Not cooking, but baking ... Banana Bread

The Boy has been asking for banana bread for a while now and I finally did something about it. The journey to banana bread is a long and windy one. :-)

For starters, bananas are really, really expensive here due to the floods that we had from Cyclone Yasi. The cost of bananas rose to about $15 per kilo. It's back down a bit now but even then, the bananas for the banana bread cost $10.78. To say The Boy was shocked was a surprise.

Then we went away for a month to the US and have been back and forth between The House and The Apartment since.

For those who know me, they will know I do not like baking. All that measuring, all that exactness. Plus, if you've read my other posts, you know I like to improvise and adjust things according to taste. That can't be done with baking. Bah!

Anyhow, being the good little wife that I am (ha ha ha ...) I looked up a recipe for banana bread and made it for the boy.

The first time was a bust because the bananas were not ripe enough. Don't get me wrong, it rose beautifully, smelled wonderful and tasted lovely, but just not banana-ey (is there such a word?) enough. We ate it anyway. It was lovely warmed up with gobs and gobs of butter.

Take two was much better. I had bought the bananas and I carefully nurtured them to the point of extreme mushy ripeness. They were so gross! but very good for baking. :-)

I woke up early this morning and The Boy has gone out for a long walk. I decided to bake and have the banana bread ready for breakfast when he got home from his walk. Ah ... fresh banana bread for breakfast!

Here's the RECIPE I used:

Ingredients:

• 125 grams Butter chopped and soft
• 180 grams Dark Brown Sugar
• 350 grams ripe bananas
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon sugar
• 250 grams plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon bicarb soda
• 3 tablespoon WARM milk

Instructions:

• Prehead oven to 180dC
• Grease a bread tin and line it with baking paper
• Then, cream butter & sugar in a mixer, then scrape down sides
• Add all other ingredients and mix until well mixed
• Pour into bread tin and bake for 55 minutes or until a cake skewer comes out clean

The only thing I have done differently is that I checked the banana bread regularly before the 55 minutes was up - once at 30 minutes, then again at 45 minutes because my oven runs hot. At 30 minutes, it was quite brown on top, but split and gooey down the middle. At 45 minutes, it was almost done, so I left it for a few more minutes.

The Apartment smelled wonderful.

Are you a fan of banana bread or even baking in general? What's your favorite baked good that you can never resist when you see it in a store? Are you one to indulge or do you have tons of self control?

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