Order our made-from-scratch Colorado Peach Quick Bread through Wednesday, 9/18. We'll bake it fresh on Thursday, 9/19, and you can pick up your order from the store of your choice starting Friday, 9/20.
BY BILL ST. JOHN

As Marczyk Fine Foods' culinary director, Jamey Fader, explains it, "A quick bread is basically a cake in the form of a loaf." We know quick breads as the ubiquitous summer's end zucchini bread or, for a more fanciful turn, St. Patrick's Day's soda bread.

A quick bread differs from so-called "regular" bread because it is made without yeast. Yeast gives most breads their rise; quick breads get their rise from leavening agents such as baking soda and baking powder. That means that quick breads need not be proofed or kneaded; they go from the mixer into the loaf pan into the oven. As breads, they are, to use their name, quicker to make than "regular" breads.
September's Artisanal Bread of the Month is Colorado Peach Quick Bread. "It is not meant to be as sweet," says Fader. "I tend to lean toward European-style desserts as not sugar-forward.

"The nice thing about this bread is that it would go great with butter or honey, of course, but also with a slice of salty cheese or some picnic ham."

Fader's bakers make Colorado Peach Quick Bread from wheat flour and both baking soda and baking powder. The peaches are all Colorado, from the Western Slope. "We make some into a purée," says Fader, "almost a coulis. That goes into the batter. Then we cook some [peaches] down a bit with a little sugar so that they don't break up too much." These latter are the sweet, juicy, peachy bits and pieces found scattered throughout the loaf.
"We typically do a French-style loaf as Artisanal Bread of the Month," ends Fader, "raised with yeast. This bread is a way to celebrate the season with something really special — Colorado peaches."