Saturday 16 January 2010

Brilliant Banana Bread

This is a great recipe for Singles because it solves the problem of the bananas slowly turning black in a bowl on your counter. And it makes only one loaf, which I think will keep for a couple of days if you cover it in plastic wrap. (It's so yummy, I never found out for sure.) I got this recipe from my childhood cookbook Let Me in the Kitchen by Susan Mendelson. It is very easy.

Brilliant Banana Bread

2 ripe bananas
2 eggs
1/2 cup (125 mL) vegetable oil
1 cup (8 oz/250 mL) brown sugar
1 1/4 cups (10 oz/300 mL) flour
1 tsp (5 mL) baking soda
dash of salt
1/2 cup (4 oz/125 mL) walnut pieces
butter

1. Preheat oven to 350 F (180 C).
2. Mash bananas on a plate with a fork.
3. Beat eggs in bowl, then add oil, sugar and mashed bananas. Whisk.
4. Sift (or stir, as I have no sifter) flour, soda and salt into the mixture in the bowl. Whisk until mixed
5. Add the walnuts to batter and mix.
6. Butter the bottom of a loaf pan. Pour batter into pan.
7. Bake for one hour.
8. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes.
9. Run knife around sides of pan, and tip bread onto a wire rack or plate for further cooling.

As I don't have a loaf pan right now, I soon will try baking this recipe in a muffin tin. I've tried throwing chocolate chips into the dough, but I think I like it better without.

7 comments:

Andrew McNabb said...

Sorry to post this non-sequitur on your blog, I hope your readers will not find this objectionable. My name is Andrew McNabb. I am an American writer and the great grand nephew of the great Dominican priest, Fr. Vincent McNabb (d. 1942: prolific writer, lead speaker for the Catholic Evidence Guild at Hyde Park, Distributist and close friend of Chesterton and Belloc.) I am the author of a short story collection, The Body of This, that many are considering "Catholic" literature. Joseph Pearce, in his cover blurb, describes the book as “as radically transforming as viniculture, transforming the water of everyday experience into the wine of life.” In Standpoint Magazine (July/August,) Piers Paul Read referred to the book as “exquisite.”

The book is important because, as can be seen in the variety of outlets where it has been reviewed, it has found a home with both a Catholic and a secular audience. There is not much writing these days that can make that claim. Sadly, Catholic or Christian writing has largely been reduced to the syrupy, the sentimental. More about me and the book (with links to reviews—including the review in the current issue of New Blackfriars Review) can be found at http://www.andrew-mcnabb.com/ and, importantly, can be purchased here.

My publisher is small and the promotional budget is modest. Whatever resources the publisher was willing to put toward the book have been expended in the States. I know that the book can find an audience in the U.K. Please help me to spread the word. Thank you! And if you do manage to find the time to post—please include the Amazon U.K. link! http://www.amazon.co.uk/Body-This-Stories-Andrew-McNabb/dp/1934866059/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1246142696&sr=1-1

Many blessings!

For more info about me and The Body of This, please visit http://www.andrew-mcnabb.com/

Seraphic said...

Well, it's a bit cheeky, but I'm sympathetic as I have a book coming out myself, so I've posted the message.

As for books that appeal both to secular and Catholic audiences, everybody should know about David Richard Adams. His "The Lost Highway" made me believe that Catholic authors might just get a fair shake from big Canadian publishers after all.

Also a plug for a buddy: The Young Chesterton Chronicles by John Coleman McNicholl is steampunk sci fi safe for children.

Mr. McNabb is married with four children. One Amazon reviewer suggests that the book is inappropriate for readers sensitive about bad language and sexual themes.

Girl with the yellow hat said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
berenike said...

I am fairly sure I ate a lot of that, or similar, banana bread in my schooldays - the younger sister of my best friend (daughters of my painting conservationist HS friend/adopted aunt) made it frequently at one point when still in primary school :)

Seraphic said...

A nice Australian girl named Anne-Marie posted a very nice comment which I've just erased because it had her email address, and maybe she doesn't want the world to have her email address!

Welcome, Anne-Marie to the comm box and thank you very much!

KimP said...

Hi Seraphic, I made this for a reception following our Right to Life speaker at my parish tonight. Big hit. Gave the few leftovers to the nuns to take back to the convent. They gave it the big thumbs up!

Seraphic said...

KimP, I'm glad everyone enjoyed it! Berenike, I made it often as a child myself!