Honeyed Banana Bread

Holy Smokes, obviously I have to apologize for my incredibly long absence from any posting whatsoever! I have been fighting with my domain provider, nothing seems to be working properly - so if you could let me know if the site in general looks quasi-appealing ie: green sketched font on the side bar and so on. For some reason when I tried viewing my site from another computer I saw a horrible version of what I had designed, and to say the least I was frustrated! But besides that...

School has taken over my life and nothing much else is left for free time, ie: blog-time. But I have managed to get this post out - which I am some what proud of. The fact that I found any time away from calculus or chemistry astounds me - but there you go, and here is a lovely little batch of banana muffins I whipped up this past weekend.

I was inspired to make banana bread for the usual reason, the three over ripe bananas that were past the peanut butter pairing stage sitting in my fruit basket. This doesn’t usually happen, as my family - namely my brother and I, go through bananas like there is no tomorrow. Every time we even so much as pass a grocery store we are in there in no time picking up another bunch of bananas, which will, as we are very much well aware, be gone within two days - MAX. Bananas are indefinitely on the grocery list, and why wouldn’t they be - they are delicious!

So, you can imagine my surprise, and curious delight, when I realized the exact number of spotted-brown bananas needed for - possibly my favourite muffin/loaf - sat longingly on the counter, as if just waiting to be turned into fluffy-golden-baked-banana-scented-bliss! I knew what I was going to be doing on the weekend. That’s right, baking banana bread.

My only issue, well I wouldn’t exactly call it an issue - it’s really more a tendency I have, is that I really love trying out new recipes. Even if I have a perfect recipe in my pocket that has served me quite well in the past - even so good it may very well be the best recipe in the WORLD (the whole of Canada at very least!). I always am interested in testing new versions, comparing which is better and then figuring out why! Of course this was one of those times, so with my beautiful world’s best banana bread recipe standing by, I forged on and tried a new one out.

This one I’ve renamed Honeyed Banana Bread, for two reasons really a) It has a nice little ring to it, and b) the original made mention of the whole wheat flour used - which incidentally I didn’t use, so no point in keeping that name! Though please, be my guest and try it out with whole wheat - it would be even more healthy than it is (entirely speaking in relative terms). Mine had gone sour - or off in any case, not good, so I kept to the plain stuff and they were very scrumptious! Actually I thought about adding 1/4 cup or so of ground flax seed or hemp seed to the mix, but alas, I didn’t have any on hand and was far too impatient to prolong the banana-bread-baking to go out and get some, so ... i didn’t. If anyone tries that out let me know how it turns out!

Also, just as an added little note: I didn’t use black coffee this time, and I only used 1/4 cup of water which I didn’t think was enough. So here I’ve knocked it up to 1/2 cup which will increase the moistness, but it wasn’t by any means too dry to start off with, so you could easily keep it at 1/4 cup. Wondering about the coffee bit? Well, try it and you’ll see what I mean. It backs up the banana flavour and gives the bread a nice deep golden colour. Plus, if you desire to you can omit the cinnamon - I’m usually a purist and don’t add it, but I tried it and have to say a little bit was nice, a little warm and spicy, nutmeg might be good to!

Needless to say I will definitely be making these again, I think with these few minor tweaks they are definitely neck-and-neck for the title of the supreme banana bread title - plus they are healthy!!

Honeyed Banana Bread

adapted from The Whole Grain Gourmet

1/3 cup margarine

1/4 cup honey

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

1 1/2 cups mashed banana, 3 medium

1 3/4 flour, all purpose of whole wheat

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup water, or cold black coffee

unsweetened coconut, totally optional

Preheat oven to 350℉. Prepare a loaf pan or line muffin cups with paper.

Sift together flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Set aside.

Cream margarine (or butter if you prefer), sugar and honey together until light and fluffy - a couple of minutes or so. Beat in eggs and vanilla, followed by gently mixing in bananas (and if you like, nuts or chocolate chips). Stir in dry ingredients alternately with water or cold black coffee. Pour into muffins tins or loaf pan and top with a sprinkling of coconut, crunchy granola or chopped nuts.

Depending on whether you choose to make muffins or a loaf the baking time is going to vary, so keep your eye on it. Start at 50 minutes for the loaf and 30 minutes for the muffins, they should be golden on top and the toothpick test should come out clean.

Enjoy!

oh, I might wait a bit until it has cooled - I made that mistake and burnt my mouth... it smelled too good to resist!

03.15.2008

Honeyed Banana Bread

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