Tag Archives: Banana bread

Bananas

Man do we love banana bread!

Banana bread is just SO easy to whip up, and to be completely frank, we always seem to have two bananas lying around from the bunch that are on their last leg. It’s almost like the food gods are telling us to just reserve those two just for the excuse to bake up a fresh loaf. Haha! Okay… Maybe not… but it is a great excuse right?!

I find that with banana bread I’m always challenging myself to make it differently each time. A tweak here, an addition of this ingredient there, etc. Heck sometimes I just open up our cabinets and throw whatever I can get my hands on into the batter.

But for blogging and sharing sake, I actually typed out quickly what went into this loaf.

Are you ready? (“Because this shi* is bananas!”) SORRY! Couldn’t resist!

I decided a banana bread would pair well with coconut….so that’s just what I did…. And my predictions were spot on! Don’t you just love when that happens? Yeah, me too!

Before popping into the oven, I topped the bread off with a little mixture of sweetened and unsweetened shredded coconut flakes for that additional flaky texture, man was it a game changer! Mr. B couldn’t resist topping his with homemade whipped cream left over from a cake I made.

If you bake a loaf, let me know what you think!

Coconut Banana Bread
Makes one loaf

Ingredients:

2 very ripe bananas, peeled
1/3 cup melted coconut oil
3/4 cup coconut sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon coconut extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
1/2 cup coconut flakes mixture of sweetened / not, reserve 2 Tablespoons for topping

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C), and grease or butter a 4×8-inch loaf pan.

In a mixing bowl, mash ripe bananas with a fork until they are smooth. Stir the melted coconut oil into the mashed bananas.

Next, mix in the baking soda and salt. Stir in the coconut sugar, beaten egg, and coconut extract. Mix in the flour and shredded coconut flakes.

Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan. Use reserved 2 Tablespoons of shredded coconut by sprinkling over the top of the loaf. Bake for 1 hour (check at 50 minutes, depending on your oven) at 350°F (175°C), or until tester inserted into the center comes out clean.

Remove from oven and let slightly cool. Slice and serve!

Backpackbees

Sleep Eat?

Lately we’ve been watching all the old episodes of Seinfeld as we cook dinner together in the evenings after work. Can you guess who takes on the role of chef and who the sous-chef is? I’m sure your presumption is correct. Anyways, did you ever see the episode where George is in the kitchen and see’s the eclair on the top of the trash pile, obviously it looks rather delicious so he proceeds to pick it up and eat it?

Last night I realized that I had four bananas that were rather ripe sitting out the counter. I decided to just make a loaf of banana bread and use them up. It’s just so darn tasty that it reminded me of that episode. Short of wanting to dump the loaf for our own good, I know we’d be suffering from Costanza moments if I did it.

I wake up in the middle of the night and sleep walk over to the water-cooler located next to our refrigerator..what a convenient location, right? ..Oh heyyy there banana bread! Leaning over the sink (of course not to crumb anywhere) I happily shovel in two delicious bites. Fulfilled I retire back to bed. I wake up in the morning with this gross slightly recognizable taste in my mouth. I think to myself in the shower, damn Did I really sleep eat that banana bread?

Can you relate? Or is this one of those awkward non discussed topics? Well, whatever the case, I don’t have willpower when it comes to this stuff. Hence a non typical baking occurrence. Luckily there’s only one loaf, must eat and keep it out of our bee hive!

But that’s just us…I’m sure you have much more willpower and should totally bake some! Thanks baby bistro cookbook (and Mary).

Banana Bread
Slightly adapted from The Baby Bistro Cookbook

Ingredients:

4 Very ripe bananas, peeled and mashed with a fork
1 Egg
1/2 Cup packed brown sugar
1/4 Cup safflower oil
1 Teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 Cups all-purpose flour
2 Teaspoons baking powder
1/2 Teaspoon baking soda
1 Teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9×5″ loaf pan, set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together bananas, egg, brown sugar, oil, and vanilla just until ingredients are blended. Next add in the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon and stir just until it’s blended together. Pour ingredients into the prepared pan and bake 45 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Backpackbees