Tuesday, January 17, 2006

Variation on a family recipe: whole wheat banana bread with cranberries

My mom once gave me her banana bread recipe and since then this is how I use the bananas that get too dark and mushy to be eaten as is. And for years, it has been the only baking I have done. I don’t know where my mom got the recipe in the first place, it might come from a magazine or a book, but the important thing is that it works all the time. Over the years however, I have developed many variations using ingredients that were sitting on my cupboard: coconut and pineapple banana bread, lemon banana bread, chocolate chip banana bread, etc. And last weekend, it is fresh cranberries that I added to my loaf.

The recipe is extremely simple and never fails.

Ingredients:

  • 1 ½ cup of flour (I now use whole wheat flour)
  • 2 tea spoon of baking powder
  • 1 tea spoon of salt
  • ¼ cup of sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/3 cup of vegetable oil
  • 1/3 cup of corn syrup
  • 1 cup of crushed ripe bananas (about 2 or 3 bananas)
  • ½ cup of chopped nuts (optional)


Mix the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar together. In another bowl, mix all the other ingredients. Combine the dry and the liquid mixtures. When everything looks wet (do not over-mix), pour everything in a greased cake tin and cook for about one hour at 350F.



In my last version, I replaced the nuts for cranberries and added some oatmeal flakes and brown sugar on the dough to make a nice crust. I served it with a cranberry sauce made using the leftover cranberries.

4 comments:

Cat said...

ça a l'air délicieux......

Elvira said...

Ouh la la! Ça a l'air trop bon!

Randi said...

do you think i could cut out the corn syrup and use honey instead?

MagicTofu said...

Hi Randi,

I think the recipe calls for corn syrup because it has a relatively neutral flavour but you can add honey or maple syrup if you like. You might want to substitute it with a simple syrup made with water and sugar too. I personally don't think honey goes too well with bananas but I know people who eat bananas and honey on their toast for breakfast. It's a matter of taste I guess. This recipe is easily adaptable so I'd suggest you try your own version and post the results on your own blog (which I just discovered)... I personally love to see how recipes evolve from one person to another.

Cheers