apple bread

Here is a moist cinnamon Apple Bread Recipe that is chock full of apples, applesauce and is perfectly spiced! This quick bread is perfect for breakfast, as a dessert, or as an afternoon snack.

This spiced apple cinnamon bread is soft, moist, and bursting with apple flavor. The tender quick bread is flavored with ground cinnamon, ginger and vanilla. Chopped apples are tossed with cinnamon sugar before a quick stir into the batter. This gives little pockets of cinnamon apple goodness throughout the easy bread! The outside has a nice crunch, while the inside is soft, moist, and lightly spiced. 

Pair this bread with my harvest apple ginger smash for the perfect post-dinner treat. And for more fun ways to use apples for a delicious treat, try making apple peanut butter granola bars or my German apple pancake.

Professional Tips for Making Apple Cinnamon Bread

• Chop the apples to roughly the same size. To ensure the apples will bake at the same time, you want to have them roughly the same size. Too small and the apples can turn to mush in the bread, and too big, they won’t bake fully. 
• The apple bread will bake best in a metal loaf pan. The metal loaf pan will help the apple bread rise and bake more evenly. It will still be delightful in a ceramic or glass baking dish. 
• Don’t over-fold in the apples. Not only can this cause you to overmix the batter, but it will also remove the cinnamon and sugar on the apples.

Ingredients & Substitutions

• Apples: Use crisp baking apples so they hold their shape when baked. When choosing apples, stick with Granny Smith, Honeycrisp, Braeburn, Macoun, Cortland, or pink lady apples. 
• Granulated Sugar & Cinnamon: Coating the apples in granulated sugar and ground cinnamon will flavor the apples and assist in the cooking process to keep them tender. 
• Coconut Oil: I use organic extra virgin coconut oil in quick breads like this apple cinnamon bread and vegan banana bread because it makes a moist, tender crumb! 
• Dark Brown Sugar: Dark brown sugar adds sweetness and a little moisture. This will keep the bread softer while adding a nice, rich molasses flavor. Coconut sugar or light brown sugar can be substituted if desired. The dark brown sugar can be reduced to ½ cup. It is still delicious, just not as sweet.
• Unsweetened Applesauce: I use organic unsweetened applesauce for a bit of moisture, additional apple flavor, and natural sweetness. You can also omit the applesauce and the quick bread will still be moist and tender. It won’t be as light or as flavorful. If you omit the applesauce, the bread only bakes for 45 minutes. I don’t recommend reducing the sugar and omitting the applesauce.
• Low-Fat Buttermilk: I generally bake with low-fat buttermilk rather than full fat. It provides just enough fat to keep cakes moist and enough moisture to hydrate the batter. You can substitute whole milk for the buttermilk. The added fat in buttermilk does give the bread a moist crumb.
• Large Eggs
• Vanilla Extract
• All-purpose Flour: You could also use whole wheat flour.
• Baking Powder
• Ground Cinnamon & Ginger

See the recipe card for full information on ingredients and quantities.

Variations

• Bake with a crumble or streusel or top it with a simple powdered sugar glaze. Top the batter with my pecan streusel from the sweet potato casserole, an oat crumble from my cranberry crumble pie, or the crumb topping from my caramel apple pie. Make that streusel gluten-free with the crumble on this caramel apple cake. 
• Add more spice. Mix up the spice by adding apple pie spice or pumpkin pie spice. You could even change the ginger for nutmeg or a chai spice mix. Be careful, some spices are stronger than others. 
• Try with pears! Pears would be delightful in this quick bread. Find some unsweetened pear sauce, use bosc, anjou, or bartlett pears, and maybe add some cardamom!  
• Muffins or mini loaves. This quick bread would be perfect for muffins or mini loaves. Just divide the batter into a lined muffin or sprayed mini loaf pans. They will bake much faster, so start checking around 15 minutes.
• If you don’t have buttermilk on hand, you can substitute it with whole milk, or you can make buttermilk at home! Mix 1 cup of milk with 1 tablespoon of fresh lemon juice, stir, and allow it to sit for at least 5 minutes before using it in the recipe. 

How to Make this Easy Apple Bread Recipe

Use these instructions to make a perfectly moist and tender apple cinnamon bread every time! Further details and measurements can be found in the recipe card below.

Making Apple Cinnamon Bread:

Step 1:  Preheat the oven to 350°F conventional, and spray a standard 1-pound loaf pan with nonstick cooking spray. 

Step 2: Peel, core, and chop the apples into small dice. 

You want the apples to be relatively the same size so they bake at the same time. There’s no need to be super persnickety about it. Just be careful of large chunks. 

Step 3: In a medium bowl, combine chopped apples, ¼ cup granulated sugar, and 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon. Toss to coat and set aside while you finish mixing the apple bread. 

Step 4: In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the dark brown sugar, applesauce, buttermilk, eggs, and vanilla extract until smooth. Then, whisk in the slightly warm coconut oil.

If the coconut oil has cooled, the resulting bread will bake fine, but it makes a tighter batter that is a little more difficult to combine with the apples and may result in a slightly overmixed bread.  

Step 5: In another medium bowl, whisk together all-purpose flour, baking powder, salt, the remaining ground cinnamon, and ground ginger.

Step 6: Pour dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and whisk gently to combine. The whisk helps prevent too many lumps from forming, but you could also fold it with a silicone spatula. 

Step 7: Stir the apples with the cinnamon and sugar one last time. Then, gently fold the apple mixture into the batter. Just 3-4 quick folds will do.

You want to try to keep some of the cinnamon sugar with the apples almost like this eggnog cinnamon swirl bread. It will soak into them as they bake and flavor the apples with cinnamon. 

Step 8: Pour into the prepared loaf pan and spread out evenly with your spatula.
Bake in the preheated oven for approximately 1 hour and 10 minutes or until a cake tester or toothpick comes out with a few clinging crumbs, and the center of the loaf provides a little resistance when touched lightly. 

Step 9: Allow to cool for 10 minutes in the pan before turning out on a wire rack to cool completely. Slice and serve! It is also delightful when served warm.

Frequently Asked Questions

Before You Go

I hope you enjoyed this professional chef tested recipe. Check out our other delicious, chef-developed quick bread recipes!