Tasty Tuesday: Banana Bread

It's no secret that Jacob and Alyssa love to help in the kitchen. They've made cupcakes by themselves (like these rainbow cupcakes and George Washington cupcakes) a few times before. This week, I had some bananas that I had been hiding from Zac (Hey, don't judge. That kid's addicted to bananas!) so we could make bread. I measured the ingredients and then invited Jacob over to whip up a delectable treat.

One man's trash is another man's treasure.

Ingredients: 

2 cups all-purpose flour                              1/2 cup butter
1 teaspoon baking soda                              3/4 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon                                  2 eggs, beaten
1/4 teaspoon salt                                         2 1/3 cups mashed overripe bananas

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
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.

Jake was busy peeling . . .

Mashing

Cracking

Beating

Pouring

Dumping

Mixing

Portioning

Posing

He did such a great job making the bread! I helped scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl to make sure he incorporated all the flour. Other than that, he did it all by himself. He insists I helped though since I put it in the oven. Hey, the kid's got a point. I should take some credit, right?

While Jake was mixing he asked, "Do I have to - What's that called again? - fold! Do I have to practice folding?" Remember, I taught the kids about that while making Boston cream pie. See, he was paying attention! He did a mighty fine job of it too. Maybe I'll let him try a meringue next time.

We (or should I say he) also topped the loaves with a flour/sugar/cinnamon mixture to give it a little crunch. The mini loaves were done in roughly 45 minutes. I could barely get them out of the pan before the kids were shoveling hot bread into their mouths. Zac took a bite, said "mmm," stuffed the rest in his mouth, and asked for "mo!" I think he may have enjoyed it.

 

So, whether you have forgotten bananas or hidden rotten bananas, be sure to make a batch of this yourself. 

Or allow your 5-and-a-half year old son to make it for you.

Tasty Tuesday: Banana Pudding

Bananas are a hot item in our house. All you have to do is mention the word, and Zac will yell, "Nana! Nana! Nana!" until either 1) You give him a banana or 2) you distract him with chocolate.  We go through bananas so quickly. I almost never make banana bread anymore because the bananas don't have a chance to over ripen. 

The other day, I had to plan to make banana pudding. To ensure we still had some left four days later, I bought a huge bunch of yellow bananas and an even huger bunch of green bananas.

And I had to keep Zac out of the kitchen.

Original Nilla Banana Pudding
Ingredients:
3/4 cup sugar, divided                                1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup all-purpose flour                             45 NILLA Wafers, divided
Dash salt                                                     5 ripe bananas, sliced (about 3 1/2 cups), divided
3 eggs, separated                                        Additional NILLA Wafers and banana slices, for garnish
2 cups milk

Directions:
1. Mix 1/2 cup sugar, flour and salt in top of double boiler. Blend in 3 egg yolks and milk. Cook, uncovered, over boiling water, stirring constantly for 10 to 12 minutes or until thickened. Remove from heat; stir in vanilla.

2. Reserve 10 wafers for garnish. Spread small amount of custard on bottom of 1 1/2-quart casserole; cover with a layer of wafers and a layer of sliced bananas. Pour about 1/3 of custard over bananas. Continue to layer wafers, bananas and custard to make a total of 3 layers of each, ending with custard.

3. Beat egg whites until soft peaks form; gradually add remaining 1/4 cup sugar and beat until stiff but not dry. Spoon on top of pudding, spreading evenly to cover entire surface and sealing well to edges.

4. Bake at 350°F in top half of oven for 15 to 20 minutes or until browned. Cool slightly or refrigerate. Garnish with additional wafers and banana slices just before serving.

My "double boiler"

We actually still had 5 bananas left!

Layer the pudding, cookies, and bananas.

Layer . . . layer some more.

End with cookies on top.

It ain't purdy, but it sure do taste good!

As you can see, I did not follow the recipe. First of all, this is not the recipe I always use. That one grew legs and walked right out of my recipe binder. That's the only logical explanation for why it was not there. I know I didn't misplace it or anything.

Carrying on . . .  My usual recipe uses a cook & serve box of pudding, not making the pudding from scratch. No problem, I thought. I've done that hundreds of times . . . give or take a few dozen. I've always made it directly in the pot though. This double boiler thing was not cutting it for me. My "pudding" was soup 30 minutes later. I added 1/4 teaspoon cornstarch. Soup. More cornstarch. Soup. I finally poured the whole thing right into the pot. Pudding! 

Then, I began to layer my star ingredients. I quickly realized that the meager amount of pudding was not going to be enough. Reflecting back on the past 40 minutes, I knew I did not want to make more of the same pudding, tasty as it was. On to Plan B: boxed pudding. All I found in the pantry was butterscotch and french vanilla. Though I'm sure my family would have loved the butterscotch, I chose the latter. Also, I used only 3 bananas. Why did I use this recipe again?

The dessert was delicious in the end, despite the frustration of the process. To us, you can't top banana pudding with meringue. It needs, dare I say deserves, a great big ol' dollop of Cool Whip plopped down on top. For Leighton, it's half pudding, half Cool Whip. For me, it's half mushy cookie, part pudding, more musy cookie. 

And for Zac, it's all banan . . . nope it's just ALL.