warm oven for the rise in the pans. 
The bread smelled wonderful while baking, and it was good, but not amazing. The recipe can be found on pages 108-109 of Baking with Julia or on the blog of Rebecca at This Bountiful Backyard.
I had trouble with mine rising too…I think your looks like it turned out great.
Your loaf looks great! And when I saw the Reading Terminal Market, I was excited because that is near me too. Haven’t been in a few years though. But what a fun place to go!
Mine rose well, but I suspect it is because I didn’t have fresh cranberries. I have heard wonderful things about that market. It makes me think I need to visit Philadelphia.
We liked this bread–but it has all my favorite flavors in it. I liked it toasted with butter for breakfast. It might be good made into french toast too. So many possibilities!
The fresh cranberries were my favorite part of this bread too. Glad you were able to find them!
I finally found fresh cranberry (first time ever) and cannot wait to rebake it with them.
Your loaves looks delicious.
Thank you for having visited me and sorry for the late reply.