I love going through my sweet bread recipes because so many of them remind me of cooking with my great-grandma on lazy Saturday afternoons.
She was the best bread maker; no bread machine was needed. If I live another 100 years, I’ll probably still not make bread as good as hers, but I’m learning.
If you love baking bread or are considering giving it a try for the first time, you’ve come to the right place.
These 25 recipes are some of the sweetest, tastiest, loveliest ones you’ll find.
I’ve tried to include a good mixture of “old-school” breads, such as condensed milk bread and homemade Amish sweet bread.
I’ve also added plenty of modern bread recipes, such as the Starbucks lemon loaf and Paula Deen’s cinnamon rolls.
I hope you find a few new favorites while browsing through my choices.
1. Hawaiian Sweet Bread
If you don’t love King Hawaiian sweet rolls, you may need to get your tastebuds checked. Those rolls are phenomenal – soft, sweet, and as pillowy as a cloud.
With this recipe, you can make Hawaiian loaf bread that feels, tastes, and even smells the same.
With its thin, brown layer of crust and light, white insides, this bread is always a hit.
2. Homemade Amish Sweet Bread
The Amish do many things right (like this Amish sugar cream pie!), but one of the things they do best is bake bread.
People pay obscene sums of money for an authentic loaf of Amish sweet bread.
But now that you have this recipe, you won’t have to be one of them because you can make your own. It’s only slightly sweet, but it’s thick, soft, and delicious.
I like to add a bit of melted butter to the top before I eat it.
3. Cinnamon Sugar Quick Bread
With a lovely swirl of cinnamon and sugar straight through the middle, this quick bread is as pretty as it is tasty, and it’s a whole lot of both.
It’s thick and crumbly, with a delightfully sweet flavor that’s hard not to love. You’ll enjoy toasting a slice or two and having it for breakfast.
4. Italian Easter Sweet Bread
You can make this incredible, orange-flavored braided Easter bread with only eight ingredients.
Surprisingly enough, one of those ingredients is a russet potato!
You’ll never taste it, though. With this bread, you’ll taste orange, sugar, and just a hint of sweet milk. If you enjoy citrus flavors, you’ll love it.
5. Twisted Sweet Bread
I wouldn’t care if this bread tasted terrible; it’s so beautiful, I’d still love it, anyway. Luckily, there’s nothing terrible about it.
It’s light and airy, and it has an unbelievably yummy filling of cream cheese and jam. (I like strawberry.)
It tastes a little like a cream cheese danish, but it’s not as dense and heavy on your stomach.
6. Mama’s Southern Sweet Bread
You can call this one whatever you like, but at the end of the day, this pretty, golden-brown sweet bread is an un-iced cake.
If it makes you feel healthier, calling it bread, by all means, do so. But this is cake.
It’s soft, sweet, and spongy, and I like to pile it high with Cool Whip and sliced sugared strawberries.
7. Moist Banana Bread
Banana bread is a favorite in my household.
The bread’s softness, the walnuts’ crunch, the bananas’ sweetness, and the lemon juice’s sharp kick – it’s almost perfect.
The only complaint I ever have about it is that it’s sometimes a bit too dry. This recipe, though, takes care of that.
This bread is as moist and flavorful as a slice of fresh-from-the-oven cake.
Honestly, I think it’s the lemon juice and sour cream.
That’s what makes this recipe different from all the rest, and I think that’s why it isn’t as dry as the others.
8. Orange Glazed Cranberry Bread
This dense, rich bread has chunks of real cranberries and chopped nuts and a decadent streusel topping that’ll have you salivating before you even taste it.
Once you top it in a sweet orange glaze, you might as well make a second one because you are not going to want to share.
9. Starbucks Lemon Loaf
You’ll make this fluffy, airy lemon loaf using a copycat Starbucks recipe, and the result is spot-on.
It’s so sweet and soft, and the zesty lemon glaze adds a touch of tartness that’ll tingle your tongue.
Best of all, it’s easy to make. Simply mix all your ingredients in a bowl, then pour the mixture into a loaf pan.
Bake it until your kitchen starts to smell lemon-fresh (a little less than an hour).
Then pour your glaze over it and let it set for half an hour before serving it.
10. Starbucks Pumpkin Bread
It’s moist and dense; it’s spicy and sweet. It’s a copycat Starbucks pumpkin bread, and it’s even better than their famous Pumpkin Spice Latte.
It takes a little time to make, but once you take that first bite, you won’t regret a single second of effort.
11. Butter Pecan Bread With Butter Pecan Glaze
This bread cake is butter pecan heaven. The batter is butter pecan; the glaze is butter pecan; heck, even the butter you use in it is butter pecan.
Trust me; if you’re a fan of butter pecan, there is nothing about this tasty treat that you won’t like.
12. Granny’s Monkey Bread
Pull-apart monkey bread is one of the sweetest, gooiest, and messiest breads you’ll ever eat, and it’s so much better when it’s homemade instead of frozen.
Requiring only five ingredients and 45 minutes to make, it’s also surprisingly simple.
Whether you’re baking for yourself, your friends and family, or a big group of kids, everyone will love this bread.
13. Chocolate Zucchini Bread
If you enjoy zucchini bread, wait until you try it with chocolate.
This recipe takes everything you love most about zucchini bread – its moistness, sweetness, and chunkiness – and adds Dutch chocolate and semi-sweet chocolate chips to it.
Each bite is more robust and chocolatey than the last. There’s no sweet-talking or getting around this one.
This is pure, decadent cake, and no one will ever confuse it for bread.
14. Cinnamon and Spice Sweet Potato Bread
Although it’s sweet and tasty, cinnamon and spice sweet potato bread really is bread.
However, it’s so fluffy, moist, and spongy that most people will swear it’s cake.
It’s a dense, dark bread, and thanks to the sweet potatoes, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, ginger, and cloves, it’s ideal for the fall and winter months.
15. Paula Deen’s Cinnamon Rolls
Whether or not you’re a fan, there’s no denying that Paula Deen can cook, and if there were any doubt about it, these cinnamon rolls would quickly dispel it.
They’re a sweet, gooey, sticky mess, and they taste so good, you’ll be tempted to lick your fingers and the plate.
If you’re craving cinnamon rolls, there’s no better recipe to follow.
16. Glazed Strawberry Bread
There is simply nothing bad you can say about this marvelous strawberry quick bread.
It’s tender and moist, and it has big chunks of real strawberries in it.
That right there is enough to convince most people it’s delicious.
However, you’ll also add a sweet, creamy glaze to the top, and that knocks it up into a whole new category of yumminess.
Although I haven’t tried it yet, I’ll bet you could also use this recipe with blueberries, raspberries, or any of your other favorite berries.
17. Lemon Blueberry Bread
This lemony loaf takes some time to make, but if you like sweets that flawlessly blend the sweet with tart and zesty, you’ll love this recipe.
If you prefer a sweeter taste, you may want to leave the lemon juice out of the glaze.
There’s still enough lemon in the bread to give you that delightful tartness, but adding more to the glaze is a bit too much for some people.
Personally, I say bring on the lemons!
18. Pineapple Bread
Because you’ll add one and a half cups of pineapples and juice to this bread, it’s one of the moistest quick breads you’ll ever make.
I swear, every time I bite into it, I almost expect pineapple juice to run down my chin.
It doesn’t, but it’s still spectacular, particularly if you enjoy sweets with a more tropical flavor.
19. Dutch Apple Bread
This soft, thick bread is buttery and full of apples, and I could sit and eat it by the handfuls with just the bread itself.
However, it also has streusel topping made of cinnamon and brown sugar and a generous spread of vanilla glaze icing on top of that.
In short, this is some of the sweetest of all the sweet breads.
You may want to pair it with a cup of black coffee or unsweetened tea to help offset all the sugar.
20. Braided Sweet Bread
Everything you need to know about this scrumptious bread is right there in the name. It’s braided; it’s sweet; it’s bread.
Put those three things together, and you’ll have a gorgeous, tasty treat.
It’s perfectly golden-brown with a slightly crispy outer crust, but the inside is pillow-soft, light, and airy.
It’s sweet, but not dessert sweet, meaning you can eat it as an appetizer or with dinner.
21. Grandma’s Portuguese Sweet Bread
This bread is very similar to the braided sweet bread.
The main difference is that you’ll also add milk and butter to it. You’ll also leave out the turbinado sugar.
The result is a richer, denser bread that tastes more natural and less sugary sweet. They’re both beautiful and golden-brown, though.
22. Condensed Milk Bread
These soft, fluffy rolls feel like clouds, and once you add the butter and condensed milk glaze, they’ll almost literally melt in your mouth.
They’re sweet, but not overly so, and they taste great by themselves, with a tall glass of milk, or served with dinner.
If you want to kick them up a notch, cover them with some homemade cinnamon butter.
23. Buttermilk Sweet Bread
If you’re looking for genuinely old-school bread like your grandma used to make, check out this recipe for buttermilk sweet bread.
It’s dense, thick, and crumbly, and although it isn’t dessert sweet like many loaves on this list, it’s incredibly yummy.
It’s also easy to make this one a savory treat by adding cheese, chives, garlic, and other tasty ingredients.
24. Cinnamon Sugar Donut Sweet Bread
This bread is surprisingly filling to be so soft and fluffy. It’s also unbelievably sweet. It’s bread, not a donut, but it certainly tastes like a donut.
It’s sweetened with sugar, vanilla, and molasses, and there’s a generous sprinkling of cinnamon added in, as well.
It’s primarily the coating that makes it instant-sugar-high sweet, though.
You’ll make it from melted butter, white and brown sugars, whole milk, and cinnamon.
It gives it an exquisite flavor, and it also makes it look lovely; the dusting of sugar all over it almost makes the bread sparkle.
25. Sweet Orange Bread
You can have this incredible orange bread ready for the oven in about 5 to 10 minutes, and it’s so good, it doesn’t need a glaze.
It requires fewer than ten ingredients to make, and all of them are everyday pantry staples.
In addition to looking pretty, this bread is sweet and citrusy, and you can enjoy it as a dessert or as a sweet breakfast option.
25 Best Sweet Breads
Ingredients
Instructions
- Select your favorite recipe.
- Organize all the required ingredients.
- Prep a sweet bread in 30 minutes or less!
