Banana Bread

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You probably have a recipe for banana bread. Or two. Or three. I do. I think I have five. Or six. That doesn't mean that any of them are sub-par recipes. On the contrary. They are all good. And they all fill different needs. One has chocolate, another chocolate chips. One is très rich, made with sour cream. Another is low in fat. This one I am posting today has a little bit of spice, and is flexible when it comes to the dairy added. You can use buttermilk, yogurt or sour cream and I often use a mixture, depending on what is in the fridge and needs to be used up. Today I had some yogurt that was dated yesterday and so I used all yogurt. As my kids would say, "It's all good."

This recipe is just slightly modified from the King Arthur Flour cookbook. It calls for a teaspoon of cinnamon, but that's too much for me. It also calls for a 1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg, but I use whole nutmeg and just a couple of scrapes on a micro plane is plenty -- probably 1/8 teaspoon. I also simplify the process -- instead of mixing the dry ingredients all together in a separate bowl, I just add them directly to the wet -- saving another dirty bowl.

This bread is moist and can be fairly low in fat if you use low fat buttermilk or low fat yogurt.

Banana Bread
makes 1 loaf

printer version

2 eggs
1 cup sugar
⅓ cup oil
1 cup mashed bananas (2-3 medium)
2 t. vanilla
1 t. baking soda
1 t. baking powder
1 t. salt
1/2 t. cinnamon
1/8 t. nutmeg
2⅔ cups flour
1 cup buttermilk, yogurt, or sour cream
1 cup walnuts (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. In a medium-sized bowl, beat together the eggs, sugar and oil. Blend in the mashed banana and vanilla. Add the baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and flour. Stir just until mixture is almost completely combined, with some flour left unmixed. Add buttermilk or sour cream or yogurt, mixing just until combined.

Pour into a greased 5x7 pan. Bake for 1 hour, until toothpick comes out clean. Tent with aluminum foil if bread browns too quickly.

Source: modified from King Arthur Flour cookbook

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Christmas Cookies

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I'm certain that I am not the only one out there whose life has been insane lately. All the preparation in the world never gets me quite ready for the two week before Christmas. I always think that I can avoid the chaos, but usually I'm just delaying the inevitable. It doesn't matter how long I put off decorating the tree or sending out the cards, it's all still there when I awake from my dreamworld.

If only the rest of the world would celebrate Christmas at Christmas and not for the four weeks before Christmas. I always tell the kids, "do we celebrate your birthday a month before your birthday?" I want this to be preparation time, not celebration time. But the rest of the world disagrees and I get left in the dust.

So while I'm still ordering a few gifts online (yes, there are still a few places who are promising Christmas delivery), and addressing the last few cards (making the last few cards), the rest of the world seems to be in full celebration mode. I'm trying to stay home and not notice.

Today is the kickoff for Christmas baking. In my Grinchiness, I almost left the baking up to my mom. She bakes at least one batch of cookies every day for the two weeks prior to Christmas. But there are some cookies that I make that my kids really enjoy, and I plan to give away a few cookie trays this years, so I listened to some Christmas music yesterday and gave myself a pep talk (my friend Margaret gave me a pep talk, too).

Below is the list of cookies I plan to bake this year. I am adding to my list this year a chocolate fudge cookie with chopped mint Hershey bars, as well as an oatmeal cookie for myrecipes.com that I will use dried cherries in. The rest is the same-old-same-old. But you know, that's what they love. I'm also adding Bourbon Fudge balls to the mix this year. Not a cookie, but definitely a treat!

Except for the above-mentioned oatmeal cookies, these recipes are all tried and true.

✔ Chocolate Chip Biscotti with red and green sugar

✔ Icing Thumbprint cookies

✔ Gingersnaps

✔ Frosted Sugar Cookies

✔ Raspberry Shortbread Thumbprints

✔ Pizzelles

✔ Fudge Brownie Cookies with chopped mint Hershey bars added

✔ Oatmeal Chocolate Chunk Cookies (I'm going to substitute dried cherries for the pecans)

✔ Bourbon Fudge Balls (this recipe is untried as well, but I've seen it all over the internet, so I'm guessing it's pretty good)


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Baking Day

I love a day spent at home in the kitchen. Yesterday was one of those. I tied on my apron and spent most of my day being a domestic goddess. It was a good day. I had a few baked goods on my list of things to do, so I just went from one to another, and checked them off my list.

The first thing I did was bake Abby's wonderful Chocolate Banana Bread. I followed her recipe exactly, except I prefer walnuts to pecans in my banana bread, and I added a layer of nuts to the top so they would get roasted and crunchy. Yum! It's a really good recipe. It was a little crumbly, but I attribute that to the nuts on tops which make it harder to slice (but, that's o.k., I like the nuts). This is not exactly a low-fat recipe (if you want one of those, try Deborah's which is also very good), so I'll keep this recipe as a treat.



Then I made some granola. I used a different recipe (see below) than my normal, because I was going to turn around and make granola bars (see below) with the granola. I didn't want to add nuts or raisins because the kids prefer plain and I was making the granola bars for them (if you want a good granola just for eating try this one, or this one). The bars turned out very good. They are more moist than packaged granola bars, but not gooey. They are dense and very flavorful. I used Sunbutter instead of peanut butter, but, to use peanut butter just substitute equal amounts and omit the lemon juice.



My last baking project for the day was Coconut Biscotti. I think they are really good, but my boys wouldn't touch them. They all suddenly developed a dislike for coconut. Oh well, Peach and I will have to eat the entire batch!

Granola

3 cups dry oatmeal
1/4 c. butter
1/4 c. corn oil (or another vegetable oil)
1/2 cup honey
1/4 teaspoon salt

Melt butter in the microwave in a glass bowl.
Add oil and then honey.
Add the salt and the oatmeal.
Stir well.
Pour mixture onto an ungreased cookie sheet with low sides
or a large 9 by 13-inch pan.
Bake at 350 degrees for 15-20 minutes, until golden brown, stirring once or twice.
Let cool on pan and then proceed with granola bars.


Granola Bars

3 cups of homemade granola (I just used the entire batch)
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup Sunbutter
1 t. lemon juice
2 medium eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
Optional: 1/2 cup add-ins like raisins, nuts, chocolate chips, etc.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a large glass bowl (or in a 2-quart pot on the stove)
melt butter and Sunbutter in microwave (one minute).
Stir well and make sure it is completely melted (but do not overheat).
In a small bowl, beat eggs with a fork and quickly whisk
into melted sunbutter mixture.
Beat in the vanilla.
Stir in the prepared homemade granola.
Add any optional ingredients.
Press mixture into an greased 8-inch square pan.
Bake for 15 minutes.
Cool completely and then cut into 16 squares.
Cover and refrigerate.