A Tale of Two Banana Nut Breads

I'm an absolutely horrible blogger, the posts coming in fits and spells.  I'd thought about doing a histiocytosis awareness post back in September when it was Histiocytosis Awareness Month.  I thought about doing another dental visit post similar to the last one.  I also thought about doing a combined post, championing histio awareness and dentistry, considering most of us adults with the disease (even in remission) seem to have a host of dental difficulties.  A recipe post on the fresh apple cake was almost written but, at the last moment, it was decided that posting it straight to the notes in FB would be a lot easier. I'd even considered writing a post on how I've gotten over food, previously my best friend, and lost 60 pounds this spring/summer/fall.   Days and weeks came and went.  Words didn't gel together.  Those five posts didn't get written.

And so it goes.  There's nothing much to tell these days, no amusing stories coming forth from Mama, no misadventures beyond taking a wrong interstate and driving completely around Birmingham, Alabama.

And it isn't that there's less free time to be a better blogger.  Free time exists.  Life gets complicated; minds get tired of thinking.  At the end of the day, I'd rather open a book and disappear into it than think another thought. Unless the book is thought provoking.  I like thought-provoking books...

Annnnyways.  I'm using a lot of words to apologize for not keeping to my own set standard of a post a week (on average).  I'll try to do better.  I will.

To kick off getting on the proverbial bandwagon, I've two recipes for Banana Nut Bread.  TWO.  Both of them start with a cake mix.  I'd been to the Pig earlier in the week and spotted a big bag of bananas in the reduced-for-quick-sale produce cart.  There must've been five pounds of bananas in the bag for a dollar.  A dollar!  Even after sharing half with Mama, there was still a huge bunch of bananas to do something with.

 Holidays are quickly approaching.  What better time to get a headstart on holiday baking?  Banana nut bread freezes very well, you know...

Except there were other cakes to be made and icing to be whipped and cardboard to be cut and covered.  I needed a recipe that wouldn't require a lot of preparation.  I googled recipes for banana nut breads and combined a couple of them to come up with two very tasty, quick and easy recipes beginning with butter cake mixes:  Pumpkin Spice Pudding Banana Nut Bread aka The One with Pudding In It, and Cream Cheese Banana Nut Bread.  I didn't photograph for tutorials;  just the ingredients and finished breads.

So, without another moment's procrastination, here are the ingredients for
Pumpkin Spice Banana Nut Bread

One butter golden cake mix
Four eggs
One half cup oil
Two to three bananas - mashed
Three fourths cup of buttermilk
One box of Jello brand instant pumpkin spice pudding mix
One teaspoon vanilla
One cup nuts

Despite all the directions to combine all the wet ingredients first and then add all the dry ingredients, I absolutely dumped everything but the pecans together in the KitchenAid bowl and let it do the work all at once.  Life is easier if you plow around the stumps.  It worked a charm.  Try, yourself, and see if it doesn't.  Stir in the pecans when it's all mixed well.

Pour into two greased and floured loaf pans or a small bundt pan.

Bake at 350 for an hour or so until it's done.
                                     

Maybe I should've rechopped Mama's chopped pecans.

Cream Cheese Banana Nut Bread

Five bananas - smashed

Three eggs

One butter cake mix

Eight ounces cream cheese - room temperature

One tablespoon vanilla

One cup chopped pecans

Seriously.  Just dump everything together and mix well, stirring in the pecans before pouring into two greased and floured loaf pans.

These are larger sized loaf pans 8 x 4 x 2 1/2.  If you've smaller

loaf pans, best to grease and flour one more.

Bake at 350 and hour or so until done.

At the point this was photographed, I was already well

into an insulin response over having consumed a slice of the

first banana nut bread.  It's a fuzzy photo.  My body was

feeling fuzzy and warm, too!

Both recipes yield a less bread-like i.e. dense loaf of tasty bread.  The pudding recipe, with oil in it, not to mention buttermilk, definitely is the moister of the two.  And the flavor the pumpkin spice pudding gives it is out of this world.  BUT, the cream cheese and banana-ness of the second recipe???  It's difficult to decide which recipe is the better one.

I've only found pumpkin spice pudding at WalMart.  Other food bloggers had been ranting and raving over it and I had to have it also.  It's worth tracking down, but you can use whatever pudding tickles your taste buds.  The original recipe had, of all things, instant banana pudding in it!

There.  It's a two-fer:  Two recipes for banana nut bread in one blog post after a month's slacking...

Y'all enjoy!

Mrs. Mary's Spicy Chocolate Buttermilk Pie

Having a 'fan' page on Facebook for an ongoing commentary on a slice of life in the Deep South has been an incredible blessing.  Folks (much preferred description than fans) come by to say "Hi" and mostly stick around.  A handful leave, the slice of life not always palatable.  It's okay.  I've left a few pages behind, myself.  The people at FB?  They're not fans:  they're friends.  They comment, share links, like photos of cakes, love Mama (a biggie in my book).  We're there for each other like long-lost kissing cousins.

They've become real friends too:  call-up-on-the-phone-and-talk-'til-the-battery-dies friends.  Mrs. Mary is one of those friends.  Weeks and weeks ago we were chatting on FB about favorite pies and the developing trend of fine chocolates with a heat source in them and she piped up with a comment about a chocolate buttermilk pie with a little pop to it;  then she came up with a recipe!

Despite having adhered to a very strict diet for going on four months,

this piece of pie broke extreme will-power as if it

had never existed.  I ate it.  And licked the plate.

It's a little different from the buttermilk pie usually made here.  This recipe has no flour but twice as many eggs.  It does have a smooth but coarse-custard texture (probably from the cocoa powder?) and is ever so bewitching that I'm having a difficult time not evening up the edges on it (a sure way to consume half of it at one sitting).  And the cayenne in it??? ohhhh wowzers.  It's not hot.  It's a warmth that develops on the tongue after the first few bites that makes the chocolate a deep richness that's indescribable.  Really!

Those are the ingredients in the photo but just in case they won't load for you here's a list:
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips, melted

3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

6 eggs, beaten until lemony-yellow light

1 1/2 cup buttermilk

1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla (I know - the dry erase board has tablespoon)

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
TWO unbaked deep dish pie shells 

Melt chocolate chips in microwave, set aside (oops - use your imagination to see chocolate chips in the microwave please).

Combine all dry ingredients and stir thoroughly.  

See the vanilla in the medicine dispenser?  They're awesome

for being able to measure flavors in to prevent fumbling with

spoons at the last moment.

And don't forget the cocoa powder to stir in too!  Take extra care to make sure all lumps from the cocoa powder have been broken up and all the dry ingredients are well-mixed.

Most everybody knows dark chocolate is favored here at Mayree's.
This is Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa powder.
Use what you and your family loves.

Beat eggs until a light lemon-ish color and almost foamy.

Any time the hand mixer is out and being used, the mixing gets done

with the bowl down in the sink.  A bunch of wiping from splatters on

the kitchen walls and cabinets is saved by doing this.

Very slowly add dry ingredients until all are well-incorporated.

I ran out of hands to take a photo of the slow process.

It's smelling fine already!

Mix in the melted chocolate chips.

The intense flavor from the dark chocolate chips is called for in this recipe 

but if you really only like milk chocolate or

**shudder** white chocolate, by all means, go for it.

Add the buttermilk

And the vanilla, giving it one last mixing.

Pour into two unbaked deep dish pie shells.

Don't give me a hard time about not making my own crusts:

I don't have to do everything.

Bake at 350 Fahrenheit for approximately 40 minutes (my oven is a little cool so it may take less time) until the centers are set.  A knife will come out clean when they're done.

 These crusts are full.  Do yourself a favor and put them in
another pan to bake them in.  They didn't bake over,
but the possibility is definitely there.

I couldn't wait until they cooled until even warm.  I ate it hot!

 This piece of pie contains more refined sugars in one slice
than I've put in my body since the Fambly Reunion the
first weekend in June.  And it was worth ever
gram of it!

There you have it!

The top has a playful crunchy crust on it that belies the custard-y and densely-chocolate-y richness beneath.  There's the barely tale tell flavor of the traditional buttermilk pie but it's secondary to the chocolate.  And the cayenne and cinnamon?  I used Penzey's Ceylon Cinnamon but wish I had used their Vietnamese cinnamon to give a stronger presence.  The cayenne is just the right amount.  This small amount isn't hot at all, truly enriching the dark chocolate and leaving a warmth on the tongue that's absolutely exquisite.

This isn't a difficult pie to put together at and the recipe makes TWO (a bonus in my book).  Make your family one this evening.  Better yet, make yourself one this evening.   You'll be glad you did.

Y'all enjoy!

Mary

Strawberry Jelly

Last Monday I made a WalMart run for cake supplies.  I prefer buying locally at the Pig as often as feasible;  however, it still pays to drive the forty mile roundtrip to Lucedale  for flour, butter, and confectioner's sugar.  Mama needed a few things from Chavers' Fruit Stand,  iconic of the mom-and-pop operations indigenous to the South, with the freshest produce south of Hattiesburg.  Mark (Chavers) had locally grown Eubanks strawberries for $16.00 a flat.  A flat; that's nine quarts of strawberries! 


The whole store smelled of red ripe strawberries, so much so that, like Pavlov's dog, I immediately began salivating.  My only thought was to procure a flat of them for the purpose of making jam to enjoy the flavor created by this smell later on in the year.

Only the ripest parts and strawberries were used to make the nine pints of jam Mama and I made Monday afternoon.  Roughly six cups of less ripe strawberries and pale bits and pieces were put in a non-reactive pan, covered with water, and brought to a slow boil for ten minutes to cook a very tart, delicate pink strawberry juice used to make this jelly.

It was strained through a flour sack dish cloth once;  the cooked strawberries then combined with fresh pears and a bit of sugar to make a simple compote.

WearEver aluminum really does last a very long time.  

See the handle burned off on this pot?  I'd say it came that way, but

I know otherwise.  This is a favorite pot at Mama's house.

For strawberry jelly 3 3/4 cups of juice, 4 1/2 cups of sugar, and a box of SureJell fruit pectin were used.

It really is a matter of following the directions for cooked jelly in the box.  I'm going to type them exactly as they are there and document with a few photos:

Stir 1 box pectin into fruit or juice in saucepot.  Add 1/2 teaspoon butter or margarine to reduce foaming, if desired (I don't add butter or margarine.  Mama does, though).

Bring mixture to full rolling boil (a boil that doesn't stop bubbling when stirred) on high heat, stirring constantly.

Stir in sugar quickly.  Return to full rolling boil and boil exactly 1 minute, stirring constantly.  Remove from heat.  Skim off any foam.

Ladle quickly into prepared jars, filling to within 1/8 inch of tops.  Wipe jar rims and threads.  Cover with two-piece lids.  Screw bands tightly....

And then the directions go on to say to cold water bath it.   The USDA says to do that too.  Uhmmm....errrrrrr....  We never have.  Don't water bath it at your discretion...

Voila!  Six cups of jelly -- just like the directions said!

A half-pint of strawberry jelly and half-pint of jam were shipped to Gainesville, to the young man that is the 800th 'like' on Facebook.  I was so tickled it was him!  His paternal grandmother is one of those awesome encouraging souls you wonder if you're ever good enough to deserve knowing.  She's a friend -- a very good friend.  Apparently, she's a pretty incredible grandmother, too!  When she saw the page at 799 likes she asked her young-ish grandson if he'd login to his FB and oblige the 800th for me.  Without flinching, hesitating, or questioning in any manner, he did!  What kind of love is that? Amazing.  It's a beautiful thing in my life, knowing Mrs. Mary's there.  Thank you, ma'am.  Love you BIG!

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We travel to New Orleans this coming Wednesday evening.  All of Mama's presurgery tests will be done Thursday with the mini-AVR scheduled for one o'clock Friday, March 2nd.  If y'all don't hear from us soon, you know why.  Thank you for all your thoughts, prayers, and support.  <3 you all!!