BANANA BREAD

BANANA-CHOCOLATE BREAD
My family LOVES this recipe.  Came from Martha Stewart FOOD magazine. Greek yogurt will work instead of sour cream.  Can also substitute pureed cauliflower if you don't have enough bananas.  I usually do flaxseed meal for one of the eggs.  Last time I made it instead of coating the pan with flour I used cocoa.  It tasted better and worked better than flour.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pan (used 1/4 c. applesauce 1/4 c. butter - couldn't taste the applesauce once it had cooled)
• 1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled), plus more for pan (I like to use cocoa powder instead of flour)
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon fine salt
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 2 large eggs, room temperature (1 flaxseed)
• 1 1/2 cups mashed overripe bananas (3 to 4) (can use some pureed cauliflower if you don't have enough bananas)
• 2 tablespoons sour cream
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 6 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a 5-by-9-inch loaf pan. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt.
2. In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar on medium-high until fluffy, 3 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping down bowl as needed. Beat in bananas, sour cream, and vanilla. Beat in flour mixture and chocolate on medium. Pour batter into pan. Bake until a skewer inserted in center of loaf comes out clean, 50 to 60 minutes.
3. Let bread cool in pan 10 minutes. Remove bread from pan and let cool completely on a wire rack.

Cook's Note

Store tightly wrapped in plastic, up to 3 days, or freeze, up to 3 months.

Chopped or Chips?
For this loaf, we like the variety of sizes we get from chopping. Tiny bits of chocolate flavor the bread beautifully, while larger ones provide big hits of deliciousness.

Kitchen Tip
If your bananas aren't quite ripe enough, put them in a 300-degree oven, unpeeled, for 15 minutes to soften.

BANANA BREAD
This recipe came from The Little Big Book for Moms.  My family liked it.  I liked the hint of lemon in it.

2 cups flour
1 T baking powder
1/2 c butter (softened)
1/2 c honey or brown sugar (used honey)
1 grated lemon peel
2 eggs (used one flax seed)
2 c banana pulp (about 3)
1 c chopped walnuts 
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350.  In a large bowl mix flour and baking powder.  In a separate bowl blend butter, honey and lemon rind until smooth.  Beat in eggs and add mixture to the flour.

Mix in banana, walnuts, nutmeg and vanilla.  Put in 9x5x3 pan and sprinkle with cinnamon. (I made the struessel topping from Deceptively Delicious pg. 50- see below) 

Bake for 1 hour.

TOPPING:
mix all together:
2/3 c old-fashioned oats
1/4 c brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
add:
2 T butter, melted

Sprinkle on top of bread and then bake.

Amy Grant's Banana Nut Bread

http://parade.condenast.com/295951/parade/amy-grants-banana-nut-bread/

We really liked this banana bread.  So easy to make and I liked how it had such few ingredients.

Banana Nut Bread

• MAKES

  1 loaf (10 to 12 servings)

• ACTIVE TIME

  20 min.

• TOTAL TIME

  2 hr. 20 min.

• SAVE RECIPE
• PRINT

INGREDIENTS

• ½ cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• Dash of table salt
• 4 small bananas (about 2 cups), sliced
• ½ cup coarsely chopped toasted pecans - didn't add, but would be good

DIRECTIONS

1. Beat butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add sugar, beating until light and fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until blended after each addition.
2. Combine flour and next 2 ingredients; gradually add to butter mixture, beating at low speed just until blended. Stir in bananas and pecans. Spoon batter into a greased and floured 9- x 5-inch loaf pan.
3. Place pan in a cold oven. Set oven to 300°F. Bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes or until a long wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean and sides pull away from the pan. Shield bread with aluminum foil after 1 hour to prevent browning, if necessary. Cool bread in pan on a wire rack 10 minutes; remove from pan, and cool 30 minutes on wire rack before slicing.