banana bread

I've made a lot of lousy loaves of banana bread.  It took me several years to get a good recipe under my belt and I think that for a while I was afraid of bananas.  My early loaves were always too dry and then there was that unfortunate chunk of time where I stopped measuring everything and routinely added too much baking soda to all baked goods and wondered why my cookies and breads left my mouth tasting like burning.  Then there was that other unfortunate time where I thought I wanted to eat healthier and used nothing but whole wheat flour, bran, and applesauce to bake with.  In case you were wondering, everything I made during that time period tasted like sticks.

It turned out okay, though.  I buy bananas now for the sole purpose of letting them rot on my kitchen counter and throw them into the freezer for later.  I realized that adding more bananas would alleviate the dryness and using actual sugar wouldn't kill me (and neither would my impending diabetes, hopefully).  I don't even burn myself anymore!

Banana Bread
Makes 2 loaves

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup whole wheal flour (old habits die hard)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda (it is important to measure this)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup butter
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 6-7 overripe bananas, mashed

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease two loaf pans.
2. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar. Stir in eggs and mashed bananas until well blended. Stir banana mixture into flour mixture; stir just to moisten*. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 60 to 65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean. Let bread cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.

* At this point you can either keep the recipe as is, or add some nuts or chocolate chips.  I know this is starting to feel like a round of Cooking Mama.  Sorry.  This time around, I opted for one plain loaf and one chocolate chip loaf.

peppermint bark

My blog readership has doubled since my last entry!  I hope y'all (all four of you) had a wonderful holiday.  I'm still getting caught up on Christmas recipes, so bear with me.  I probably should have done this sooner as I had over a week off from work, but I was too busy wallowing in a bed full of post-Christmas malaise.  Life is tough, guys.

I had made peppermint bark the year before and recalled it being a pretty simple recipe to make.  You get out my Pyrex dish, melt some dark chocolate, spread it around, wait for it to cool, melt some white chocolate with peppermint extract mixed it and spread it on top of the dark chocolate, crush some candy canes and sprinkle them on top.  Done.  Eat.

Of course things do not go that smoothly.  I didn't check to see how much white chocolate I had left before I started making this.  Turns out, not really enough.  I ended up having to unwrap and throw in some candy cane flavored Hershey's Kisses which turned out to be a good idea.  The white chocolate was festively pink with little flecks of candy cane inside of it already.  I was a little too stingy with the peppermint extract, as it smelled like Listerine when I opened it and I was afraid of it being too overwhelming.  Lesson learned.

Most important lesson leaned?  LINE THE GLASS DISH WITH SOMETHING.  Chocolate is really hard to get out of glass, guys.



Peppermint Bark

• 8oz semisweet chocolate chips
• 8oz white chocolate chips
• 1tsp peppermint extract
• candy canes

Directions

1. Lightly grease a 9x9 inch pan and line with waxed paper, smoothing out wrinkles; set aside.
2. Place the semisweet chocolate in the top of a double boiler over just barely simmering water, stirring frequently and scraping down the sides with a rubber spatula to avoid scorching. When the chocolate is melted, stir in 1/4 teaspoon of the peppermint extract. Pour the melted chocolate into the prepared pan, and spread evenly over the bottom of the pan. Refrigerate until completely hardened, about 1 hour.
3. Place the white chocolate and the remaining 1 teaspoon canola oil in the top of a double boiler over just barely simmering water, stirring frequently and scraping down the sides with a rubber spatula to avoid scorching. When the chocolate is melted, stir in the remaining 1/4 teaspoon peppermint extract. Pour the white chocolate directly over the semisweet chocolate layer; spread evenly. Sprinkle the remaining crushed candy over the top and gently press in. Refrigerate until completely hardened. Remove from pan; break into small pieces to serve.