Last Updated on October 5, 2022 by Aaron von Frank
This persimmon bread recipe makes a rich, moist, and delicious breakfast bread. In addition to ripe persimmons, it uses 100% whole wheat organic flour, oats, walnuts, dried fruit, and honey (not cane sugar).
Last fall, we harvested a large box of persimmons from our ‘Ichi Ki Kei Jiro’ and ‘Fuyu’ persimmon trees. Since Japanese persimmons store well, we ate persimmons pretty much every day over the following month.
Then we had a baby and forgot about the remaining shelf full of persimmons left downstairs. Upon re-finding the now overripe persimmons, we realized we were going to have to figure out a way to use a lot of persimmons fast before they went bad…
These overripe Japanese persimmons were reincarnated as persimmon bread.
What can you do with over-ripe Japanese persimmons?
A great way to use up a bunch of overripe persimmons is to make persimmon bread.
We’ve used up all of our remaining persimmons getting this persimmon bread recipe just right!
Organic whole wheat persimmon bread with honey (no cane sugar)
We wanted a persimmon bread recipe that was chock full of good ingredients:
- organic stone ground whole wheat flour (we highly recommend Great River Organic’s flour, which we buy in bulk),
- walnuts,
- dried fruit,
- organic old fashioned oats,
- duck eggs from our backyard flock,
- milk kefir (or yogurt), and
- honey rather than cane sugar, since we have jars full of honey that need to be used up before the next honey harvest in the spring.
We made up our own persimmon bread recipe, which took a bit of trial and error to get just right. Good news: we think we created a keeper that we’ll enjoy making every year when we’re flooded with persimmons. We hope this will become a go-to seasonal recipe for you as well!
If you don’t have super mushy overripe persimmons, don’t worry! Simply put your firm Japanese persimmons in a blender until pulped, although this might not make as moist a bread as overripe persimmons. (Just like you want to use old bananas to make banana bread.)
Another option: put your firm Japanese persimmons in the freezer overnight then thaw them out before making this recipe. That will help get them nice and soft prior to use.
And, yes, in case you’re wondering you CAN use American persimmons for this recipe!
FIVE persimmon bread recipe tips
Five tips to help you make and enjoy the best tasting persimmon bread you’ve ever had:
1. Use fresh grated spices if possible.
Yes, it might take more effort than getting pre-ground spices, but using a microplane to grate your own cinnamon and nutmeg ramps up the flavor a few decibels.
Fresh grated cinnamon from a microplane. Orange zest in the background. Freshly grated ingredients add more and better flavor to any recipe.
2. Use citrus zest, ideally fresh-zested from organically grown fruit.
Keep the microplane out! You’ll need to use it to zest a bit of citrus skin. (Here’s how to zest citrus in case it’s your first time.)
Citrus zest will add just the right zip and nuance to balance out some of the other flavors in this recipe. We think orange zest is best for this recipe (we used our homegrown blood oranges), but lemon zest will work fine too.
3. Let it rest.
Some foods are best served immediately after they’re made. This persimmon bread isn’t one of those.
While it certainly isn’t bad eaten immediately after it cools, it actually tastes better when it’s had a chance to rest 12 hours or so. In fact, The Tyrant thinks the flavor continues to improve over the course of several days.
4. Reheat slices in a skillet (preferably cast iron).
We’ve found that the best way to reheat a slice of persimmon bread (or other breakfast bread) is to plop it in a medium-low heat cast iron skillet with a bit of grass-fed butter, flip it and repeat. It comes out warm, lightly buttered, and delicious.
5. If using overripe persimmons, remove the skin.
Our Japanese persimmons were so ripe, that they tasted like they were just starting to ferment and the skin had an almost crunchy texture.
If you incorporate the skin into the bread, it can add a mealy texture to the bread. So for this recipe, squeeze or scoop out the persimmon pulp and compost the skin. Also, remove any seeds.
Images showing you how to extract the pulp (and leave the skin) from an overripe Japanese persimmon. Cut the top off like a jack-o-lantern, then scoop or squeeze out the pulp.
Now let’s get cooking!
Recipe: Persimmon bread with oats, walnuts, and honey (no cane sugar)
Persimmon bread with oats, walnuts, and honey (no sugar)
A rich, moist, and delicious breakfast bread made with Japanese (or American) persimmons, 100% whole wheat organic flour, oats, walnuts, dried fruit, and honey (not cane sugar).
Ingredients
- 2 cups organic whole wheat stone ground flour
- 1 cup organic old fashioned oats
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg fresh ground is best
- 1 Tbsp ground cinnamon fresh ground is best
- 2 tsp orange zest
- 1 pinch pink sea salt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup organic grass-fed butter, softened to room temperature
- 1 cup honey
- 3 duck eggs or large chicken eggs, beaten
- 1/2 cup milk kefir or yogurt made from whole organic grass-fed milk
- 2 cups persimmon pulp or puree
- 2 cups cups chopped nuts, lightly toasted pecans are ideal
- 1 cup dried fruit raisins, dates, dried figs, or whatever you have available
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 350ºF (180ºC) and butter two bread pans. (We used one bread pan and a small casserole dish since our other bread pan has gone missing!)
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In one mixing bowl, mix together flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, and spices.
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In second bowl, mix together persimmon pulp, eggs, milk kefir (or yogurt), honey, vanilla, and fresh orange zest.
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Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and mix. Add softened butter, then mix again. Add dried fruit and nuts, and mix a final time.
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Pour badder into two bread pans and bake for ~55-60 minutes, or until toothpick pulls out without badder on it.
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Once done, let cool in pans for about 5 minutes. Then use butter knife to separate bread from sides of pan, flip the bread out, and place on cooling rack until cool. Wrap in foil and store in fridge for up to one week. See tip #4 in section above for best method of reheating prior to serving.
We hope you love this persimmon bread recipe and use it during persimmon season each year!
Persimmon bread on a cooling rack.
KIGI,
Sink your teeth into more persimmon articles:
- Japanese vs American persimmons: how to grow, forage, eat
- How to store Asian persimmons – with recipes!
- Recipe: Persimmon oat crumble (gluten-free)
- Recipe: Persimmon cranberry relish
- American persimmon seed tea (yes, persimmon seeds are edible)
- Chestnut breakfast porridge with pan-roasted persimmons
- Recipe: Persimmon bread with oats, walnuts, and honey
- Recipe: American persimmon pie with chestnut flour crust & maple whipped cream
- Recipe: Acorn flour & persimmon cookies
- Recipe: American persimmon panna cotta
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8 Comments
Sandi
November 11, 2024 at 2:05 amThis is a nice whole grain recipe but the spicing isn’t right. It’s moist and has a good crumb, but could use more salt to balance out the flavors, a bit more sweetener, (possibly depends on the sweetness of the persimmons- I usually use less sweetener than recipes call for but ended up adding in the full cup of honey and the finished product is under sweet. Most importantly, it needs WAY less nutmeg- probably 1/4 teaspoon rather than the 1 currently in the recipe.. I only did about half of what the recipe called for and it tastes like cough medicine. I’ll make it again but will significantly adjust the spicing.
Aaron von Frank
November 12, 2024 at 1:24 pmSorry the first iteration didn’t come out to your liking, Sandi. Thanks also for your recommendations for modifications. We’ve made this persimmon bread recipe multiple times and loved it, as have other folks. So trying to figure out what might be going on… For starters, we use overripe persimmons that are very sweet, squishy, and relatively low in moisture content, so that could be a key difference. We’re also very keen on the taste of nutmeg, so tend to bump that ingredient to higher levels in our recipes. Anyway, hope you’re able to use our recipe as a starting point to developing your own whole grain persimmon bread that’s perfectly suited to your fruit and tastes.
Kimarie
November 20, 2023 at 11:53 amDo you happen to have the nutritional value of this bread per serving size? Particularly how many grams of carbohydrates per serving. It would be very appreciated.
Aaron von Frank
November 20, 2023 at 4:04 pmHi Kimarie! It’s very difficult to calculate nutritional value on this recipe, so we’re going to use a slice of quality organic 100% whole grain bread we bought from the grocery store as a reference. 1 slice of that commercial bread contains 22 grams of carbohydrates (further breakdown: 5 grams fiber, 5 grams sugar, 12 grams complex carbs). This persimmon bread is more dense than a standard bread and also contains persimmons and oats, which obviously fall almost entirely into the carbohydrate category. Best guess is that 1 slice of our persimmon bread contains somewhere in the range of 30-35 grams of carbohydrates, but the majority of that is going to be complex carbs. Hope this info helps!
Hana
December 5, 2022 at 7:30 pmDelicious!
I’ve been trying to bake more with whole grain flour and without refined sugar and often the recipes come out as dry bricks! This, on the other hand, was deliciously moist, had strong persimmon flavor, and all-around scrumptious.
Thank you for posting this recipe!
Aaron von Frank
December 6, 2022 at 11:21 amSo glad to hear you enjoyed this whole wheat persimmon bread, Hana! Yes, it is possible to make really tasty baked goods with certain types of whole wheat flour, so hopefully more people will start making the switch away from refined flours.
Bill Kidd
December 29, 2021 at 9:24 pmI used almonds and walnuts, which we grow, and also added some flaxseed and coconut and it’s one of the best breads I’ve ever made
Aaron von Frank
December 30, 2021 at 1:47 pmThanks Bill! Glad you enjoyed this persimmon bread recipe – thanks also for the mention of your customizations. We’re jealous of your walnut and almond grow op!